• QUESTION

  Write a minimum 800 to 1,000 word CONTRAST and COMPARE essay paper using the Purdue MLA Style Guide after reading the two short stories – “The Lottery” by Jackson and “The Swimmer” by Cheever.  

  MLA, 800-1,000 words, college-level, read both short stories and then consider similar themes, symbolism and opposite themes. Then using your point-of-view contrast and compare the themes you identified from both short stories in a minimum 800 to 1,000 word essay paper. Cite both sources using a works cited page. Avoid plagiarism (below 10%).

  Heading:

  Daphne May
  Professor Grudzinski
  English 102
  1 November 2020

  The Swimmer  by John Cheever

  It was one of those midsummer Sundays when everyone sits

  around saying, “I drank too much last night.” You might

  have heard it whispered by the parishioners leaving church,

  heard it from the lips of the priest himself, struggling with his

  cassock in the vestiarium, heard it from the golf links and the

  tennis courts, heard it from the wildlife preserve where the

  leader of the Audubon group was suffering from a terrible

  hangover. “I drank too much,” said Donald Westerhazy. “We

  all drank too much,” said Lucinda Merrill. “It must have been

  the wine,” said Helen Westerhazy. “I drank too much of that

  claret.”

  This was at the edge of the Westerhazys’ pool. The pool, fed

  by an artesian well with a high iron content, was a pale shade

  of green. It was a fine day. In the west there was a massive stand

  of cumulus cloud so like a city seen from a distance— from the

  bow of an approaching ship— that it might have had a name.

  Lisbon. Hackensack. The sun was hot. Neddy Merrill sat by

  the green water, one hand in it, one around a glass of gin. He

  was a slender man— he seemed to have the especial slenderness

  of youth— and while he was far from young he had slid down

  his banister that morning and given the bronze backside of

  Aphrodite on the hall table a smack, as he jogged toward the

  smell of coffee in his dining room. He might have been compared

  to a summer’s day, particularly the last hours of one, and

  while he lacked a tennis racket or a sail bag the impression was

  definitely one of youth, sport, and clement weather. He had

  been swimming and now he was breathing deeply, stertorously

  as if he could gulp into his lungs the components of that moment,

  the heat of the sun, the intenseness of his plea sure. It all

  seemed to flow into his chest. His own house stood in Bullet

  Park, eight miles to the south, where his four beautiful daughters

  would have had their lunch and might be playing tennis.

  Then it occurred to him that by taking a dogleg to the southwest

  he could reach his home by water.

  His life was not confining and the delight he took in this observation

  could not be explained by its suggestion of escape.

  He seemed to see, with a cartographer’s eye, that string of

  swimming pools, that quasi-subterranean stream that curved

  across the county. He had made a discovery, a contribution to

  modern geography; he would name the stream Lucinda after

  his wife. He was not a practical joker nor was he a fool but he

  was determinedly original and had a vague and modest idea of

  himself as a legendary figure. The day was beautiful and it

  seemed to him that a long swim might enlarge and celebrate

  its beauty.

  He took off a sweater that was hung over his shoulders and

  dove in. He had an inexplicable contempt for men who did

  not hurl themselves into pools. He swam a choppy crawl,

  breathing either with every stroke or every fourth stroke and

  counting somewhere well in the back of his mind the one-two

  one-two of a flutter kick. It was not a serviceable stroke for

  long distances but the domestication of swimming had saddled

  the sport with some customs and in his part of the world a

  crawl was customary. To be embraced and sustained by the

  light green water was less a pleasure, it seemed, than the resumption

  of a natural condition, and he would have liked to

  swim without trunks, but this was not possible, considering his

  project. He hoisted himself up on the far curb— he never used

  the ladder— and started across the lawn. When Lucinda asked

  where he was going he said he was going to swim home.

       The only maps and charts he had to go by were remembered

  or imaginary but these were clear enough. First there

  were the Grahams, the Hammers, the Lears, the Howlands, and

  the Crosscups. He would cross Ditmar Street to the Bunkers

  and come, after a short portage, to the Levys, the Welchers,

  and the public pool in Lancaster. Then there were the Hallorans,

  the Sachses, the Biswangers, Shirley Adams, the Gil –

  martins, and the Clydes. The day was lovely, and that he lived

  in a world so generously supplied with water seemed like a

  clemency, a beneficence. His heart was high and he ran across

  the grass. Making his way home by an uncommon route gave

  him the feeling that he was a pilgrim, an explorer, a man with

  a destiny, and he knew that he would find friends all along the

  way; friends would line the banks of the Lucinda River.

  He went through a hedge that separated the Westerhazys’

  land from the Grahams’, walked under some flowering apple

  trees, passed the shed that housed their pump and filter, and

  came out at the Grahams’ pool. “Why, Neddy,” Mrs. Graham

  said, “what a marvelous surprise. I’ve been trying to get you

  on the phone all morning. Here, let me get you a drink.” He

  saw then, like any explorer, that the hospitable customs and

  traditions of the natives would have to be handled with diplomacy

  if he was ever going to reach his destination. He did not

  want to mystify or seem rude to the Grahams nor did he have

  the time to linger there. He swam the length of their pool and

  joined them in the sun and was rescued, a few minutes later, by

  the arrival of two carloads of friends from Connecticut. During

  the uproarious reunions he was able to slip away. He went

  down by the front of the Grahams’ house, stepped over a

  thorny hedge, and crossed a vacant lot to the Hammers’. Mrs.

