How Is Lord Of The Flies Relevant Today

William Golding's 1959 novel ‘Lord of the Flies’ has a plot that concerns a group of young boys stranded on an island without any adults. The boys develop a set of rules but without any singular clear figure of authority, the society they have created slowly turns to chaos. The themes in ‘Lord of the Flies’ are entirely relevant today. Despite the fact that 'Lord of the Flies' was written over six decades ago, the novel comments on different leadership styles that are all still present in the world today. It also explores the binary oppositions of ‘civilization versus savagery’ which is still relevant due to brutal behaviours that continue to take place.

Golding uses the characters of Ralph and Jack to represent two contrasting leadership

On the contrary, Jack symbolises a totalitarian style of leadership, he is controlling and power hungry. We see these types of leadership in the real world today. Such examples of this include Vladimir Putin, Russia’s leader and Xí Jìnpíng, President of China and there are many more across the globe. These leaders are known to lack humanity. In ‘Lord of the Flies’ Ralph says “We have lots of assemblies. Everybody enjoys speaking and being together. We decide things.” This quote thoroughly shows that under Ralph's regulation everything is under control and chaos is fairly absent due to the factual and almost mundane tone. Golding uses simple sentences to give the reader a sense of order and structure. Later in the novel, the boys begin to gravitate towards Jack as a leader, Jack promises that under his rule they will have fun and feast, although, as the novel progresses, Jack seizes total jurisdiction. ‘The rock struck Piggy a glancing blow from chin to

In the first chapter a civilised functioning society is established by Ralph, but as the novel progresses, Jack begins to be seen as the primary leader and ‘savagery’ starts to emerge. “We’ve got to have special people for looking after the fire. Any day there may be a ship out there… and if we have a signal going they’ll come and take us off. And another thing. We ought to have more rules. Where the conch is, that’s a meeting. The same up here as down there.” Golding’s use of short, simple sentences provides a predictable, matter of fact tone. This provokes a sense of calm and almost regimented order. Contrarily, later in the novel Jack says, “Bollocks to the rules! We’re strong – we hunt! If there’s a beast, we’ll hunt it down! We’ll close in and beat and beat and beat. '' In this quote, the use of exclamation marks gives a lively and aggressive tone. Golding also uses repetition to further emphasise the violence in Jack's approach. Another literary technique utilised in this quote is polysyndeton, in this case ‘and’, this adds intensity. In this quote, all these literary devices are used simultaneously to create an aggressive, unorderly and chaotic tone. Golding is clearly warning readers of the dangers of savagery by depicting it as an inadequate way of life while displaying civilization as the best