The Lucky Winner: My Explication of a Paragraph in Jackson’s
The original paraphernalia for the lottery had been lost long ago, and the black box now resting on the stool had been put to 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 like 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 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 about a new box, but every year the subject was allowed to fade off without a