  Hammer, looking up from her roses, saw him swim by

  although she wasn’t quite sure who it was. The Lears heard

  him splashing past the open windows of their living room. The

  Howlands and the Crosscups were away. After leaving the How –

  lands’ he crossed Ditmar Street and started for the Bunkers’,

  where he could hear, even at that distance, the noise of a party.

  The water refracted the sound of voices and laughter and

  seemed to suspend it in midair. The Bunkers’ pool was on a

  rise and he climbed some stairs to a terrace where twenty-five

  or thirty men and women were drinking. The only person in

  the water was Rusty Towers, who floated there on a rubber

  raft. Oh, how bonny and lush were the banks of the Lucinda

  River! Prosperous men and women gathered by the sapphire-colored

  waters while caterer’s men in white coats passed them

  cold gin. Overhead a red de Haviland trainer was circling

  around and around and around in the sky with something like

  the glee of a child in a swing. Ned felt a passing affection for

  the scene, a tenderness for the gathering, as if it was something

  he might touch. In the distance he heard thunder. As soon as

  Enid Bunker saw him she began to scream: “Oh, look who’s

  here! What a marvelous surprise! When Lucinda said that you

  couldn’t come I thought I’d die.” She made her way to him

  through the crowd, and when they had finished kissing she led

  him to the bar, a progress that was slowed by the fact that he

  stopped to kiss eight or ten other women and shake the hands

  of as many men. A smiling bartender he had seen at a hundred

  parties gave him a gin and tonic and he stood by the bar for a

  moment, anxious not to get stuck in any conversation that

  would delay his voyage. When he seemed about to be surrounded

  he dove in and swam close to the side to avoid col –

  liding with Rusty’s raft. At the far end of the pool he bypassed

  the Tomlinsons with a broad smile and jogged up the garden

  path. The gravel cut his feet but this was the only unpleasantness.

  The party was confined to the pool, and as he went

  toward the house he heard the brilliant, watery sound of voices

  fade, heard the noise of a radio from the Bunkers’ kitchen,

  where someone was listening to a ball game. Sunday after –

  noon. He made his way through the parked cars and down the

  grassy border of their driveway to Alewives Lane. He did not

  want to be seen on the road in his bathing trunks but there

  was no traffic and he made the short distance to the Levys’

  driveway, marked with a private property sign and a green

  tube for The New York Times. All the doors and windows of

  the big house were open but there were no signs of life; not

  even a dog barked. He went around the side of the house to

  the pool and saw that the Levys had only recently left. Glasses

  and bottles and dishes of nuts were on a table at the deep end,

  where there was a bathhouse or gazebo, hung with Japanese

  lanterns. After swimming the pool he got himself a glass and

  poured a drink. It was his fourth or fifth drink and he had

  swum nearly half the length of the Lucinda River. He felt tired,

  clean, and pleased at that moment to be alone; pleased with

  everything.

       It would storm. The stand of cumulus cloud— that city—

  had risen and darkened, and while he sat there he heard the

  percussiveness of thunder again. The de Haviland trainer was

  still circling overhead and it seemed to Ned that he could

  almost hear the pilot laugh with plea sure in the afternoon; but

  when there was another peal of thunder he took off for home.

  A train whistle blew and he wondered what time it had gotten

  to be. Four? Five? He thought of the provincial station at that

  hour, where a waiter, his tuxedo concealed by a raincoat, a

  dwarf with some flowers wrapped in newspaper, and a woman

  who had been crying would be waiting for the local. It was

  suddenly growing dark; it was that moment when the pinheaded

  birds seem to organize their song into some acute and

  knowledgeable recognition of the storm’s approach. Then

  there was a fine noise of rushing water from the crown of an

  oak at his back, as if a spigot there had been turned. Then the

  noise of fountains came from the crowns of all the tall trees.

  Why did he love storms, what was the meaning of his excitement

  when the door sprang open and the rain wind fled rudely

  up the stairs, why had the simple task of shutting the windows

  of an old house seemed fitting and urgent, why did the first

  watery notes of a storm wind have for him the unmistakable

  sound of good news, cheer, glad tidings? Then there was an

  explosion, a smell of cordite, and rain lashed the Japanese

  lanterns that Mrs. Levy had bought in Kyoto the year before

  last, or was it the year before that?

       He stayed in the Levys’ gazebo until the storm had passed.

  The rain had cooled the air and he shivered. The force of the

  wind had stripped a maple of its red and yellow leaves and

  scattered them over the grass and the water. Since it was midsummer

  the tree must be blighted, and yet he felt a peculiar

  sadness at this sign of autumn. He braced his shoulders, emptied

  his glass, and started for the Welchers’ pool. This meant

  crossing the Lindleys’ riding ring and he was surprised to find

  it overgrown with grass and all the jumps dismantled. He wondered

  if the Lindleys had sold their horses or gone away for the

  summer and put them out to board. He seemed to remember

  having heard something about the Lindleys and their horses

  but the memory was unclear. On he went, barefoot through

  the wet grass, to the Welchers’, where he found their pool was

  dry.

       This breach in his chain of water disappointed him absurdly,

  and he felt like some explorer who seeks a torrential head water

  and finds a dead stream. He was disappointed and mystified. It

  was common enough to go away for the summer but no one

  ever drained his pool. The Welchers had definitely gone away.

  The pool furniture was folded, stacked, and covered with a tarpaulin.

