Symbolism In William Golding's Lord Of The Flies

The Evolution of the Beastie’s Symbolism

Nightmares are something that everyone gets in their lifetime but the “worst nightmares can also happen with your eyes open” (Florence Welch). The book Lord of the Flies written by William Golding is about a bunch of boys who are stuck on an island because their plane has crashed, no one knows where they are and they are no adults present on the island with them. Another major factor that had affected all the boys that were stuck on an island was time. Time goes by really quickly and with time even people change. Fear soaked in the boys, and as time passed on they went from being civilized little kids, to irrational, schizophrenic little kids to finally being complete savages, which corresponds to the

Jack speaks up for Percival, who is trying to speak but can’t, and says “He says the beast comes out of the sea” (Golding 96). Golding shows the boys perception of this as he states that the boys “considered the vast stretches of water, the high sea beyond, unknown indigo of infinite possibility” (Golding 96). The boys are slowly changing as shown in this quote, they are all scared of the beast and all over the place. This is followed by the sighting of the beast from the air. Sam and Eric were the ones to spot the beast and “They became motionless, gripped in each other’s arms, four unwinking eyes aimed and two mouths open.” (Golding 107). The beast from the air is truly a man, but the schizophrenia of the kids motivates them to believe that the adult, who represents civilization is truly a beast, which is quite ironic. Fear inside the kids had become much worse day by day, till they finally recognized a beacon of hope as its opposite, fear. This shows the kids slow, but steady decline from

Towards the beginning the boys were rational in thinking of a potential danger, a beastie, and they embodied it as a snake. But after a while the boys changed the beastie to absurd creatures, and use it to gain power over each other. They finally show it as Simon, who has just realized that the beast truly does not exist, and for this they kill him. All these things combined led to their unstable mental condition. Golding uses the beast as a source of fear in the boys, to bring out the evil and ability to be