"The Lottery" By Shirley Jackson

The town boys (Bobby Martin , Dickie Delacroix, Harry Jones, Bobby Jones) Baxter Martin Mr. and Mrs. Martin Old Man Warner Mr. Summers Mr. and Mrs. Graves Mr. and Mrs. Hutchinson The Hutchinson kids (Bill Jr., Nancy, Dave) The Watsons The Dunbars

The primary setting is a small village of about 300 people. The people are gathered in the town square for "the lottery." Jackson leads us to believe that the town may be a farm community, because the townspeople talk of crops and farming machinery.

We are not told what year the story takes place. The author does this purposely to make the story seem applicable for any time period

The story takes place on the exact date of June 27. This is when the town has "the lottery" every year

The story is told from a third person point of view, specifically an objective point of view. The narrator seems to know the outcome of the story and does not follow the perspective of any one character.

The main conflict of the story is drawing to find out the "winner" of the lottery.

The type of conflicts are: 1. Human vs. Human: Mrs. Hutchinson is literally attacked by other humans 2. Human vs. Society: There are some members in town who do not believe in the lottery anymore, and who are battling against the ideas held by the society

At the beginning of the story, the townspeople gather for the selection of the lottery. Mr. Summers begins the rituals and the families all stand together.

The head of each household (usually the father) in the family comes up to select a piece of paper. Families wait to look at the papers until all other families have selected. Mr. Summers then tells everyone when they can look at their papers.

The Hutchinson family has received the chance to draw again in the lottery. Each member of the family then goes up to select a final piece of paper. Mr. Hutchinson, Mrs. Hutchinson, Bill Jr., Nancy, and David all draw again

The townspeople wait to see who has chosen the "black dot," which indicates that they are the winners of the lottery. Each member of the Hutchinson family draws again. The townspeople need to help Little Davey pick his paper because he is so little. A whisper goes through the crowd after each family member has picked. "Who is it?" everyone asks.

Mrs. Hutchinson is declared the winner of the lottery, and is stoned to death. This is considered a tradition of the town. We discover that the stones the boys gathered at the beginning of the story were meant for the stoning

Tradition, following customs, barbarism, society

-The boys are collecting rocks at the beginning of the story not to play a game with, but to stone someone to death -The people talk of other towns that are thinking about changing the lottery tradition. They think it is awful and barbaric to get rid of the tradition -The "prize" for winning the lottery is death by stoning. Usually it is a good thing to win a lottery -Old Man Warner says the town will lose it's morals if they don't continue the tradition. This is ironic because the "tradition" is is stoning someone to death every year, which seems morally wrong