Conformity and Rebellion

When writing about conformity and rebellion, authors, Franz Kafka and Shirley Jackson take two different approaches to convey their ideas. In Franz Kafza’s, A hunger artist the story is told from the point of view of an omniscient narrator. In Shirley Jackson's, The lottery the author uses more of a third-person narrative style. Although both styles are not noticeably different they do in fact have some small distinct differences. Both authors effectively uses fictional literary devices to express their ideas through language, but seem to both fail to have much literary conventions.

A hunger artist, Franz Kafka is essentially about conformity and rebellion. Kafka expresses to his reader how the world begins to get away from old traditions and begins to conform to whatever is the new fad. He shows through omniscient narrative that the Hunger Artist loves his craft because of the public interest and not because he loves to fast. The Hunger Artist refuses to conform to the times and rebels by joining the likes of circus folk just to have some on lookers watch him fast.

The lottery, Shirley Jackson is a work more or less about conformity. She sets the stage by using a third person narrator who tells the story and a kind of babbling manor. The narrator is used to show how the people of this town are dead set on tradition. Jackson writes (1948), “The lottery was conducted- as were the square dances, the teenage club, the Halloween program” (pg.356), this gives the reader a picture of the lottery as being a kind of a holiday event, something that all would want to go to. Despite the picture painted by the narrator the lottery was an event that someone like myself would find ridiculous and barbaric, which goes to show that a town such has this one has conformed to such tradition no matter how asinine they may seem.

The difference and which both authors use to convey their themes is simple. Kafka automatically allows the narrator to tell the