SETTING

The setting of "The Lottery" is, according to Shirley Jackson, her village of Bennington,
Vermont:

Plot refers to what happens in any given story—the events that make up the story. Shirley
Jackson's short story "The Lottery" tells of a small town that gathers yearly to take part in a
lottery. As the story progresses the reader realizes that this particular lottery is not one you
might hope to win.

Exposition: Everyone in the small New England village gathers at the end of June each year for
the lottery. The audience is not informed as to why the lottery is held each year but is intrigued
as the children gather stones and families stand next to each other. Mr. Summers is in charge of
running the lottery, and Jackson provides some background details concerning the foreboding
black box, which is presented in front of the community. Despite Mr. Summers's attempts to
replace the old black box, the community does not want to mess with tradition and decides to
keep it. Old Man Warner complains about how some villages have stopped participating in the
lottery and is depicted as an opponent of progress and change. Tessie Hutchinson also arrives
late to the lottery and takes her place beside her family. Mr. Summers then tells the villagers to
not look at their slips until instructed and the heads of each household are called to retrieve their
slips of paper from the black box.

Conflict: When the villagers look at their pieces of paper, Bill Hutchinson discovers that he is
holding the slip with the black dot on it. His wife, Tessie, immediately complains that the drawing
is not fair because Bill did not have enough time to choose his slip. The central conflict in
“The Lottery” is the external conflict of person vs. society, because it is the traditions of the
village that cause Tessie Hutchinson to be killed, and one other person a year before her.

Rising Action: The entire Hutchinson family is told to place their five slips back into the black
box for a second drawing. The tension builds as the reader wonders which member will draw
the slip with the ominous black dot.

Climax: After each family member draws and opens their slips, Tessie discovers that she is
holding the piece of paper with the black dot in the middle.

Falling Action: Tessie Hutchinson begins to scream and complain that the lottery is not fair as
the other villagers begin to gather stones.

Resolution: The villagers rush towards Tessie and begin throwing stones at her. A stone strikes
Tessie in the head as Old Man Warner encourages the villagers to hurl more stones at the
defenseless woman

THEME

What are the themes in "The Lottery"? In "The Lottery," Shirley Jackson represents the notion
of the scapegoat as someone who is blamed for the evils of a society and banished in order to
expel sin and allow for renewal. The townspeople are governed by mob psychology and
abandon their reason to act with great cruelty..
MESSAGE

One key theme of "The Lottery" is the danger of tradition and blindly following along. The
characters in the story simply follow the tradition of the lottery because that is all they have ever
done. They don't quite recall how the lottery started. They don't recall all of the original
ceremonies.

 The Boys (Bobby Martin, Dickie Delacroix, Harry and Bobby Jones)
 Boys Will Be Boys...?In a story this sparse, it's pretty striking how much the boys
of the village tell us, not only about the nature of the lottery (consider that early,
ominous pile of stones), b...

 Mr. (Joe) Summers
 Summerstime, and the Living Is EasyUnlike many characters in "The Lottery," we
find out quite a bit about Mr. Summers. We know he's married to "a scold" and
has no children. The villagers feel sorr...

 Mr. (Harry) Graves
 A Grave ManMr. Summers may act like he's the BMIV (that's Big Man In Village,
for all you city-dwellers), but he still has to be sworn in by the mysterious Mr.
Graves. Mr. Graves is never described...

 Old Man Warner
 Old Man, Take A Look At My Life"The Lottery" is about capital-T Tradition, the
kind of tradition that "no one liked to upset" (5). Given how symbolic the other
characters are—Mr. Graves, we're lo...

 Tess Hutchinson
 Dead Woman WalkingMrs. Tess Hutchinson stands out right from the start: she
arrives at the lottery late, having "clean forgot what day it was" (8). The town
treats her tardiness lightly, but severa...

 Mr. and Mrs. Adams
 First In LineMr. Adams is the first person to draw in the lottery, which makes
sense alphabetically – but we don't think we're stretching too far to say that it's
also because he's the first man....

 The Delacroix Family
 Enjoy DelacroixThe Delacroix family is in the mix right from the start. There's
Dickie Delacroix, who gathers his stones with the other boys, there's Mr.
Delacroix drawing his strip of paper, there...

 The Watsons and the Dunbars
  The Watsons and the Dunbars are both intriguing because Jackson specifies
that their family arrangements break the father-as-head-of-the-family-drawing-
the-lottery-papers norm. Mrs. Dunbar has to d...

 Mrs. Graves
 Mrs. Graves is the wife of Mr. Graves. She is a friend of both Mrs. Delacroix and
Mrs. Hutchinson. She tells Tess frankly that the lottery is fair—after all, everyone
took an equal chance.

 Mr. (Bill) Hutchinson
 Bill Hutchinson is the husband of Tess Hutchinson. When she protests his
selection in the lottery, he tells her to shut up. It is unclear why he does so—
maybe he believes in the lottery, or perha...

 The Hutchinson Children
 The Hutchinson children are named Bill, Jr., Nancy, and Dave. Nancy has
supporters in the crowd who openly express hope that she's not the one chosen.

 Baxter Martin
 Baxter is the oldest son in the Martin family.

 Mr. and Mrs. Martin
 Mr. and Mrs. Martin are the parents of Baxter and Bobby. They run the grocery
store.

POINT OF VIEW"The Lottery," by Shirley Jackson, is told from the point of view of an
objective, third person narrator. Let's explore what this means.In the third person narrative,
there are different options as to how the narrator will tell the story.Whatever the narrator
decides, the narrative in third person stems from the principle that the narrator is not involved in
the story. The narrator is unattached.Therefore, the narrator refers to the main characters...

DENOUMENTThe finale of the story is that Bill Hutchinson's wife was the final winner of the lottery.
It was then revealed that the lottery has no real winner but instead is the worst loser. The lottery is
a raffle as to who will be chosen as the human sacrifice for a bountiful harvest.