Fear Drives Sanity to Savagery
Imagine that someone is just a child who has survived a plane crash and landed on an isolated island with no adults. He has no experience in taking care of himself and must figure out how to establish order without turning against aother. This is the dilemma that the children in The Lord of the Flies by: William Golding have found themselves in, so one can picture the fear that comes with this more than unfavorable situation. In the novel, the theme of fear is shown most distinctly through the symbols of the Lord of the Flies, the beast, and the conch.
The first symbol that is a huge representation of fear in the novel is the Lord of the Flies itself. For starters, the actual representation of the Lord of the Flies is capable of inhibiting terror. It is a pig head stuck on a stick that is sharpened on both ends that is often surrounded by flies, so this visual could scare some of the children. In addition, the idol scares Simon through the things that it “says” to him while he is hallucinating. “’There isn’t anyone to help you. Only me. And I’m the Beast…. Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill!’” (Golding 111). In this quote the Lord of the Flies is explaining that they should fear the beast inside of them, not a physical creature. Finally, The Lord of the Flies represents the devil and evil on the island. It is this evil of the devil inside of each of them that turned Jack and Roger to destruction and manic. Another