  The bathhouse was locked. All the windows of the house

  were shut, and when he went around to the driveway in front

  he saw a for sale sign nailed to a tree. When had he last

  heard from the Welchers— when, that is, had he and Lucinda

  last regretted an invitation to dine with them? It seemed only a

  week or so ago. Was his memory failing or had he so disci-

  plined it in the repression of unpleasant facts that he had damaged

  his sense of the truth? Then in the distance he heard the

  sound of a tennis game. This cheered him, cleared away all his

  apprehensions and let him regard the overcast sky and the cold

  air with indifference. This was the day that Neddy Merrill

  swam across the county. That was the day! He started off then

  for his most difficult portage.

       Had you gone for a Sunday afternoon ride that day you might

  have seen him, close to naked, standing on the shoulders of

  Route 424, waiting for a chance to cross. You might have

  wondered if he was the victim of foul play, had his car broken

  down, or was he merely a fool. Standing barefoot in the deposits

  of the highway— beer cans, rags, and blowout patches—

  exposed to all kinds of ridicule, he seemed pitiful. He had

  known when he started that this was a part of his journey— it

  had been on his maps— but confronted with the lines of traffic,

  worming through the summery light, he found himself unprepared.

  He was laughed at, jeered at, a beer can was thrown at

  him, and he had no dignity or humor to bring to the situation.

  He could have gone back, back to the Westerhazys’, where Lu –

  cinda would still be sitting in the sun. He had signed nothing,

  vowed nothing, pledged nothing, not even to himself. Why,

  believing as he did, that all human obduracy was susceptible to

  common sense, was he unable to turn back? Why was he determined

  to complete his journey even if it meant putting his

  life in danger? At what point had this prank, this joke, this

  piece of horseplay become serious? He could not go back, he

  could not even recall with any clearness the green water at

  the Westerhazys’, the sense of inhaling the day’s components,

  the friendly and relaxed voices saying that they had drunk too

  much. In the space of an hour, more or less, he had covered a

  distance that made his return impossible.

       An old man, tooling down the highway at fifteen miles an

  hour, let him get to the middle of the road, where there was a

  grass divider. Here he was exposed to the ridicule of the north –

  bound traffic, but after ten or fifteen minutes he was able to

  cross. From here he had only a short walk to the Recreation

  Center at the edge of the village of Lancaster, where there were

  some handball courts and a public pool.

       The effect of the water on voices, the illusion of brilliance

  and suspense, was the same here as it had been at the Bunkers’

  but the sounds here were louder, harsher, and more shrill, and

  as soon as he entered the crowded enclosure he was confronted

  with regimentation. “All swimmers must take a

  shower before using the pool. All swimmers must use

  the footbath. All swimmers must wear their identification

  disks.” He took a shower, washed his feet in a cloudy

  and bitter solution, and made his way to the edge of the water.

  It stank of chlorine and looked to him like a sink. A pair of lifeguards

  in a pair of towers blew police whistles at what seemed

  to be regular intervals and abused the swimmers through a

  public address system. Neddy remembered the sapphire water

  at the Bunkers’ with longing and thought that he might contaminate

  himself— damage his own prosperousness and charm

  — by swimming in this murk, but he reminded himself that he

  was an explorer, a pilgrim, and that this was merely a stagnant

  bend in the Lucinda River. He dove, scowling with distaste,

  into the chlorine and had to swim with his head above water to

  avoid collisions, but even so he was bumped into, splashed,

  and jostled. When he got to the shallow end both lifeguards

  were shouting at him: “Hey, you, you without the identification

  disk, get outa the water.” He did, but they had no way of

  pursuing him and he went through the reek of suntan oil and

  chlorine out through the hurricane fence and passed the handball

  courts. By crossing the road he entered the wooded part

  of the Halloran estate. The woods were not cleared and the

  footing was treacherous and difficult until he reached the lawn

  and the clipped beech hedge that encircled their pool.

       The Hallorans were friends, an elderly couple of enormous

  wealth who seemed to bask in the suspicion that they might be

  Communists. They were zealous reformers but they were not

  Communists, and yet when they were accused, as they sometimes

  were, of subversion, it seemed to gratify and excite them.

  Their beech hedge was yellow and he guessed this had been

  blighted like the Levys’ maple. He called hullo, hullo, to warn

  the Hallorans of his approach, to palliate his invasion of their

  privacy. The Hallorans, for reasons that had never been explained

  to him, did not wear bathing suits. No explanations

  were in order, really. Their nakedness was a detail in their un-

  compromising zeal for reform and he stepped politely out of

  his trunks before he went through the opening in the hedge.

  Mrs. Halloran, a stout woman with white hair and a serene

  face, was reading the Times. Mr. Halloran was taking beech

  leaves out of the water with a scoop. They seemed not surprised

  or displeased to see him. Their pool was perhaps the

  oldest in the country, a fieldstone rectangle, fed by a brook. It

  had no filter or pump and its waters were the opaque gold of

  the stream.

  “I’m swimming across the county,” Ned said.

  “Why, I didn’t know one could,” exclaimed Mrs. Halloran.

  “Well, I’ve made it from the Westerhazys’,” Ned said. “That

  must be about four miles.”

       He left his trunks at the deep end, walked to the shallow

  end, and swam this stretch. As he was pulling himself out of the

  water he heard Mrs. Halloran say, “We’ve been terribly sorry

  to hear about all your misfortunes, Neddy.”

  “My misfortunes?” Ned asked. “I don’t know what you

  mean.”

