The Lottery of Babylon by Jorge Luis Borges

 

Feeling lucky?

Test your luck by reading The Lottery of Babylon by Jorge Luis Borges. Of course, you know such an offer amounts to little more than a joke: how much luck comes into play reading a short story, even one written by the great Jorge Luis Borges?

On the other hand, what would it take for you to buy a lottery ticket? Judging by the number of people around the globe who regularly play the lottery (millions every day), it doesn't take that much.

Why is this? Surely one of the top reasons is the fact that buying a lottery ticket is so incredibly easy. And people can put so much energy in choosing their "lucky" numbers. I suppose many women and men enjoy the idea they stand a chance of winning a pile of gold so they can be freed up from having to show up every day at their crap job and start living their dream.

I myself have never felt the urge to play the lottery; I never bought a lottery ticket; I don't follow the size of the grand prize or watch the drawing of the winning number - nothing about gambling or the lottery has ever held any appeal for me.

Perhaps this accounts for the reason I find the narrator in The Lottery of Babylon the least appealing narrator of any of the Borges tales I've read.

Added to this, the story has a strong totalitarian edge to it - the Company running the lottery in Babylon quickly takes on the status of the state, a state having absolute power over each and every individual, where the Company can bestow a high office on a winner or, much more likely, condemn losers to torture or prison or death. With such a lottery run by such a Company in such a state, I wouldn't think the Babylonians wouldn't find the below advertisement for their Babylonian lottery charming or the least bit funny.



No, the lottery is not something I'll ever play. This is certainly a prime reason I'm attracted to reading and writing So much of the creative process depends not on luck or chance but on honing one's skill by continual practice. One of my favorite quotes for aspiring writers: "Read, read, read. Write, write, write."

How much of your life do you attribute to chance? How much to fate? How much to your own efforts? After reading The Lottery in Babylon, will you change any of your answers?