Argumentative Essay On The Lottery

1426 Words3 Pages

Death Is The Prize
The lottery is something everyone wants to win no matter what the prize. People buy their tickets and await their fates. Some people win the lottery and many more lose. Losing the lottery causes something inside of us to die, but it is almost impossible to quit playing. The gambling becomes an addiction. The reason why people are constantly drawn to these lotteries is because deep down, the people who play them are convinced they can win.
In Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” the winner is in fact the loser, making the idea of winning completely twisted. Clearly, there is blatant irony in this because when one wins a lottery, there is typically a good connotation connected to it. However in “The Lottery,” winning means death--something that the people in the village have become accustomed to. In this story “The Lottery,” which is described as something that would closely resemble a festival, turns out to be something very sinister. Once a name is drawn from the black box, that person is placed in the town square and is stoned to death by anyone, child or adult, who is willing to partake in the act.
Everyone from the town-- men, women and children-- gather to put a list of family names within the village into a black lottery box. Everyone in the village has their jobs on the …show more content…

Summer, the man who organizes the lottery every year, is described as “a jovial, roundfaced man” (420). But as the reader progresses through the story, Mr. Summer’s character begins to shape into something more of a serious and heartless person who sees the lottery as just another regular day. Mr. Summers, the conductor of the lottery, is the one who draws Tessie’s name from the black box and announces it to the people in attendance, “‘It’s Tessie,” . . . and his voice was hushed” (425). Interestingly, Mr. Summers is also the one who appears to premeditate Tessie’s death when he states to her, “Thought we were going to have to get on without you”

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