  “Why, we heard that you’d sold the house and that your

  poor children . . .”

  “I don’t recall having sold the house,” Ned said, “and the

  girls are at home.”

  “Yes,” Mrs. Halloran sighed. “Yes . . .” Her voice filled the

  air with an unseasonable melancholy and Ned spoke briskly.

  “Thank you for the swim.”

  “Well, have a nice trip,” said Mrs. Halloran.

       Beyond the hedge he pulled on his trunks and fastened

  them. They were loose and he wondered if, during the space

  of an afternoon, he could have lost some weight. He was cold

  and he was tired and the naked Hallorans and their dark water

  had depressed him. The swim was too much for his strength

  but how could he have guessed this, sliding down the banister

  that morning and sitting in the Westerhazys’ sun? His arms

  were lame. His legs felt rubbery and ached at the joints. The

  worst of it was the cold in his bones and the feeling that he

  might never be warm again. Leaves were falling down around

  him and he smelled wood smoke on the wind. Who would be

  burning wood at this time of year?

       He needed a drink. Whiskey would warm him, pick him up,

  carry him through the last of his journey, refresh his feeling

  that it was original and valorous to swim across the county.

  Channel swimmers took brandy. He needed a stimulant. He

  crossed the lawn in front of the Hallorans’ house and went

  down a little path to where they had built a house for their

  only daughter, Helen, and her husband, Eric Sachs. The

  Sachses’ pool was small and he found Helen and her husband

  there.

  “Oh, Neddy,” Helen said. “Did you lunch at Mother’s?”

  “Not really,” Ned said. “I did stop to see your parents.”

  This seemed to be explanation enough. “I’m terribly sorry to

  break in on you like this but I’ve taken a chill and I wonder if

  you’d give me a drink.”

  “Why, I’d love to,” Helen said, “but there hasn’t been anything

  in this house to drink since Eric’s operation. That was

  three years ago.”

  Was he losing his memory, had his gift for concealing

  painful facts let him forget that he had sold his house, that his

  children were in trouble, and that his friend had been ill? His

  eyes slipped from Eric’s face to his abdomen, where he saw

  three pale, sutured scars, two of them at least a foot long. Gone

  was his navel, and what, Neddy thought, would the roving

  hand, bed-checking one’s gifts at 3 a.m., make of a belly with

  no navel, no link to birth, this breach in the succession?

  “I’m sure you can get a drink at the Biswangers’,” Helen

  said. “They’re having an enormous do. You can hear it from

  here. Listen!”

  She raised her head and from across the road, the lawns, the

  gardens, the woods, the fields, he heard again the brilliant noise

  of voices over water. “Well, I’ll get wet,” he said, still feeling

  that he had no freedom of choice about his means of travel.

  He dove into the Sachses’ cold water and, gasping, close to

  drowning, made his way from one end of the pool to the other.

  “Lucinda and I want terribly to see you,” he said over his

  shoulder, his face set toward the Biswangers’. “We’re sorry it’s

  been so long and we’ll call you very soon.”

  He crossed some fields to the Biswangers’ and the sounds of

  revelry there. They would be honored to give him a drink,

  they would be happy to give him a drink. The Biswangers invited

  him and Lucinda for dinner four times a year, six weeks

  in advance. They were always rebuffed and yet they continued

  to send out their invitations, unwilling to comprehend the

  rigid and undemocratic realities of their society. They were the

  sort of people who discussed the price of things at cocktails,

  exchanged market tips during dinner, and after dinner told

  dirty stories to mixed company. They did not belong to Neddy’s

  set— they were not even on Lucinda’s Christmas-card list. He

  went toward their pool with feelings of indifference, charity,

  and some unease, since it seemed to be getting dark and these

  were the longest days of the year. The party when he joined it

  was noisy and large. Grace Biswanger was the kind of hostess

  who asked the optometrist, the veterinarian, the real-estate

  dealer, and the dentist. No one was swimming and the twilight,

  reflected on the water of the pool, had a wintry gleam.

  There was a bar and he started for this. When Grace Biswanger

  saw him she came toward him, not affectionately as he had

  every right to expect, but bellicosely.

  “Why, this party has everything,” she said loudly, “including

  a gate crasher.”

       She could not deal him a social blow— there was no question

  about this and he did not flinch. “As a gate crasher,” he asked

  politely, “do I rate a drink?”

  “Suit yourself,” she said. “You don’t seem to pay much attention

  to invitations.”

       She turned her back on him and joined some guests, and he

  went to the bar and ordered a whiskey. The bartender served

  him but he served him rudely. His was a world in which the

  caterer’s men kept the social score, and to be rebuffed by a

  part-time barkeep meant that he had suffered some loss of

  social esteem. Or perhaps the man was new and uninformed.

  Then he heard Grace at his back say: “They went for broke

  overnight— nothing but income— and he showed up drunk

  one Sunday and asked us to loan him five thousand dollars.

  . . .” She was always talking about money. It was worse

  than eating your peas off a knife. He dove into the pool, swam

  its length and went away.

       The next pool on his list, the last but two, belonged to his

  old mistress, Shirley Adams. If he had suffered any injuries at

  the Biswangers’ they would be cured here. Love— sexual

  roughhouse in fact— was the supreme elixir, the pain killer, the

  brightly colored pill that would put the spring back into his

  step, the joy of life in his heart. They had had an affair last

  week, last month, last year. He couldn’t remember. It was he

  who had broken it off, his was the upper hand, and he stepped

  through the gate of the wall that surrounded her pool with

  nothing so considered as self-confidence. It seemed in a way to

  be his pool, as the lover, particularly the illicit lover, enjoys the

  possessions of his mistress with an authority unknown to holy

  matrimony. She was there, her hair the color of brass, but her

  figure, at the edge of the lighted, cerulean water, excited in

  him no profound memories. It had been, he thought, a lighthearted

  affair, although she had wept when he broke it off.

