The Lottery

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Lottery (German. Die Lotterie , first translation by Peter Naujack, 1968) is a short story by the American writer Shirley Jackson , which was first published in 1948 in the New Yorker and in 1949 in the anthology The Lottery. Adventures of the Demon Lover (Eng. The Devil's Bride · 25 demonic stories , translated by Anna Leube and Anette Grube, 1989) was recorded. Since then, both the original text and German translations have been republished in various anthologies .

The story is about a ritual in a rural village in the USA, where a lottery is held every year , the “winner” of which is stoned .

The critically acclaimed story, which is still one of Shirley Jackson's best-known works to this day, was initially received extremely controversial by the audience. The Lottery has also been adapted in a variety of formats including a radio play (1951), a ballet (1953), a television film (1996), and an opera .

action

In an unnamed American village, which is initially sketched allegorically as an archetypal image of a contemplative rural community, an unspecified traditional lottery takes place every year on June 27th. The residents who have gathered to hold the lottery are introduced; some individual names are mentioned. The further preparations are described; the reader learns some details about the lottery and its history. At the start of the lottery, members of the individual village families are called according to precisely defined rules to draw tickets. After the lots have been drawn, they are checked more closely. When it turns out that Bill Hutchinson has drawn a special lot, his wife Tessie reacts with panic behavior. There will be another draw in which all members of the Hutchinson families will now draw another lot. This time there is a black dot on Tessie Hutchinson's lot. Then at the end of the story she is stoned to death by all the inhabitants of the village settlement . They believe that the well-being of their community depends on the ritual described, which has existed as a tradition since the village was founded, although its origins and the precise background have darkened in the course of history.

Due to the strict chronological structure of the plot with numerous retarding elements , the reader only suddenly becomes aware of the fate of the person drawn at the end of the story, despite individual references to an unexpected outcome of the lottery.

Interpretative approach

Neither the innocuous title nor the beginning of the story initially indicate what will happen. The plot is presented at the beginning by an authoritative narrator , who seems to be reporting from a distance, but is obviously quite familiar with the circumstances. Already in the opening passage of the narrative, the focus is drawn to what is happening in the center: the lottery, which is also held elsewhere and which can last up to two days, is settled in the small, unnamed village here in just two hours before noon. The exposition of the story provides the reader with essential background information about the purpose of gathering all residents of the settlement and holding a lottery, which is a repetitive, apparently eagerly anticipated, traditional community event. The initial situation sketched out on this warm, sunny morning is initially idyllic and apparently completely peaceful.

The following section of the short story serves as a further introduction to the circle of narrative characters who are initially only presented anonymously as a crowd and are essentially taken from the standard repertoire. The focus is initially on the schoolchildren whose holidays have just started. However, mentally, they are obviously not in the holiday mood. The narrator reports seamlessly that Bobby Martin, the first person ever mentioned by name, fills his pocket with stones and the other village boys follow his example, collecting the "smoothest and roundest stones" . In addition, some of the boys layers strangely on a heap of stones, which they against "raids" ( "raids" defend) the other boys. In contrast, the girls stand apart, indifferent, engrossed in conversation with one another.

Next to the boys, the men of the village then come into focus; they too gather and talk while supervising the children on subjects such as sowing and rain or tractors and taxes. Obviously, the story takes place in the 20th century, as the tractors mentioned make clear; However, this does not agree with the deliberation of the men and their restrained jokes ( "their jokes were quiet" ); the description of women in their faded aprons ( “faded house dresses and sweaters” ) does not seem to fit the image of a modern village community. The initially coherent impression of an idyllic village atmosphere is clouded; the reader is prepared for the fact that more is hidden behind the surface of everyday village normality.

After the first performance of the villagers, the narrator again something concrete in the center of his observation: the "black wooden box" ( the black wooden box ), the color of which is in contrast to the warm tones in the initial part of the story. The black box is obviously the reason for the bias of the men; they keep their distance and hesitate to touch the box when Mr. Summers, the lottery manager, shuffles the tickets. At this point, the reader learns something about the history of the "black box" : The shabby box is ancient - a relic from the distant past, which the people in the village still accept uncritically in the same way as the annual customs associated with it the lottery itself.

The exact background of the lottery remains in the dark as well as the origin of the black box, the repeated mention of which apparently suggests the passage of time, similar to Poe's The Masque of Red Death . The annual ritual repetition of the lottery, the inviolable custom of which, like the antiquated box, goes back to the time the village was founded, has become an indispensable part of the life of the people in the settlement, which is taken as an unquestioned matter of course.

