The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is a short story about a small town where everyone shows up every year for the lottery. The whole town, men, women and children, are waiting for the big event, which is organized by Mr. Summers. Each family draws a slip of paper from a black box and one family member will be chosen. The story gets more and more tense as the lottery goes on and everyone is uncomfortable but no one questions the tradition. When the final drawing is done, it’s Tessie Hutchinson who is the “winner” of the lottery. The lottery isn’t a prize, it’s a sacrifice: Tessie is stoned to death by the townspeople, including her own family.
People often blindly follow tradition, even when there are flaws in the tradition, such as acts of brutality just because of something different.Sometimes people blindly follow tradition because they do not know what to do. The village lottery culminates in a violent murder each year, a bizarre ritual that suggests how dangerous tradition can be when people follow it blindly. Before we know what kind of lottery they’re conducting, the villagers and their preparations seem harmless, even quaint. The villagers’ blind acceptance of the lottery has allowed ritual murder to become part of their town fabric. As they have demonstrated, they feel powerless to change—or even try to change—anything, although there is no one forcing them to keep things the same. Old Man Warner is so faithful to the tradition that he fears the villagers will return to primitive times if they stop holding the lottery. Old Man Warner actively objects to not doing the lottery, saying, “Next thing you know, they'll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody work any more, live that way for a while.” (Jackson 6) The only clear statement in favor of continuing the lottery is Old Man Warner’s insistence that ending the lottery would bring “nothing but trouble.” He equates removing the lottery with society regressing, “going back to live in caves” and “nobody working anymore.” Yet Old Man Warner’s support of the lottery has no explanation other than the importance of tradition. In this way, the story captures the circular logic that gives tradition its strength. People often do traditions because they do not want to be different, and the mob mentality is always the same.
Tessie, the main character, has a name that doesn't match her situation. "Tessie" might come from "Theresa," a name that means someone pure or innocent. But she ends up as the victim in the brutal lottery. Her name clashes with her awful fate showing how normal people can fall prey to cruel mindless customs. Mr. Summers runs the lottery. His name makes people think of warm nice things, which is the opposite of what he does in organizing this terrible event. Old Man Warner is one of the village elders. His name has "Warner" in it, which sounds like he should warn people. But he stands firm in defending the lottery and fights any changes to it. He represents how people stick to old harmful traditions even when they can see the bad results. “Bobby and Harry Jones and Dickie Delacroix—the villagers pronounced this name "Dellacroy"—eventually made a great pile of stones” (Jackson 1) The name "Delacroix" itself is derived from the French word "la croix," meaning "the cross," which could be seen as a reference to sacrifice, linking the family to the central ritual of the lottery, where a human life is sacrificed for the supposed benefit of the community. However, this may not always be beneficial, as sometimes anyone can become a scapegoat. People sacrifice a lot for the perceived good of the community.
When people run into tough things and hard situations, sometimes they instinctively blame someone for no reason. It's a kind of automatic reflex to pin things on other people. When confronted with challenges they can’t manage, people often let go of people they don’t value or do not think truly add value. Often they let go of these people completely randomly and there is really no significant reason why it just sort of happens. In this case, winning the lottery is not voluntary but a sort of random selection ritual. The act of picking the unlucky person among the town that just killed someone by chance seems to be sadistic. The process begins with the drawing of slips of paper from a black box, with one slip marked with a black dot. The randomness of the draw suggests that anyone in the community, regardless of age, status, or past behavior, could be chosen as the sacrificial victim. And this randomness really just puts a squishy finger on the flip side of tradition, highlighting how absurdist and cruel they can be. It's completely arbitrary and random, not based on any specific wrongdoing or crime. This ensures that the victim’s fate is not tied to personal characteristics or actions but is instead a product of blind chance, reflecting how persecution can sometimes be senseless and without cause. “Suddenly, Tessie Hutchinson shouted to Mr. Summers, "You didn't give him time enough to take any paper he wanted. I saw you. It wasn't fair!" (Jackson 7) With this arbitrary process, Jackson shows how swiftly humans can become scapegoats in a society that mindlessly observes antiquated traditions, and how these traditions can foster new forms of violence and injustice. The randomness of the selection drives home the idea that anyone could be the victim. It highlights the arbitrary nature of how people can end up facing persecution for reasons unrelated to their deeds or character or any wrongdoing—they're just the unlucky one. Just because they are the unlucky one, they are the scapegoat of the entire community.
When people blindly follow tradition, there will often be consequences. Just because they follow tradition doesn’t mean that they are doing the right thing. In the Lottery, people stone other citizens to death, not because they have done something but, but just because they have something different from the group: a black dot. In this case, winning the lottery is not voluntary but a sort of random selection ritual. The act of picking the unlucky person among the town that just killed someone by chance seems to be sadistic. The villagers’ blind acceptance of the lottery has allowed ritual murder to become part of their town fabric. As they have demonstrated, they feel powerless to change—or even try to change—anything, although there is no one forcing them to keep things the same.
Sources Cited
Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery.
Comments