In its most general sense, the victim in the barbarism and savagery are supposed to be sympathized. However, it is not always the case, which can be justified in Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery”. In this story, both the dead and the alive are brutal and responsible for the tragedy.

     It goes without saying that the villagers who stone Mrs. Hutchinson to death without feeling guilty should be to blame. They stick closely to the barbaric tradition even though they know it is antithetical to everything that humanity stands for. During the lottery, Mrs. Adams says that some places have already quit lotteries, but her words are totally shrugged off. The lottery goes on and Old Man Warner even stoutly claims that “Nothing but trouble in that. Pack of young fools”. They believe that “Lottery in June, Corn be heavy soon”, which leads to the long lasting tradition free of contestation and alteration. The evil part of human nature is epitomized by the process of the killing Mrs. Hutchinson. Every one of the villagers, old and young, pick up stones without hesitation and Mr. Delacroix, the pleasant lady who talks with Mrs. Hutchinson before the lottery, turn to be the cruelest killer who selects a stone so large that she has to pick up with both hands. The tendency to remain savage and resist change proves to be the villagers’ most nasty sin against humanity.    

     While the villagers who stone Mrs. Hutchinson to death are to blame for their connivance of savagery and inhumanity, it is doubtful that Mrs. Hutchinson is totally innocent. She is not only killed by other people’s brutality; but also dies due to her own indifference to the tramped integrity. She attends the lottery, making no exception, and even runs all the way up to the square when she realizes she is running out of time. She allows other people to die, like everybody else. Besides, although she does rebels, she only rebels when someone in her family is threatened. While some people regard Mrs. Hutchinson’s scream of “It isn’t fair, it isn’t right” as a symbol of revolt against the patriarchal society, one thing the reader must consider is that all she does is for her own purpose. Her protest should be attributed to self-interest rather than somewhat female self-discovery and self-assertion. Apparently, she won’t bother to rebel if the winner of the lottery is someone else out of her family. So, Mrs. Hutchinson is also partly responsible for her death, to say the very least. In fact, she is in no way different from the villagers in the passive way they deal with the outworn tradition. The difference between Mrs. Hutchinson and the great silent majority, if any, is that the poor lady happens to get trapped into the shared web of sin a little bit earlier than other villagers.

     The story examines certain traits of human nature, by virtue of the deliberate ironies employed widely in it. The story opens with false innocence, portraying children’s boisterous play and housewives’ delightful jabber. It was not until Mrs. Hutchinson gets stoned to death that the reader realizes that he has been totally tricked. Actually, all the parts of the story which the reader may consider “good fun” are nothing but a smoke screen used by the author. While some people think that the ironies are adopted to simply enhance the reader’s shock at Mrs. Hutchinson’s death, I observe that the author is trying to associate the story’s style with its theme. The story conveys a great message that the victim may not be always totally innocent. The message itself is an irony. So, the author employs the homonymic literary device, in order to achieve the consistence of the message and the way she delivers the story. There is no doubt that the irony hidden in the theme highlights the story in an amazing way.

     Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a story that examines certain aspects of human nature in a deeply thoughtful way. Human nature has two sides to it. By virtue of irony, the author successfully communicates the message that the “dark side” of the human nature is relatively universal. Just because one falls victim to barbarism and savage doesn’t mean that he is necessarily free of guilt.