"We Go On to Roll the Dice Once More"

"Around 1806, Britain’s most popular board game was introduced to the United States. Called the Mansion of Happiness, it—like the New Game of Human Life, a somewhat less thrilling predecessor—was based on the idea that life is a voyage in which travelers are buffeted between vice and virtue. In 1843 an American edition was issued. It quickly caught on, selling 4,000 copies in 10 months. The 'mansion' in question was a heavenly one, the final destination for the pious. ('Be virtuous then and forward press, / To gain the seat of happiness,' the rules read.)
"By the second half of the 19th century, a young entrepreneur named Milton Bradley had reinvented the game as the Checkered Game of Life, in which piety took a back seat to prosperity, perseverance led to success, and truth had no value. As Jill Lepore writes in 'The Mansion of Happiness,' a trenchant and fascinating intellectual history of life and death, the new game wasn’t 'a race to heaven,' but 'a series of calculations about the best route to collect the most points, fastest. Accumulate or fail.' In other words, he who ends up with the most toys, wins."

In The New York Times, Dani Shapiro reviews Jill Lepore's The Mansion of Happiness: A History of Life and Death.