The Irony of It “Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be ever in your favor” (Collins). One of the many ways that irony can be presented is through hypocritical statements like this quote. This is true for the short story, “The Lottery” written by Shirley Jackson in 1948 which can easily be compared to the modern film, The Hunger Games, originally a book authored by Suzanne Collins. Both of these pieces encase many different literary devices; irony was the most evident. “The great thing about irony is that it splits things apart, gets up above them so we can see the flaws and hypocrisies and duplicates” (“Irony Quotes”). These literary and commercial works feature the literary device irony to showcase a woman protagonist who happened to experience an unlucky moment which lead to their own death and near death experiences. The Hunger Games features irony chronologically placed throughout the …show more content…
The short story begins with the quote, “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” (Jackson). This gives no suggestion that there is imminent danger; however, this annual event held in town square each year is actually a stoning. This is a prime example of situational irony which is defined by Dictionary.com as an “irony involving a situation in which actions have an effect that is opposite from what was intended, so that the outcome is contrary to what was expected”. This is precisely the case for “The Lottery”, when the townspeople's are all so willingly joining in the center of town for what seems to the audience as a happy and normal occasion. None of the villagers hesitate to thrown a stone, even though this year’s “winner”, Mrs. Hutchinson is a friend, wife and mother. They all seem to be groomed into the idea that the killing of a random citizen is a normal and