The Lottery Irony

Every June twenty-seventh the villagers in the small town gather in the square for the annual “lottery”. The children usually arrive first. They play and gather stones in preparation for the drawing. The husbands and fathers are the next to gather. They tell jokes, but “they smiled rather than laughed.” The men do not seem to be as excited as the children are. When finally the women arrive, the families form into their respective groups and they wait for Mr. Summers—the lottery official—to commence the drawings. There are volunteers to hold "box" from which the “heads of the families” draw the slips. One-by-one the papers are withdrawn from the customary box by chosen heads of the families.

As instructed by Mr. Summers, no one is allowed to view the slips until all the paper pieces have been removed. They are called up in alphabetical order until every family is represented by a slip of paper. Once the drawing has finished they are allowed to look at their paper slips to see who receives entrance into the next round of the lottery. On this day in the story, the one who holds the fateful slip of paper is Bill Hutchinson. With the next round, each of his family members is asked to draw their own piece of paper from the black box. The three children are the first to draw. Little Dave chooses a slip, then Nancy and Bill Jr. is the last of the children. Tessie Hutchinson—Bill’s wife—is the fourth to draw, with Bill being last of the family members to receive his fate. One at a time the pieces of paper are opened to reveal each person’s secret. The crowd voices their relief as the children’s papers show them to be out of prize contention. Bill then opens his slip to find that, he too, will not be able to claim the lottery winnings. Tessie’s paper is opened last, to reveal that she is the winner. She has the “black dot” on her slip, which had been penciled in by Mr. Summers the night before. The crowd backs away from her and prepares to issue her the prize. They all grab stones, and as she cries “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right”, they begin to pummel her to the ground.

I was utterly appalled and completely surprised when I was finished reading “The Lottery”. Though there was excellent use of foreshadowing, I was still hoping for a different ending. When Shirley Jackson writes about the children gathering a pile of stones and filling pockets, it is fairly evident that the stones are going to be used in a manner not conducive to continued life. The fact that the men gathered away from the rock pile indicates