The critical analysis "Learning from 'The Lottery': How Jackson's Story Might Help Us Rethink Tradition" by Nick Crawford is an excellent interpretation of "The Lottery." Crawford sees the central point of the story as "Once people are used to a way of doing things, it's hard for them to break with tradition, no matter how pointless and destructive it might be" (845). The tradition of killing a member of the town in "The Lottery" was never questioned, the townspeople were so used to doing it that it was hard for them to quit. Even though it was killing people for no reason.
This is exactly how I saw the story. People keep doing traditions that are past on by their family or someone else and as time goes on and needs are changed the traditions is being practiced until
someone finally questions it. Crawford's interpretations helped me to see that tradition can become very destructive if it is not questioned and reevaluated from time to time. "The Lottery" helps one to see the effects of an unquestioned tradition.
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Hi Starla, I agree with your interpretation of "The Lottery". Tradition unquestioned can be very destructive and life threatening as we see in the story. It is easy to say the story is an exageration and yet thoughout history we see such traditions being carried out without thought and regard to human life. One such time period that comes to mind is when the Nazi's were in power in Europe. People obeyed Hitler's desires and dictations without fighting back for quite a long time.
ReplyDeleteHi Nikole,
ReplyDeleteI too read Crawford's critique of "The Lottery" but Even though I understood his analogy of the stoning of the woman in the story and the cars Americans choose to drive I could not relate to his critique. I then read the critique by Romano and it moved me emotionally. In reflection I realized that it was because he used other senseless human death in his analogy. It is sad to think that the story, written in 1948, and the critique, written in 1979, could have a new critique written now in 2009 and there would be a new analogy in present day that could be used since senseless death still occurs in Iraq.
:)
Sue