  She seemed confused to see him and he wondered if she was

  still wounded. Would she, God forbid, weep again?

  “What do you want?” she asked.

  “I’m swimming across the county.”

  “Good Christ. Will you ever grow up?”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “If you’ve come here for money,” she said, “I won’t give

  you another cent.”

  “You could give me a drink.”

  “I could but I won’t. I’m not alone.”

  “Well, I’m on my way.”

       He dove in and swam the pool, but when he tried to haul

  himself up onto the curb he found that the strength in his arms

  and shoulders had gone, and he paddled to the ladder and

  climbed out. Looking over his shoulder he saw, in the lighted

  bathhouse, a young man. Going out onto the dark lawn he

  smelled chrysanthemums or marigolds— some stubborn au –

  tumnal fragrance— on the night air, strong as gas. Looking over –

  head he saw that the stars had come out, but why should he

  seem to see Andromeda, Cepheus, and Cassiopeia? What had

  become of the constellations of midsummer? He began to cry.

       It was probably the first time in his adult life that he had ever

  cried, certainly the first time in his life that he had ever felt so

  miserable, cold, tired, and bewildered. He could not under –

  stand the rudeness of the caterer’s barkeep or the rudeness of a

  mistress who had come to him on her knees and showered his

  trousers with tears. He had swum too long, he had been immersed

  too long, and his nose and his throat were sore from

   

  the water. What he needed then was a drink, some company,

  and some clean, dry clothes, and while he could have cut directly

  across the road to his home he went on to the Gilmartins’

  pool. Here, for the first time in his life, he did not dive but

  went down the steps into the icy water and swam a hobbled

  sidestroke that he might have learned as a youth. He staggered

  with fatigue on his way to the Clydes’ and paddled the length

  of their pool, stopping again and again with his hand on the

  curb to rest. He climbed up the ladder and wondered if he had

  the strength to get home. He had done what he wanted, he

  had swum the county, but he was so stupefied with exhaustion

  that his triumph seemed vague. Stooped, holding on to the

  gateposts for support, he turned up the driveway of his own

  house.

  The place was dark. Was it so late that they had all gone to

  bed? Had Lucinda stayed at the Westerhazys’ for supper? Had

  the girls joined her there or gone someplace else? Hadn’t they

  agreed, as they usually did on Sunday, to regret all their invitations

  and stay at home? He tried the garage doors to see what

  cars were in but the doors were locked and rust came off the

  handles onto his hands. Going toward the house, he saw that

  the force of the thunderstorm had knocked one of the rain

  gutters loose. It hung down over the front door like an umbrella

  rib, but it could be fixed in the morning. The house was

  locked, and he thought that the stupid cook or the stupid maid

  must have locked the place up until he remembered that it had

  been some time since they had employed a maid or a cook. He

  shouted, pounded on the door, tried to force it with his shoulder,

  and then, looking in at the windows, saw that the place

  was empty.

   

  The Lottery – Full Text

  by Tiffany

  The Lottery

  by Shirley Jackson

  Full Text below

  The Lottery” is a short story first published in 1948 in the magazine The New Yorker. When first published, it received an incredibly negative response from readers. This controversial story was banned in America and became one of the most banned books in schools and libraries. Over time, it has become a classic American story.

  The reader is taken into a narrative journey which finds the traditions and values of small town America twisted into a sort of barbaric violence. You may be surprised to realize that the town’s “lottery” is not at all what you imagine it to be…

  The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green. The people of the village began to gather in the square, between the post office and the bank, around ten o’clock; in some towns there were so many people that the lottery took two days and had to be started on June 2th. but in this village, where there were only about three hundred people, the whole lottery took less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o’clock in the morning and still be through in time to allow the villagers to get home for noon dinner.

  The children assembled first, of course. School was recently over for the summer, and the feeling of liberty sat uneasily on most of them; they tended to gather together quietly for a while before they broke into boisterous play and their talk was still of the classroom and the teacher, of books and reprimands. Bobby Martin had already stuffed his pockets full of stones, and the other boys soon followed his example, selecting the smoothest and roundest stones; Bobby and Harry Jones and Dickie Delacroix- the villagers pronounced this name “Dellacroy”-eventually made a great pile of stones in one corner of the square and guarded it against the raids of the other boys.

  The girls stood aside, talking among themselves, looking over their shoulders at the boys and the very small children rolled in the dust or clung to the hands of their older brothers or sisters.

  Soon the men began to gather, surveying their own children, speaking of planting and rain, tractors and taxes. They stood together, away from the pile of stones in the corner, and their jokes were quiet and they smiled rather than laughed. The women, wearing faded house dresses and sweaters, came shortly after their menfolk. They greeted one another and exchanged bits of gossip as they went to join their husbands. Soon the women, standing by their husbands, began to call to their children, and the children came reluctantly, having to be called four or five times. Bobby Martin ducked under his mother’s grasping hand and ran, laughing, back to the pile of stones. His father spoke up sharply, and Bobby came quickly and took his place between his father and his oldest brother.