The detailed description of the laborious preparation of the ritual also serves as a retarding moment in the narrative; the preliminaries such as checking the list or swearing in have not yet been completed; Nevertheless, it is becoming increasingly clear that, despite all the ambiguities and the details that have faded over time, the legitimacy of this tradition is accepted and confirmed by all those involved with unreserved agreement.

The lottery as such will not be further described at a later point; rather, their implementation is shown to the reader in the subsequent dramatic dialogue parts like an observer or witness; at the same time, the initial authoritative narrative situation is replaced by a personal one . Adverbs such as “humourlessly” (German “humorless”) or “nervously” (German “nervous”) refer to the tension and the nervousness that is difficult to find among those involved; There seems to be hardly any time between the individual draws.

After the last lot has been drawn, there is another longer break, followed by a brief mess. After the Hutchinson family has been determined as the one who has hit the lot, the remaining villagers, to whom nothing more can happen, then endeavor to end the lottery as quickly as possible. Bill Hutchinson takes the draw rather resignedly , while his wife Tessie desperately tries to avert her fate until the end.

The shock effect for the reader at the end of this short story is mainly due to the fact that something positive is usually associated with the title term “lottery”. It is true that in the course of the narrative there are some indications that this lottery is not about a pleasant win; however, in the course of the story the reader is in no way prepared for the senseless brutality at the end of the story. The original meaning of the ritual has long been lost; the only thing the people in the village do is imitate the sheer outer shape, which pretends that whoever is hit by the lot has to die. All previous family or friendly interpersonal relationships and ties are suddenly ineffective or ineffective; even Tessie Hutchinson's youngest son Davy ends up holding rocks and taking part in the killing of his own mother.

In retrospect, it becomes clear to the reader that the lottery first forces the families in the village to fierce competition for their own lives, then the members of the families drawn, as no one in the village can evade the given rules of this meaningless tradition. Although there is not the slightest discernible justification or legitimation for the traditional ritual of the cruel stoning at the end, for the villagers mere tradition is sufficient as the sole reason to shed innocent blood.

Before the actual description of the stoning of Tessie Hutchinson, for example, the narrator comments on the behavior of the villagers in an ironic way , due to the narrative technique of "a calm before the storm" being brought into the field of vision of the reader relatively late . cynical form as follows: "Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones" (in the German translation: "Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box , knew they still believe that stones were used ”).

reception

The story appeared in the June 26, 1948 issue of the well-known culture magazine The New Yorker . Shortly after its publication, many angry readers wrote hateful letters both to the editorial staff of the magazine and to the author herself; This story was repulsive and, better still, had never been written, it was said in many letters. Numerous readers also canceled their subscriptions after the publication; the title was banned in the South African Union .

Jackson found himself compelled to justify the story in the San Francisco Chronicle on July 22 of that year . Jackson's biographer Judy Oppenheimer described the turmoil around the story as the greatest outburst of anger, fear, rage, displeasure and intense fascination that a publication of the magazine had triggered.

In the January 1984 issue of Playboy magazine , the story ranked 17th on a list of the top 30 literary works banned from U.S. schools and libraries.

Although this Shirley Jackson short story is still widely read and has generated extremely violent reader reactions, The Lottery has not received undue attention in secondary literature for a long time, presumably because this short story is clearly written and essentially easy to understand acts.

The end of the story, however, remains open and leaves room for different readings or interpretations, especially because little is explained in the text. For example, the story can be interpreted using psychoanalytic or mythological approaches that are able to provide explanatory models that the story itself does not provide.

In more detailed interpretations, the secondary literature mostly deals with topics such as “ evil in human nature”, “violence by a group against individuals” or also with mythology and customs. Mostly the topic of the scapegoat is addressed. However, The Lottery represents a reinterpretation of the Jewish ritual originally mentioned in the term . While billy goats were selected in this old ritual, in The Lottery it is now an innocent person who sacrifices for others in an actually pointless act with no deeper meaning for those involved becomes. However, the victim is symbolically “loaded and chased away” with all evil in the community, thus escaping, as it is also expressed in the English term scapegoat .

Adaptations

In 1951, the first radio play version of the short story was broadcast on the radio station NBC . A theatrical version followed in 1955, which was also broadcast on television. The script for it comes from Ellen M. Violett.

In 1969 the first film adaptation followed by Larry Yust , who made a short film based on the story as part of a short story collection for the Encyclopedia Britannica . The film is considered the second best-selling educational film in the United States and was supplemented by a commentary from literary expert James Durbin .

