Who are the protagonists and the antagonist of the "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson?

In many short stories, it is fairly easy to identify the protagonist or protagonists, and it is also often easy to identify the antagonist or antagonists. In most cases, the roles played by the characters are realized, or at least suspected, relatively early in the rising action. The issue of who is the protagonist and who, or what, is the antagonist in Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is interesting because who or what fulfills those roles is not fully revealed until the climax.

As the story develops, several named characters are introduced to the reader, as is custom in literary works. What is not clear during much of the rising action, however, is which of these characters will fulfill the protagonist role. It is not until the conclusion of the town lottery that it becomes fully clear that Tess Hutchinson is the focal point of the climax of the story. It is as if no protagonist existed—just potential protagonists—until one was chosen by the lottery. At that point, Tess becomes the protagonist.

In the same vein, the role of antagonist is not realized until the climax of the story. Even then, it is not definitive whether the townspeople themselves, including Tess’s family, become collectively the antagonists or custom (the lottery) is the antagonist and the townspeople are merely an instrument. One way to conceptualize it is that custom is the primary antagonist, but that the townspeople serve in the role of accomplices to that antagonist.