  The lottery was conducted – as were the square dances, the teen club, and the Halloween program – by Mr. Summers, who had time and energy to devote to civic activities. He was a round-faced, jovial man and he ran the coal business, and people were sorry for him, because he had no children and his wife was a scold. When he arrived in the square, carrying the black wooden box, there was a murmur of conversation among the villagers, and he waved and called. “Little late today, folks.” The postmaster, Mr. Graves, followed him, carrying a three-legged stool, and the stool was put in the center of the square and Mr. Summers set the black box down on it. The villagers kept their distance, leaving a space between themselves and the stool. When Mr. Summers said, “Some of you fellows want to give me a hand?” there was a hesitation before two men, Mr. Martin and his oldest son, Baxter, came forward to hold the box steady on the stool while Mr. Summers stirred up the papers inside it.

  The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting on the stool had been put into use even before Old Man Warner, the oldest man in town, was born. Mr. Summers spoke frequently to the villagers about making a new box, but no one liked to upset even as much tradition as was represented by the black box. There was a story that the present box had been made with some pieces of the box that had preceded it, the one that had been constructed when the first people settled down to make a village here. Every year, after the lottery, Mr. Summers began talking again about a new box, but every year the subject was allowed to fade off without anything being done. The black box grew shabbier each year: by now it was no longer completely black but splintered badly along one side to show the original wood color, and in some places faded or stained.

  Mr. Martin and his oldest son, Baxter, held the black box securely on the stool until Mr. Summers had stirred the papers thoroughly with his hand. Because so much of the ritual had been forgotten or discarded, Mr. Summers had been successful in having slips of paper substituted for the chips of wood that had been used for generations. Chips of wood, Mr. Summers had argued, had been all very well when the village was tiny, but now that the population was more than three hundred and likely to keep on growing, it was necessary to use something that would fit more easily into the black box. The night before the lottery, Mr. Summers and Mr. Graves made up the slips of paper and put them in the box, and it was then taken to the safe of Mr. Summers’ coal company and locked up until Mr. Summers was ready to take it to the square next morning. The rest of the year, the box was put way, sometimes one place, sometimes another; it had spent one year in Mr. Graves’s barn and another year underfoot in the post office and sometimes it was set on a shelf in the Martin grocery and left there.

  There was a great deal of fussing to be done before Mr. Summers declared the lottery open. There were the lists to make up – of heads of families, heads of households in each family, members of each household in each family. There was the proper swearing – in of Mr. Summers by the postmaster, as the official of the lottery; at one time, some people remembered, there had been a recital of some sort, performed by the official of the lottery, a perfunctory tuneless chant that had been rattled off duly each year; some people believed that the official of the lottery used to stand just so when he said or sang it, others believed that he was supposed to walk among the people, but years and years ago this part of the ritual had been allowed to lapse. There had been also a ritual salute which the official of the lottery had had to use in addressing each person who came up to draw from the box, but this also had changed with time, until now it was felt necessary only for the official to speak to each person approaching. Mr. Summers was very good at all this, in his clean white shirt and blue jeans, with one hand resting carelessly on the black box. He seemed very proper and important as he talked interminably to Mr. Graves and the Martins.

  Just as Mr. Summers finally left off talking and turned to the assembled villagers, Mrs. Hutchinson came hurriedly along the path to the square, her sweater thrown over her shoulders, and slid into place in the back of the crowd. “Clean forgot what day it was,” she said to Mrs. Delacroix, who stood next to her, and they both laughed softly. “Thought my old man was out back stacking wood,” Mrs. Hutchinson went on, “and then I looked out the window and the kids was gone, and then I remembered it was the twenty-seventh and came a-running.” She dried her hands on her apron, and Mrs. Delacroix said, “You’re in time, though. They’re still talking away up there.”

  Mrs. Hutchinson craned her neck to see through the crowd and found her husband and children standing near the front. She tapped Mrs. Delacroix on the arm as a farewell and began to make her way through the crowd. The people separated good-humoredly to let her through: two or three people said, in voices just loud enough to be heard across the crowd, “Here comes your, Missus, Hutchinson,” and “Bill, she made it after all.” Mrs. Hutchinson reached her husband, and Mr. Summers, who had been waiting, said cheerfully. “Thought we were going to have to get on without you, Tessie.” Mrs. Hutchinson said grinning, “Wouldn’t have me leave m’dishes in the sink, now, would you. Joe?,” and soft laughter ran through the crowd as the people stirred back into position after Mrs. Hutchinson’s arrival.

  “Well, now.” Mr. Summers said soberly, “guess we better get started, get this over with, so’s we can go back to work. Anybody ain’t here?”

  “Dunbar.” several people said. “Dunbar. Dunbar.”

  Mr. Summers consulted his list. “Clyde Dunbar.” he said. “That’s right. He’s broke his leg, hasn’t he? Who’s drawing for him?”

  “Me. I guess,” a woman said and Mr. Summers turned to look at her. “Wife draws for her husband.” Mr. Summers said. “Don’t you have a grown boy to do it for you, Janey?” Although Mr. Summers and everyone else in the village knew the answer perfectly well, it was the business of the official of the lottery to ask such questions formally. Mr. Summers waited with an expression of polite interest while Mrs. Dunbar answered.

  “Horace’s not but sixteen yet.” Mrs. Dunbar said regretfully. “Guess I gotta fill in for the old man this year.”

  “Right.” Sr. Summers said. He made a note on the list he was holding. Then he asked, “Watson boy drawing this year?”

