An understanding of Jackson's life and times can serve to illuminate the motif and meaning, thus gaining a further appreciation of this work. Shirley Jackson was born in 1919, at the time of the “Lost Generation”. While attending Syracuse University, she met Stanley Edgar Hyman, a Jewish classmate, numismatic intellectual, and literary critic whom she married in 1940. With the end of the war in 1946, the publication of "The Lottery" in 1948, and her marriage to a Jewish intellectual. it seems likely that news of the Holocaust would have influenced his writing. In “The Lottery,” Shirley Jackson describes a situation that, aside from the time and place, mirrors Europe under Nazi authority. Shirley Jackson's allegory operates on several levels simultaneously, structuring this narrative with different allusions and inferences. Within this tapestry I find a confluent theme as she demonstrates how our natural aversion to violence can be overcome by cultivating the concept of authority and creating individual interdependence, despite our natural individual independence. Jackson implies the argument that this can happen to almost any individual or group. Jackson's point is that we should recognize the influences of our world, so that we do not become evil. A multitude of indications in this story confirm or support the natural aversion to violence. Villagers naturally distance themselves from symbols of death and violence when they exercise independent and uncorrupted thought. This is evident in the following sentences from “The Lottery,” “They stood together away from the pile of stones in the corner”; “The villagers kept their distance, leaving space between them and the stool.” When Mr. Summers asks for help with the black box, we are... middle of paper... The use of Tessie as a scapegoat, Azazel, mirrors the use of Jews as scapegoats for problems. in Germany. In “The Lottery,” the villagers have forgotten the original reason for the ritual. Once deprived of independence by the crowd, manipulated by reason, forced by authority and conditioned to accept it, with multiple fallacious reasons, original reason has little practical importance. The use of fallacious propaganda was a technique widely used by the Nazi Party. Shirley Jackson wove complex allegory with almost endless symbolism, uniting multiple concepts. As I read this I recognize Rousseau as the origin of some of the ideas presented. Perhaps the greatest statement of his skillful artwork is that there are so many different suggestions to his theme and point. I believe this is its ultimate goal, to inspire original thinking.