The Lottery

Title: The Lottery
Author: Shirley Jackson
Date: 10/30/08


Prereading: What is justice?
-Justice is when one recieves the freedom and rights that all others have and are able to have.
-Easter is always with my moms side of the family.
-Father's Day is spent working at St. Romans Festival while my dad golfs.
-Fourth of July is always spent with my cousin Rachel.
-Labor Day is spent with my cousins swimming and being the last out of the pool.
-Thanksgiving is always spent with my moms side of the family.
-Christmas Eve is with my dads sister and my moms family.
-Christmas Day is with my dads family.


Plot/Reaction: Theres a small town made of roughly 300 people and its the end of June. The of the citizens are all preparing themselves to go to the town center for some sort of meeting. The meeting consists of a long lived tradition with a black box and slips of paper that are blank or have black dots. Each head of family must pick a slip of paper out of the box and not look at it until all have choosen. Then the family that has the black dot must do the same choosing of slips within the family. The Hutchinson family has to do so and Mrs. Hutchinson ends up getting the slip of paper with a big black dot on it. The pebbles and piles of stones children had been putting together were ready for use. They all tell Tessie Hutchinson she gets to have a short lead, before they begin stoning her to death. Her youngest son, Davy grabs some stones and throws them at his mother.


Questions: -Why are they stoning someone every year? Why does someone have to die?
-Who came up with this horrid idea that someone has to be killed every year?


Quotes: "Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones"(9). This wraps the story around in full circle. At the beginning small boys were gathering stones and pebbles in piles, and now this is telling us that they are going to stone this woman to death.
"It isn't fair, it isn't right," Mrs. Hutchinson screamed, and then they were upon her"(9). Tessie Hutchinson is displaying to us what the 'new kids' and why other towns have gotten rid of the lottery, because it is not just.