The Lottery Analysis

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The lottery was an interesting short story, with its thought-provoking theme which is about the following tradition recklessly, without knowing the negative aspects of it. In the lottery the villagers, every year enact a murder for their own well-being, and people follow that tradition blindly. This is interesting because of the blind acceptance of this ritual has created murder to be a part of their yearly activities in this small town. In the story, it says how they try to change the ritual but they are still faithful to keep things the same. Also no one is trying to stop this ritual until it comes to them, they would easily murder someone if they have to but when the roles are reversed it becomes chaos. An example is a character

She stood there like everyone else and accepted what was coming to everyone until her husband picked up the slip of paper that had the black box. Tessie’s actions instantly changed, she started to become more frustrated and protective. She had stated that “You didn’t give him time enough to take any paper he wanted.” This statement shows the change of tone Tessie had from the beginning of the story to the end. In the end, Tessie was the one that was prosecuted and even if she had done nothing wrong, she was still murdered. My first reaction to this story was disgust, I was pretty disgusted about the selfless murders that happened on this town. The way how everyone knew that the other towns were stopping this ritual but they didn’t stop was cowardly to me. I believe this because everyone in this story is pretty selfish until the tradition falls on them, no one steps up to stop this murderess act because their all to scared. Scared about them being murdered, which keeps this tradition going

An event that would have changed the entire story would be if everyone agreed with Tessie Hutchinson and accepted that it was not fair to be executed. The whole plot would have changed, Tessie would not have been executed and everyone would finally realize that how blind they were all these years. They would probably turn on Mr. Summers and Old Man Warner and make them change the rules of the town. After this I believe the old tradition would soon be forgotten and everyone would go on with their daily lives. If Tessie Hutchinson had been lucky and had not been chosen I believe she would have just stood there and watched the person who did get chosen and watched them die. I believe in this because when the carnival began Tessie was a part of the major crowd and did not care what happened to anyone until her family got chosen. After that she became protective, so if she did not get chosen she would have never stood up to Mr. Summers. I feel that everyone would that in the small town, because of the fear. Fear that no one would accept their opinion and that they would be punished because of it. This story’s theme shows what wrong decisions does and how no one would stop to prevent