  A tall boy in the crowd raised his hand. “Here,” he said. “I m drawing for my mother and me.” He blinked his eyes nervously and ducked his head as several voices in the crowd said thin’s like “Good fellow, lack.” and “Glad to see your mother’s got a man to do it.”

  “Well,” Mr. Summers said, “guess that’s everyone. Old Man Warner make it?”

  “Here,” a voice said and Mr. Summers nodded.

  A sudden hush fell on the crowd as Mr. Summers cleared his throat and looked at the list. “All ready?” he called. “Now, I’ll read the names – heads of families first – and the men come up and take a paper out of the box. Keep the paper folded in your hand without looking at it until everyone has had a turn. Everything clear?”

  The people had done it so many times that they only half listened to the directions: most of them were quiet, wetting their lips, not looking around. Then Mr. Summers raised one hand high and said, “Adams.” A man disengaged himself from the crowd and came forward. “Hi. Steve.” Mr. Summers said and Mr. Adams said. “Hi. Joe.” They grinned at one another humorlessly and nervously. Then Mr. Adams reached into the black box and took out a folded paper. He held it firmly by one corner as he turned and went hastily back to his place in the crowd where he stood a little apart from his family, not looking down at his hand.

  “Allen.” Mr. Summers said. “Anderson…. Bentham.”

  “Seems like there’s no time at all between lotteries any more.” Mrs. Delacroix said to Mrs. Graves in the back row.

  “Seems like we got through with the last one only last week.”

  “Time sure goes fast, Mrs. Graves said.

  “Clark…. Delacroix”

  “There goes my old man.” Mrs. Delacroix said. She held her breath while her husband went forward.

  “Dunbar,” Mr. Summers said, and Mrs. Dunbar went steadily to the box while one of the women said. “Go on. Janey,” and another said, “There she goes.”

  “We’re next.” Mrs. Graves said. She watched while Mr. Graves came around from the side of the box, greeted Mr. Summers gravely and selected a slip of paper from the box. By now, all through the crowd there were men holding the small folded papers in their large hand turning them over and over nervously. Mrs. Dunbar and her two sons stood together, Mrs. Dunbar holding the slip of paper.

  “Harburt…. Hutchinson.”

  “Get up there, Bill,” Mrs. Hutchinson said and the people near her laughed.

  “Jones.”

  “They do say,” Mr. Adams said to Old Man Warner, who stood next to him, “that over in the north village they’re talking of giving up the lottery.”

  Old Man Warner snorted. “Pack of crazy fools,” he said. “Listening to the young folks, nothing’s good enough for them. Next thing you know, they’ll be wanting to go back to living in caves, nobody work any more, live that way for a while. Used to be a saying about ‘Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon.’ First thing you know, we’d all be eating stewed chickweed and acorns. There’s always been a lottery,” he added petulantly. “Bad enough to see young Joe Summers up there joking with everybody.”

  “Some places have already quit lotteries.” Mrs. Adams said.

  “Nothing but trouble in that,” Old Man Warner said stoutly. “Pack of young fools.”

  “Martin.” And Bobby Martin watched his father go forward. “Overdyke…. Percy.”

  “I wish they’d hurry,” Mrs. Dunbar said to her older son. “I wish they’d hurry.”

  “They’re almost through,” her son said.

  “You get ready to run tell Dad,” Mrs. Dunbar said.

  Mr. Summers called his own name and then stepped forward precisely and selected a slip from the box. Then he called, “Warner.”

  “Seventy-seventh year I been in the lottery,” Old Man Warner said as he went through the crowd. “Seventy-seventh time.”

  “Watson” The tall boy came awkwardly through the crowd. Someone said, “Don’t be nervous, Jack,” and Mr. Summers said, “Take your time, son.”

  “Zanini.”

  After that, there was a long pause, a breathless pause, until Mr. Summers, holding his slip of paper in the air, said, “All right, fellows.” For a minute, no one moved, and then all the slips of paper were opened. Suddenly, all the women began to speak at once, saving. “Who is it?,” “Who’s got it?,” “Is it the Dunbars?,” “Is it the Watsons?” Then the voices began to say, “It’s Hutchinson. It’s Bill,” “Bill Hutchinson’s got it.”

  “Go tell your father,” Mrs. Dunbar said to her older son.

  People began to look around to see the Hutchinsons. Bill Hutchinson was standing quiet, staring down at the paper in his hand. Suddenly, Tessie Hutchinson shouted to Mr. Summers. “You didn’t give him time enough to take any paper he wanted. I saw you. It wasn’t fair!”

  “Be a good sport, Tessie.” Mrs. Delacroix called, and Mrs. Graves said, “All of us took the same chance.”

  “Shut up, Tessie,” Bill Hutchinson said.

  “Well, everyone,” Mr. Summers said, “that was done pretty fast, and now we’ve got to be hurrying a little more to get done in time.” He consulted his next list. “Bill,” he said, “you draw for the Hutchinson family. You got any other households in the Hutchinsons?”

  “There’s Don and Eva,” Mrs. Hutchinson yelled. “Make them take their chance!”

  “Daughters draw with their husbands’ families, Tessie,” Mr. Summers said gently. “You know that as well as anyone else.”

  “It wasn’t fair,” Tessie said.

  “I guess not, Joe.” Bill Hutchinson said regretfully. “My daughter draws with her husband’s family; that’s only fair. And I’ve got no other family except the kids.”

