Anti-Semitism In The Lottery, By Shirley Jackson

In Shirley Jackson’s short story, “The Lottery,” Tessie Hutchinson gets stoned to death, by her friends and family in the annual lottery of the village. Throughout the day emotions ran high and changed significantly. The future of every family relied on a single piece of paper with a solid black blotch, which left the small village on edge. After all the families were accounted for the lottery began, and lives were about to change for the worst. The Hutchinson’s were the unfortunate family of this particular year. Their family was about to be ripped apart without them having a say so in what was about to happen. The crowd moved away from Tessie, leaving her to fend for herself. As you looked around, there were large piles of stones that had been gathered earlier in the day. Participating in this horrific …show more content…
Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery,” is a criticism of prejudice amongst people, focusing on anti-Semitism. “The Lottery” is written three short years after the conclusion of War World II and The Holocaust, and while most Americans saw themselves as the “good guys” Jackson shows how “the face of human evil could look just like their next door neighbor” (Jackson 304). Jackson uses the town’s annual lottery to portray just how evil humans can be. In “The Lottery,” families began to turn on each other denying “the myth of family love” (Coulthard). When the Hutchinson family was chosen, Tessie turned on her family by “defying tradition and adding her married daughter to the killing