QUESTION 4
In the short story version of The Lottery, the Marxist perspective can be seen through the terms bourgeoisie, proletariat, ideology, and revolution/revolt. The bourgeoisie are the members of the village who conduct the lottery, Mr. Summers and Mr. Martin, and the oldest man of the village, Old Man Warner, who has participated in the lottery 77 times. These men keep the lottery going as a tradition in the village and refuse to get rid of it, unlike several other villages. Although each of them participate, they are very unlikely to be the ones who are sacrificed, especially since Old Man Warner has participated 77 times and still hasn't been sacrificed. The ones who are more likely to be sacrificed are the proletariat, the ordinary members of the village, and specifically Mrs. Tessie Hutchinson, the one who is ultimately sacrificed. The ideology in the short story is the belief that this annual ritual will help the village prosper, despite the gruesome murder of a citizen every year. The village believes that the murder is justified because the lottery is essentially random; one member of each family takes a paper out of a box without anyone knowing which paper contains the fatal black dot. However, one person, Tessie Hutchinson, challenges this, which explains the revolution/revolt aspect of Marxist criticism. She claims that the lottery this year isn't fair, that Mr. Summers didn't give her husband enough time to take any paper he wanted, and continues to claim that it isn't fair and right when she's being stoned to death.
GROUP 2
QUESTION 6
At first, it seems that in "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas", the individual self-interest is regarded higher than society and the greater good. The people of Omelas are extremely happy and are able to indulge in any desire that they please, like running around naked and having sex. There is no king or soldiers to provide oppression to the people, which would be an aspect of the greater good. The people conduct a festival to promote such indulgence in their lives, listening to heavenly music and dancing to it. However, the story shifts to the idea of society and the greater good being more important than the individual and self-interest. This shift is shown when the story of the boy who lives in the broom closet is told. While the rest of the people of Omelas have a pleasurable life, the boy who lives in the broom closet faces the worst kind of misery. Then, it is revealed that "their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child's abominable misery." This boy faces misery for the greater good of the people of Omelas.
The relationship between individual and society in The Lottery is more straight-forward than in "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas". Society is regarded higher than the individual. The village has the lottery for the greater good of the village; "lottery in June, corn will be heavy soon". One person will be sacrificed each year just to help the harvest of corn.
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