In the overview of "The Lottery" written by Hicks, it is stated that the lottery gives people the disturbance that people feel they need in life (Hicks) . The Sun Journal states that "'The Lottery' is considered one of the most disturbing and shocking stories in modern American fiction" (Sun Journal). The story was originally published in the New Yorker in 1948 and after the story was published several people wrote letters and called the New Yorker expressing their disgust, dismay and curiosity” (Sun Journal: Overview) Martin states that “”Mr. Summers , Mr. Graves, seems trivial, until the reader realizes that one of the members of the close-knit community is about to be stoned to death by the other residents. Nebeker writes in 'The Lottery': Symbolic Tour de Force about how the symbolism is strong especially with the black box, black representing death, and ritual ideas (Nebeker). The date itself is June 27th and that is the summer solstice season which is known for ritual times (Nebeker). , and then the women join their husbands and call their children to them (Nebeker). Nebeker says: “Once oral but now written – which the dead hand of the past has codified into religion, customs, government and the rest of the culture, and passed down from generation to generation, leaving it to become ever more cumbersome, meaningless and indefensible” (Nebeker). The Lottery has lost a lot of its past rituals and Nebeker is saying that now, since they lost the ritual part, it's just become a pointless, pointless thing. Fritz shows a piece that John H. Williams wrote saying, “What I am suggesting, then, is that The way the story can be seen is as a representation of the way in which a patriarchal society controls female sexuality” (Fritz) . Fritz points out several ways in which males are inferior to females in this story, Mr. Summers and Mr. Graves need help and want the boys to help out. Fritz states that “The lottery is organized by families and households , women are assigned to their husbands' families, who draw for them in the initial round" (Fritz). Fritz states that “Mrs. Hutchinson complains that the drawing was unfair, her husband orders her tersely and authoritatively: " Shut up, Tessie." And when it becomes clear that Tessie has pulled out the marked paper, Bill “ripped the paper out of her hand” and “held it up” for the crowd to see” (Fritz). This shows how much over time where this story was written, how different it was and how women should have kept quiet while the man of the house did what he was supposed to do. Fritz also states that “Mr. Summers is given his position because people feel "sorry for him" as someone who "had no children" and whose "wife was a scold." The childless woman is dismissed as a "rebuke", a challenge to male authority" (Fritz).