A Time By Nandine Gordimer And The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

Speech 2015 Have you ever wondered why our society is built on about what other people think? Well it’s probably because they’re too afraid to stand up for what they think is right. During our generation the use of fiction has influenced us in such a way that it can mirror and reflect the fears that plagues our society to this very day. Two short stories that display this is Once Upon a Time by Nandine Gordimer and The Lottery by Shirley Jackson. The writers creation behind these stories helped engage people’s minds and enlightened them to the social concerns in a certain way that reality could not. They shaped fiction into a whole new direction that it reflected the cultural values, societal fears and the current events for the public to envision. Yet it also provided a mirror for real life. The short story Once Upon a Time was authored by a South African writer Nandine Gordimer originally published in 1989. The story is based upon how people can create their own downfall at which they cannot allow themselves to be ruled by fear all the time. The story politically relates to the apartheid which was a system of racial segregation. It was enforced through legislation by the National Party, who were the reigning party in South Africa from 1948 to 1994. It was then that the rights of the black inhabitants of South Africa had been decreased. Yet the white supremacy and Afrikaner minority rule was still maintained. Gordimer was born in a small South African town in the 1930s.