I think I am not alone in the experience of being forced, as a student in the 1970s, to read Shirley Jackson’s short story The Lottery. And the fact that this chilling tale remains a curriculum mainstay, even as my peers have become the teachers, must mean I’m not the only one to be thankful for that. It’s a piece of literature that grabs your attention first with its cold horror, then remains in your memory yielding its more subtle lessons over time.