NARRATOR

Plot Summary

“The Lottery” by Shirley Jackson opens on a warm June day in a town of about 300 people and describes an annual event in the town, a tradition that is apparently widespread among surrounding villages as well. Children arrive in the town square first and engage in “boisterous play.” Some of the boys create a “great pile of stones in one corner of the square.”

When the men of the village arrive they stand away from the stones, joke quietly, and smile instead of laugh. The women arrive next. As they join their husbands, they call to their children. One mother’s voice carries no weight, and it is her husband that commands Bobby Martin’s attention.

The event for which they gather is a lottery conducted by Mr. Summers, a neatly dressed, jovial business man with a wife but no children. Although many traditional customs associated with the lottery seemed to have been lost over time, Mr. Summers still has “a great deal of fussing to be done” before he declares the lottery open. He has created lists of households, their heads, and their members. He and Mr. Graves, the postmaster, have spent the previous night making up slips of paper to be placed in a shabby black box that has been used for the lottery for as long as Mr. Summers can remember.

As Mr. Summers is about to begin the drawing, Tessie Hutchinson hurries to join the crowd. She had forgotten that today was the lottery and remembered while she was washing dishes. She speaks briefly with Mrs. Delacroix about her forgetfulness and makes her way to stand beside her husband. Mr. Summers then begins to call off the names of each family in the village. As the household name is called the male head of the family steps up to Mr. Summers and draws a slip of paper from the box. All are told not to look at the slip until after the last name has been called. During the time it takes to complete the drawing, Mr. Adams notes that some towns have started to talk about doing away with the lottery. Old Man Warner, participating in his seventy-seventh lottery, snorts at the idea and says that would only cause trouble.

After the last name has been drawn there is a long pause before Mr. Summers tells the men to look at their slips of paper. When Tessie Hutchinson realizes that her husband holds the marked slip, she cries out that the process was not fair. The reader learns at this moment that the lottery does not offer a reward or prize in the traditional sense. Tessie claims her husband had to rush to choose the slip of paper and that her daughter and son-in-law should be included in the next round. Her husband tells her to be quiet as Mr. Graves puts only five slips of paper into the box, one for each family member who lives in the Hutchinson household.

The Hutchinson children pick first followed by Bill and then Tessie. The two older children look at their slips and rejoice. Mr. Hutchinson looks at his and shows the blank paper to Mr. Summers. It is then clear that Tessie has drawn the unfortunate slip and Mr. Summers asks the townspeople to complete the lottery quickly. They begin to gather up stones and throw them at Tessie.

Themes

“The Lottery” focuses on Tessie Hutchinson, a woman who is stoned to death by members of her village.

Violence and Cruelty

Violence is a major theme in “The Lottery.” While the stoning is a cruel and brutal act, Jackson enhances its emotional impact by setting the story in a seemingly civilized and peaceful society. This suggests that horrifying acts of violence can take place anywhere at anytime, and they can be committed by the most ordinary people. Jackson also addresses the psychology behind mass cruelty by presenting a community whose citizens refuse to stand as individuals and oppose the lottery and who instead unquestioningly take part in the killing of an innocent and accepted member of their village with no apparent grief or remorse.

Custom and Tradition

Another theme of “The Lottery” concerns the blind following of tradition and the negative consequences of such an action. The people of the village continue to take part in the lottery even though they cannot remember certain aspects of the ritual, such as the “tuneless chant” and the “ritual salute,” simply because the event has been held for so long that these aspects have been lost to time. Jackson highlights the theme of tradition through symbolism. For example, the black box from which the slips of paper are drawn represents the villagers’ inability to change. The box is very old and in bad shape, but when it is suggested that the people make a new box, the subject is “allowed to fade off without anything’s being done.” Further emphasizing the long history of both the box and the ritual, the narrator notes: “There was a story that the present box had been made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it, the one that had been constructed when the first people settled down to make a village here.” Old Man Warner, the oldest man in the village, also represents the theme of tradition. When Mr. and Mrs. Adams suggest to Warner that some other villages have already given up the lottery or are thinking about doing so, he replies with, “Next thing you know, they’ll be wanting to go back to living in caves. . . . There’s always been a lottery.”

Victim and Victimization

Victimization, or the act of oppressing, harming, or killing an individual or group, is also addressed in “The Lottery.” The villagers believe, based on ancient custom, that someone has to be sacrificed for the good of the village even if that person has not done anything wrong. Jackson highlights humankind’s capacity to victimize others by having friends and family participate in Tessie’s killing. For example, even though Mrs. Delacroix is kind and friendly to Tessie at the beginning of the story, she rushes to stone her “with a stone so large she had to pick it up with both hands” after Tessie’s name is drawn. It is also considered significant that a woman is chosen as the story’s victim. Some critics maintain that Jackson’s depiction of a “normal” town that victimizes a woman fits logically with the traditional patriarchal type of society in which men have power and authority over women that has been accepted as “normal” in much of the world.

