Reflection For The Lottery By Shirley Jackson

The short story The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, in a seemingly normal town, everyone gathers together to conduct the annual traditional lottery. What is the lottery exactly? Well, you don’t truly discover the magnitude of its horror until the final passage. A lottery in the real world is typically a good thing but in this small town it’s anything but. Being the reader, I assumed people got money at the end. I feel that is something everyone was expecting. Throughout the entire book, things were happening that still did not give evidence as to what The Lottery was about. Certain thing throughout the story hint that something bad is going to happen, the people becoming nervous, the implication that the lottery is actually a purpose for regarding the future of the crops, and the piles of stones that the kids begin to gather. People in this village stone a person to death every year because were believed that sacrificing a life will produce better corn.

I loved how thrilling the story is from the

start until the very end. Jackson uses a casual writing style to lull the readers into a false sense of security. Upon a first reading, the horrific ending catches me by surprise. Jackson opens the story with a happy, light-hearted scene of a town gathering. Children play, housewives chat, men laugh. The weather is perfect, which, according to one character, is fortunate because that day is lottery day. This lottery seems innocent enough at first, but as the story goes on, hints are dropped that cast a decidedly less pleasant light on the annual occasion. From the way the story was going I thought that there would be a winner at the end, but there isn't really a real winner. As the time for the lottery draws nearer, the housewives stop chatting, the men's laughs become nervous, forced, and weak. When lottery begins, each head of a house, the oldest male or woman if there’s no male, goes up and draws a slip a paper from a black box. Whoever draws the slip with a black spot has to pick again along with their family. Mr. Hutchinson draws the slip with a black spot. After Mr. Hutchinson, Mrs. Tessie Hutchinson, and their three kids draw, Tessie has the black spot. For good luck and a good harvest, the town stones Tessie to death. At the end of the story, neighbours who once were nothing but civil to each other become savage and bloodthirsty beasts. Family turns on family, a friend on friend, a neighbour on neighbours, and the latent brutality we all possess takes centre stage during this lottery that no one would want to win.

The character Tessie is a housewife who gets chosen to be sacrificed. She was all for The Lottery, but when her family is chosen, she tries to argue that it was unfair and when she is chosen, she realizes the horror of what they've been doing. Old Man Warner is 77 years old and has been participating in the lottery for all 77 years. He’s one of the main reasons that the town still practices the ritual even though some of the surrounding towns have given it up. He still firmly believes in the lottery.

What I liked about this short story is it was out of the ordinary and unexpected.

The eeriest thing about this story is the whole mystery behind the lottery. At first no one truly knows when it actually started, why it ever started, only that it is a tradition performed every year. It is mentioned that other towns have dismissed the idea immediate as foolishness. With so many years of doing the tradition, the concept of not doing the lottery, of not doing a tradition, is enough to frighten the people in the village because they do not know the possible implications of not doing it will cause. What I also found interesting and chilling, was the way the people kept insisting that they should "get on with it" and "wrap it up". The way they said it was cold and suggested that they may have seen it as a mandatory thing, and an interruption to their day, but can't help but wonder if they also needed to partake in their part of the "prize". To get out whatever demons, they

harbor.

Since the story is so harsh I would recommend this to year 12 and older. I think year 12’s would found would be a good age for this. It does have some confusing parts, so you will also need to pay full attention when you read it. I really enjoyed this short story and think others would too. Traditions that occur yearly in any family could be a little odd, but we do them anyway because our parents ask us to. Peer pressure is also a big part of this short story because everyone had to stone the winner. I think that the year 12 will find this story shocking and completely unexpected. Then, after reading it once, they will have the need to read it again and savour the experience, realizing how it ends, and marvel at the chilling oddness between the ending and the rest of the story which leads it.