By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘The Lottery’ is the best-known story of the American writer Shirley Jackson. Published in the New Yorker in 1948 and collected in The Lottery and Other Stories, the story is about a village where an annual lottery is drawn. However, the fate of the person who draws the ‘winning’ slip is only revealed at the end of the story in a dark twist.
‘The Lottery’ forces us to address some unpleasant aspects of human nature, such as people’s obedience to authority and tradition and their willingness to carry out evil acts in the name of superstition.