Comparing Satire In Lord Of The Flies And Saturday Night Live

Satire is used in all types of media. Examples can be seen in books, television shows, and even the comic strips in the morning paper. Most people don’t notice it though, because they don’t have an understanding of what satire is, and what purpose it serves. There are a few different types of satire, and several different techniques used to make it effective. These can be seen throughout the novel Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, and in the television show Saturday Night Live.

Satire is the use of humor to poke fun at human institutions, in hopes of bringing about change. It brings attention to the issues, so that people will better understand the problem. There are two main types of satire that authors use often: Juvenalian and

The book was written after World War Two; after the atomic bomb was created. The bomb was created by the intellectuals of society, and Golding didn’t agree with them. So he used satire to demonstrate the problems with the war. He pokes fun at the intellect through Piggy. “Piggy is the intellectual with poor eyesight, a weight problem, and asthma” (Character). The boys decide to build a fire so they can be rescued. They start to work, and even “the small boys who had reached the top came sliding too until everyone but Piggy was busy” (Golding, 39). Piggy doesn’t do the work, but he still expects his fair share of everything. Later in the story, the boys need to build a need fire on the beach. It was Piggy’s idea to do so, and he’s extremely proud that he thought of such a thing, because, “Only Piggy could have the intellectual daring to suggest moving the fire from the mountain” (Golding, 109). The intellectuals are the only ones who could’ve possibly created the bomb, and Golding relates this to Piggy being the only one able to come up with an idea to solve the problem. At the end of the book, a Navy officer comes to rescue the boys. When he arrives, the boys are in the process of hunting and killing another boy. The adult officer assumes they’re just playing a game and having fun. In a way, this is an exaggeration. The adult’s naivety is so ridiculous that the reader can easily see the problem with