  “Then, as far as drawing for families is concerned, it’s you,” Mr. Summers said in explanation, “and as far as drawing for households is concerned, that’s you, too. Right?”

  “Right,” Bill Hutchinson said.

  “How many kids, Bill?” Mr. Summers asked formally.

  “Three,” Bill Hutchinson said.

  “There’s Bill, Jr., and Nancy, and little Dave. And Tessie and me.”

  “All right, then,” Mr. Summers said. “Harry, you got their tickets back?”

  Mr. Graves nodded and held up the slips of paper. “Put them in the box, then,” Mr. Summers directed. “Take Bill’s and put it in.”

  “I think we ought to start over,” Mrs. Hutchinson said, as quietly as she could. “I tell you it wasn’t fair. You didn’t give him time enough to choose. Everybody saw that.”

  Mr. Graves had selected the five slips and put them in the box and he dropped all the papers but those onto the ground, where the breeze caught them and lifted them off.

  “Listen, everybody,” Mrs. Hutchinson was saying to the people around her.

  “Ready, Bill?” Mr. Summers asked, and Bill Hutchinson, with one quick glance around at his wife and children, nodded.

  “Remember,” Mr. Summers said, “take the slips and keep them folded until each person has taken one. Harry, you help little Dave.” Mr. Graves took the hand of the little boy, who came willingly with him up to the box. “Take a paper out of the box, Davy.” Mr. Summers said. Davy put his hand into the box and laughed. “Take just one paper.” Mr. Summers said. “Harry, you hold it for him.” Mr. Graves took the child’s hand and removed the folded paper from the tight fist and held it while little Dave stood next to him and looked up at him wonderingly.

  “Nancy next,” Mr. Summers said. Nancy was twelve, and her school friends breathed heavily as she went forward switching her skirt, and took a slip daintily from the box “Bill, Jr.,” Mr. Summers said, and Billy, his face red and his feet overlarge, near knocked the box over as he got a paper out. “Tessie,” Mr. Summers said. She hesitated for a minute, looking around defiantly. and then set her lips and went up to the box. She snatched a paper out and held it behind her.

  “Bill,” Mr. Summers said, and Bill Hutchinson reached into the box and felt around, bringing his hand out at last with the slip of paper in it.

  The crowd was quiet. A girl whispered, “I hope it’s not Nancy,” and the sound of the whisper reached the edges of the crowd.

  |”It’s not the way it used to be.” Old Man Warner said clearly. “People ain’t the way they used to be.”

  “All right,” Mr. Summers said. “Open the papers. Harry, you open little Dave’s.”

  Mr. Graves opened the slip of paper and there was a general sigh through the crowd as he held it up and everyone could see that it was blank. Nancy and Bill. Jr. opened theirs at the same time. and both beamed and laughed, turning around to the crowd and holding their slips of paper above their heads.

  “Tessie,” Mr. Summers said. There was a pause, and then Mr. Summers looked at Bill Hutchinson, and Bill unfolded his paper and showed it. It was blank.

  “It’s Tessie,” Mr. Summers said, and his voice was hushed. “Show us her paper. Bill.”

  Bill Hutchinson went over to his wife and forced the slip of paper out of her hand. It had a black spot on it, the black spot Mr. Summers had made the night before with the heavy pencil in the coal company office. Bill Hutchinson held it up, and there was a stir in the crowd.

  “All right, folks.” Mr. Summers said. “Let’s finish quickly.”

  Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones. The pile of stones the boys had made earlier was ready; there were stones on the ground with the blowing scraps of paper that had come out of the box Delacroix selected a stone so large she had to pick it up with both hands and turned to Mrs. Dunbar. “Come on,” she said. “Hurry up.”

  Mr. Dunbar had small stones in both hands, and she said, gasping for breath. “I can’t run at all. You’ll have to go ahead and I’ll catch up with you.”

  The children had stones already. And someone gave little Davy Hutchinson few pebbles.

  Tessie Hutchinson was in the center of a cleared space by now, and she held her hands out desperately as the villagers moved in on her. “It isn’t fair,” she said. A stone hit her on the side of the head. Old Man Warner was saying, “Come on, come on, everyone.” Steve Adams was in the front of the crowd of villagers, with Mrs. Graves beside him.

  “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right,” Mrs. Hutchinson screamed, and then they were upon her.

  Understanding the Text

  Here are a few questions to see how well you have understood what you just read.

  1. Who are the leaders in control of the rest of the town?
  2. Why does the author choose to avoid explaining what the lottery tradition is until the end of the story? Why is this an effective method of storytelling?
  3. In the third paragraph, what suggests that the lottery is a serious event?
  4. What are the rules concerning people who can’t attend the lottery?
  5. Normally, a person “wins” the lottery. In this story, however, the word “win” is never used. What expression is used instead?

  Discussions

  1. What sort of message might the author be illustrating? Think about the message it may be implicating in terms of democracy, religion, or even the fragility of family loyalties.
  2. Examine the text from beginning to end and note the changes in Tessie’s attitude over the course of the story. What kind of themes can you take from these changes? What themes are evident in this story?
  3. The setting takes place in a small, peaceful town. How does the setting contrast with the plot and characters? How do these elements of the story create interest and contradiction? How does the author fool the reader?
  4. What hints does the author give us that all is not what it appears to be? Give examples of “foreshadowing” which leads up to the stoning.

  References: American Literature, Wikipedia, English Teachers Network

  Image Credits: libaer2002, dmleastbranch

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