Sex Roles

Some recent reviewers of “The Lottery” tend to classify the story as feminist literature. They maintain that Jackson highlights the negative aspects of patriarchal societies through her telling of the lottery ritual. In the story, men draw for their family, and women are treated as possessions or subordinates. For example, when Tessie dares to question the method of drawing, her husband tells her to shut up. Some critics have also noted that the method of the ritual itself helps guarantee the traditional role of women as mothers in the village. Fritz

Oehlschlaeger states in Essays in Literature that “the nature of the process by which the victim is selected gives each woman a very clear incentive to produce the largest possible family.”

Author Biography

Born December 14, 1919, into an affluent family in San Francisco, California, Jackson wanted to be a writer from an early age. She wrote poetry and kept journals throughout her childhood, and these writings have revealed her interest in the supernatural and superstition. When she was fourteen, Jackson’s family moved from California to New York, and in 1935 Jackson began college at the University of Rochester but withdrew for a year to teach herself to write. She tried to write at least a thousand words a day and established a disciplined writing routine she kept for the rest of her life. Jackson completed her bachelor of arts degree at Syracuse University in 1940. As a student, Jackson regularly published fiction and nonfiction in campus magazines. Additionally, her editorials denounced prejudice at Syracuse, particularly against Jews and blacks.

Shortly after graduation, Jackson shocked her Protestant family by marrying Stanley Edgar Hyman, a left-wing Jew and fellow student from Syracuse University who later became an eminent literary critic. Living in New York City, Jackson worked briefly as a clerical worker and continued to publish short fiction regularly. In 1945 the couple moved to the village of North Bennington in Vermont, where Jackson lived for the rest of her writing career. It is in North Bennington where she wrote “The Lottery,” and Jackson has admitted that the village served as a model for the setting of the story. The diversity of Jackson’s popular stories in such periodicals as The New Yorker, Good Housekeeping, The Hudson Review, Woman’s Day, and The Yale Review thwarted the efforts of most critics to neatly categorize her work. Jackson joined the teaching staff at the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference in 1964; she won the Edgar Allan Poe Award in 1961 and the Syracuse University Arents Pioneer Medal for Outstanding Achievement in 1965. Jackson died of heart failure on August 8, 1965.

Style

Setting

Jackson establishes the setting of “The Lottery” at the beginning of the story. It takes place on the morning of June 27th, a sunny and pleasant summer day, in the village square of a town of about three hundred people. The setting is described as tranquil and peaceful, with children playing and adults talking about everyday concerns. This seemingly normal and happy setting contrasts greatly with the brutal reality of the lottery. Few clues are given to a specific time and place in the story, a technique used to emphasize the fact that such brutality can take place in any time or in any place.

Narration

Jackson’s narrative technique, the way she recounts the events in the story, is often described as detached and objective. Told from a third-person point of view, the narrator is not a participant in the story. The objective tone of the narrative, meaning the story is told without excessive emotionalism or description, helps to impart the ordinariness of the barbaric act.

Symbolism

Jackson uses symbolism, a literary technique in which an object, person, or concept represents something else, throughout “The Lottery.” For example, the story takes place on June 27, near the summer solstice, one of the two days in a year when the earth is farthest from the sun. Many prehistoric rituals took place on the summer solstice, so by setting the lottery at this time, Jackson draws similarities to such ancient rituals. Another symbol in the story is the black box. Although it is old and shabby, the villagers are unwilling or unable to replace it, just as they are unwilling to stop participating in the lottery. Many critics have also argued that Jackson uses name symbology extensively in the story. For example, Mr. Summers’s name is said to represent joviality while Mr. Graves’s name represents tragedy. Delacroix, which in French means “of the cross,” suggests sacrifice because of its reference to Jesus Christ’s death on the cross.

Irony

Jackson also uses irony, the recognition of a reality different from appearance, extensively in “The Lottery.” It is ironic that the story takes place in a tranquil and peaceful setting because what actually occurs is brutal and violent. It is also ironic that the events of the story are related in a matter-of-fact and objective way since the story as a whole seeks to elicit profound emotions and question morality.

Parable

“The Lottery” is often characterized as a parable, a story that presents a moral lesson through characters who represent abstract ideas. While no extensive character development takes place in the story, the shocking ending prompts readers to think about the moral implications of the lottery and how such issues relate to society as a whole. Certain characters represent certain ideas in the tale: Old Man Warner represents tradition and ritual, Mr. Summers represents joviality, Mr. Graves represents tragedy, and so forth. Jackson does not interject into the story any ethical commentary, but rather challenges readers to find their own meaning.

