Comparison of The Lottery and The Story of an Hour Essay

â€Å"The Story of an Hour†, by Kate Chopin; this story was about a wife who was told that her husband had died. The wife went through many emotions but the main emotion she went through upon hearing about her husband’s death was elation. She felt free from his presence in her life, but at the same time, she also felt sadness. She did not feel sadness for her husband’s death. She felt the sadness for her happiness about his death. â€Å"When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: â€Å"free, free, free!† (The Story of an Hour, by Kathy Chopin). In this excerpt the writer describes how Mrs. Mallard was feeling about the death of her husband. â€Å"But now there was a dull stare in her eye, whose gaze was fixed away off yonder on one of those patches of blue sky. It was not a glance of reflection, but rather indicated a suspension of intelligent thought.† This quotation appears after Mrs. Mallard goes to her room to be alone with her thoughts. This quote gives us insight into how Mrs. Mallard feelings are developing about the death if her husband. She sees something completely different than what someone else would see after finding out their husband has died suddenly. â€Å"The Lottery†, by Shirley Jackson; this story is about rituals. The townspeople gather every year on June 27th. The townspeople have many emotions toward their yearly ritual. They feel apprehension, excitement, anticipations, sadness and relief. In this story, the Lottery is to pick someone in the town that must be stoned to death to maintain their yearly ritual. The person that wins after the motions of picking pieces of paper out of a box happens to be the late comer to the Event. â€Å"Soon the men began to gather, surveying their own children, speaking of planting and rain, tractors and taxes. They stood together, away from the pile of stones in the corner, and their jokes were quiet and they smiled rather than laughed† (The Lottery, Shirley Jackson) this quote gives the reader insight into how the men were apprehensive and uneasy around one another. They exhibited signs of worry and uneasiness about the events that were to follow. These two stories are alike in the way that the characters in the story go through high and low emotions. Both writers are females and they write their stories in the third person, both stories are best described as a limited third person. Kate Chopin has written her story from the point of view of the wife but mostly third person limited. The story begins with a narrator but then the wife’s thoughts begin to tell what she is feeling from her point. In The Lottery, the story is third person only, the author, has the narrator tell the story as if he were there but not directly involved in the actions of the story. These two stories have a unique way of getting the reader’s attention in how they wrote their stories. Kate Chopin gives the reader the impression the story is going to be a long drawn out tale but the story is based off the hour that Mrs. Mallard has to contemplate what her life will be like without her husband. Whereas, The Lottery is a drawn out story that in real time only takes approximately 15-20 minutes to complete the task of picking out pieces of papers and stoning the winner. Shirley Jackson expands her story on what the atmosphere is like with the townspeople, she also goes in depth with the many characters. Shirley Jackson’s, The Lottery could have been shorten but would have spoiled the suspense.