What historical event inspired Shirley Jackson to write The Lottery?

Answer 1

Mussolini, Stalin, and Hitler. 1948 was the beginning of the Cold War, and she thrived on fear, and the West feared nothing more than the spread of forms of government like socialism, fascism,communism, and totalitarianism.Making a direct connection to Jackson's short story and the dictatorships of Europe and Eastern Europe is a simplistic approach. Jackson was examining and illustrating something far deeper in the human psyche, the loss of individualization, and the movement of the mob as one, despite attachments and social connections.

While Jackson may have been partially inspired by the events of WW2, she never clearly stated such. And, there is a lot of landscape between the isolation of the groups that the Nazis exterminated, and the member of the village the people in The Lottery stoned to death. Jackson went further by connecting the events of The Lottery with the religion and moral fiber of the members of the community and the ritualized human sacrifice they perform in the story.