Anthony Spinner wrote a screenplay for a television film in the 1990s, which first aired on NBC in 1996. Directed by Daniel Sackman . In this adaptation, the plot is told from the point of view of a stranger who comes to the place by chance and describes his view of the events. The plot is supplemented by a love story and explanations about the reasons for the "lottery", which are not in the original showed up. The film was nominated for a Saturn Award in 1997, but did not win it.

Influence on literature and pop culture

The story influenced numerous other writers, and references to The Lottery can be found in many works in literature, film, and music. As early as 1955, a science fiction short story , The Public Hating , by Steve Allen was published , which shifts the plot of The Lottery into a dystopian future. Further allusions and parodies of the story can be found, for example, in the television series South Park and Sliders as well as in songs by Marilyn Manson ( Man That You Fear ) and REM.Last parallels were noticed in the successful book / cinema series The Hunger Games , in which a village community must draw a lottery participant for a gladiator fight that only one person can survive alive.

Secondary literature

  • Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , pp. 101-109.
  • Noreen O'Donovan: Shirley Jackson, The Lottery . In: Noreen O'Donovan: Famous Stories of Surprise · Model Interpretations . Klett Verlag , Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-12-577610-4 , pp. 60-68.
  • John V. Hagopian: Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery . In: John V. Hagopian, Martin Dolch (Eds.): Insight I Analyzes of American Literature , Hirschgraben Verlag Frankfurt a. M. 1971, pp. 129-132.
  • Judy Oppenheimer: Private Demons: The Life of Shirley Jackson . Putnam, New York 1988, ISBN 0-399-13356-9 .
  • Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , pp. 146-152.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Lottery. Adventures of the Demon Lover was published in 1949 by Avon Books Verlag in New York, the German translation by Leube and Grube was published in 1989 by Diogenes Verlag , Zurich, ISBN 3-257-22446-X ; the translation of Naujack was u. a. in the by Mary Hottinger ed. Collection: The best classic and modern horror stories , Diogenes Verlag, Zurich 1968, ISBN 3-257-00902-X , pp. 355-370, published.
  2. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 147 f. and Noreen O'Donovan: Shirley Jackson, The Lottery . In: Noreen O'Donovan: Famous Stories of Surprise · Model Interpretations . Klett Verlag , Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-12-577610-4 , p. 61 and 67.
  3. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , pp. 147-150.
  4. ↑ See Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 103 f. See also Noreen O'Donovan: Shirley Jackson, The Lottery . In: Noreen O'Donovan: Famous Stories of Surprise · Model Interpretations . Klett Verlag, Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-12-577610-4 , p. 61. Likewise, John V. Hagopian: Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery . In: John V. Hagopian, Martin Dolch (Eds.): Insight I Analyzes of American Literature , Hirschgraben Verlag Frankfurt a. M. 1971, p. 129 f.
  5. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 148.
  6. ↑ See Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 104. See also Noreen O'Donovan: Shirley Jackson, The Lottery . In: Noreen O'Donovan: Famous Stories of Surprise · Model Interpretations . Klett Verlag, Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-12-577610-4 , p. 61 f. and John V. Hagopian: Jackson, Shirley • The Lottery . In: John V. Hagopian, Martin Dolch (Eds.): Insight I Analyzes of American Literature , Hirschgraben Verlag Frankfurt a. M. 1971, p. 130.
  7. ↑ See Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 104 f. See also Noreen O'Donovan: Shirley Jackson, The Lottery . In: Noreen O'Donovan: Famous Stories of Surprise · Model Interpretations . Klett Verlag, Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-12-577610-4 , p. 61 f. See also Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 148 ff. And John V. Hagopian: Jackson, Shirley · The Lottery . In: John V. Hagopian, Martin Dolch (Eds.): Insight I Analyzes of American Literature , Hirschgraben Verlag Frankfurt a. M. 1971, p. 130.
  8. ↑ See Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 105 f. and Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 149 ff.
  9. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 149.
  10. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 150 f. and Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 106 f.
  11. ↑ See Horst Brinkmann: Shirley Jackson, "The Lottery" . In: Peter Freese (ed.): The American Short Story of the Present: Interpretations . Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 1976, ISBN 3-503-01225-7 , p. 107.
  12. ↑ Stanley Edgar Hyman, Just an Ordinary Day , Introduction, Bantam, 1995 (Jackson biography). See also in detail Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 147.
  13. ↑ Interview with Judy Oppenheimer ( Memento of the original from May 2, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , 1988 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.wiredforbooks.org
  14. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 151 f.
  15. ↑ See Karin Plewka: Shirley Jackson: The Lottery . In: Michael Hanke (Ed.): Interpretations · American Short Stories of the 20th Century . Reclam jun. Verlag, Stuttgart 1998, ISBN 3-15-017506-2 , p. 151 f.