After reading Shirley Jackson's story "The Lottery", a view on humanity was opened to me that I never gave too much thought to before. ... Jackson uses this story as a reflection of our human society. ... Jackson's story also emphasizes how we must face consequences in our society. ...In my opinion, this story is a way to demonstrate how everyone has a weakness inside them, but more significantly, an underlying evil. Even today, people follow what is done by others, and not what they truly believe in. In a way, depending on the ending, it is truly evil.
I find this story to be startling and eye-opening because it shows the reader (after having to do some thinking) that standing up for what you believe in is paramount and can mean the difference between good and evil.
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is a good, classic piece of horror literature. The reader is not aware of what is happening till the very end of the short story, moreover, in the first half of it the reader is supposed to think the described society, people, town, its life are as normal as his own and contemporary to his own time. The author tells us about such things as taxes, tractors, post office and bank, teen-age club and the Halloween program in order to make us feel at home, or at least, somewhere nearby that place. The introductory description is even, modest even tiresome to a certain extent. Ordinary people, ordinary life, ordinary matters, all the action is concentrated around the mysterious lottery, but as far as nothing more is mentioned of it, the reader’s interest is quite moderate, for the reader must have grasped the idea of the whole thing long time ago, he knows what lottery is.