Gothicism

Gothic literature typically features such elements as horror, the supernatural, suspense, and violence. While “The Lottery” is not graphic in its description of Tessie’s killing, it is considered an example of the Gothic genre because of the feeling of horror it generates in the reader. Because of Jackson’s use of suspense, readers do not understand the full ramifications of the lottery until the end of the story. Readers could, in fact, think that it is a good thing to “win” the lottery. While some critics have faulted this technique, suggesting that Jackson deliberately misleads her readers, others have noted that it is a very effective means of highlighting the brutality of the story. Robert B. Heilman, for example, wrote in Modern Short Stories: A Critical Anthology:“Suddenly, in the midst of this ordinary, matter-of-fact environment, there occurs a terrifying cruel action.”

Characters

Mr. Adams

Mr. Adams is one of the men of the village. While he seems to be one of the few who questions the lottery when he mentions that another village is thinking about giving up the ritual, he stands at the front of the crowd when the stoning of Tessie begins.

Mrs. Adams

Along with Tessie Hutchinson, Mrs. Adams seems to be one of the few women of the village who questions the lottery. She tells Old Man Warner that “some places have already quit lotteries.”

Mrs. Delacroix

An acquaintance of Tessie Hutchinson’s, Mrs. Delacroix is the first person Tessie speaks to when she arrives late at the lottery. When Tessie protests the method of drawing, it is Mrs. Delacroix who says, “Be a good sport, Tessie.” Mrs. Delacroix, however, is among the most active participants when the stoning begins, grabbing a stone so heavy she cannot lift it. Some critics suggest that Mrs. Delacroix represents the duality of human nature: she is pleasant and friendly on the outside but underneath she posesses a degree of savagery.

Mrs. Janey Dunbar

Janey Dunbar is the one woman at the lottery who has to draw for her family because her husband is at home with a broken leg. When Mr. Summers asks her if she has an older son who can do it for her, she says no and then, regretfully, “Guess I gotta fill in for the old man this year.” She seems to accept the patriarchal system with complacency, but when the stoning begins she picks up only small stones and then says she cannot run and will “catch up.” This is one of the few hopeful and seemingly compassionate actions in the story.

Mr. Graves

Mr. Graves is the village’s postmaster, the second most powerful official in the community. He helps Joe Summers administer the lottery and, like Summers, represents tradition and the status quo.

Mrs. Graves

Mrs. Graves is one of the female villagers, and she seems to accept the lottery without question. When Tessie complains about the method of the drawing, she snaps, “All of us took the same chance.” She is also at the front of the crowd when the stoning begins.

Bill Hutchinson

Bill Hutchinson is Tessie Hutchinson’s husband. When Tessie questions the method of drawing, he says, “Shut up, Tessie”; he also forces the slip of paper with the black spot on it out of her hand and holds it up in front of the crowd. Bill’s control over Tessie highlights the patriarchal system of the village. His unquestioning acceptance of the results of the lottery, despite the victim being his wife, emphasizes the brutality the villagers are willing to carry out in the name of tradition.

Tessie Hutchinson

A middle-aged housewife and mother of four children, Tessie Hutchinson “wins” the lottery and is stoned to death by her fellow villagers. Tessie arrives late at the event, stating that she forgot what day it was. She questions Joe Summers, the administrator of the lottery, about the fairness of the drawing after her family draws the unlucky slip. She also questions the tradition of married daughters drawing with their husband’s family. When she draws the paper with the black mark on it, Tessie does not show it to the crowd; instead her husband Bill forces it from her hand and holds it up. Tessie’s last words as she is being stoned are, “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right.” By challenging the results of the lottery, Tessie represents one of the few voices of rebellion in a village controlled by tradition and complacency. Her low status as a woman has also led many critics to state that Tessie’s fate illustrates the authority of men over women.

Mr. Martin

Mr. Martin is a grocer who holds the lottery box while the slips of paper are drawn by the villagers.

Joe Summers

Joe Summers is a revered member of the community, the village’s most powerful and wealthy man, and the administrator of the lottery. He has no children and his wife is described as “a scold.” In addition to representing tradition — he continually stresses the importance of ritual to the survival of the village — his character is said to symbolize the evils of capitalism and social stratification.

Old Man Warner

The oldest man in the village, Old Man Warner has participated in the lottery seventy-seven times. When Mr. Adams remarks to him that another village is thinking about giving up the lottery, Old Man Warner replies, “Pack of crazy fools.” Resistent to change and representing the old social order, he goes on to insist how important the event is to the survival of the village. When Tessie draws the paper with the black mark on it, Old Man Warner is in the front of the crowd spurring on the others to stone her.

Media Adaptations

• “The Lottery” was recorded by Shirley Jackson for Folkway Records in 1963.
• The Lottery and Other Stories was recorded by actress Maureen Stapleton for Caedmon in 1976.
• A dramatization of The Lottery was videotaped by Encyclopedia Britannica Education Corporation in 1969. Also available is a videotaped discussion of the story by James Durbin. Both are available from Britannica Films.
• The Lottery was filmed by the Landsburg Company/Picture Entertainment and aired on NBC in September, 1996. The movie was written by Anthony Spinner, directed by Daniel Sackheim, and starred Dan Cortese, Veronica Cartwright, and M. Emmet Walsh.