We're Talking Lives, Not Money.

Talk about too much strength in tradition! In "The Lottery," the village has a strange but accepted tradition of rounding the town up, picking a family name from a box, and then killing off one of those family members. Disturbing? Quite. As the story begins, one gets the impression the lottery is looked forward to every year. The lottery is placed next to "square dances, the teenage club, and the Halloween program," all of which seem fall of fun and celebration! With the children present first at the lottery, the end of the story is even more alarming; no one went against the tradition! In fact, Mrs. Hutchinson left her dishes to make it to the drawing! And then, quite as powerful as the excitement comes the tenseness of the villagers. As a general consensus, all of the villagers chase Tessie Hutchinson down, disconnected with anything but their strange, murderous tradition!