Leadership In Lord Of The Flies Essay

657 Words3 Pages

Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, is a novel about a group of young, British boys that crashland on a remote island. The novel begins as the boys emerge from the wreckage and gather together. They attempt to form a version of government and establish a leader, Ralph, and also establish a leader for hunting, Jack. After the meeting, they explore the island and light a fire. After a while, most of the boys forget about the rescue and start to focus more on hunting. Due to a disagreement between Jack's group and Ralph’s group, Jack challenges Ralph, leading more of them to turn on each other. Eventually this tension turns into bloodshed, leading to the deaths of Simon and Piggy. Jack’s group then sets a fire to smoke out Ralph, hoping to find and kill him. As …show more content…

Shortly after the crash, Ralph blows into a conch and calls it the other boy. While discussing the crash, they agree that they should make rules and elect a leader for the group and a leader for hunting on the island. Ralph exclaims, “We have rules! Lots of rules!”(33). By establishing a government and a leader, the boys show that they are accustomed to the social norms and maintain civility on the island. After establishing Ralph as the leader, as well as Jack for hunting, Ralph decides that the boys should light a signal fire because the rescuers will not be able to spot them unless they see the smoke (38). The boys’ urgency to be rescued allows the reader to understand the level of civility that the boys possess at this point in the novel. As time progresses, the boys begin to give in to the savage instincts that take advantage of the absence of social norms. Conflicts between the boys start to happen, especially between Ralph and Jack. At one point in the novel, Ralph asks, “Why do you hate me?” This conflict causes a disruption in order. Meanwhile, most of the boys are becoming obsessed with hunting and