Comparing Lord Of The Flies And All Quiet On The Western Front

During the first semester, English 2 Honors has read two books: Lord Of the Flies and All Quiet on the Western Front. Throughout both of these novels, many ideas were taught, some which were similar and others which were different. Now even though there is a time gap between the book written by Golding and the book written by Remarque, the similarities and differences are still very noticeable. A similarity would be the main topic of each book: the war currently taking place during that time period. The differences would include the setting/time period of the book and the themes present in each novel.

While reading both of these books, similarities became apparent: it was clear the main idea of each book was war. In Lord Of the Flies, the

In Lord Of the Flies, a theme that could be found was the loss of innocence. Like said previously, the young group of boys were stranded on an island with no adults left to fend for themselves. In the beginning they still had all their innocence and humanity in them. However, as time went on, most of them lost it completely. “The three boys rushed forward and Jack drew his knife again with a flourish. He raised his arm in the air. There came a pause, a hiatus…,” (Lord Of the Flies, Chapter 1). This quote shows how there was still innocence in the character Jack when the story first began. On the other hand, he was able to shout “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood,” while on the hunt for a pig; that certainly has no ring of innocence in it. Now in All Quiet On the Western Front, one of the main themes was the feeling of comradeship. Comradeship is the company and friendship of others with common aims. In this case, the common aim was the war. The main group of young men in this novel had gone to school together and signed up for the war together. This means they had already spent time together and got to know each other in some shape or form. When they were out on the battlefield, they knew this could be the last second of each one of their lives so when they were back in a “safe zone” they were able to mess around and try to have fun in someway with one another. These young men were able to create such an incredible, strong connection with his fellow soldiers. Additionally, the idea of comradeship creates such an intense bond that one would expect the death of one soldier to trigger a strong emotional reaction from the others.But unfortunately, grief is a luxury these soldiers cannot