Loss Of Innocence In Lord Of The Flies, By William Golding

In William Golding's novel The Lord of the Flies, Golding uses motifs and themes to create deeper meaning. One theme Golding uses is the loss of innocence. Golding introduces the loss of innocence by using two motifs, Piggy’s glasses and the Beast. The first motif is Piggy’s glasses, Piggy’s glasses show the loss of innocence because in the beginning of the story, the glasses are used to start a signal fire to try and get the boys off the island, however, as the boys become more wild, the glasses are stolen from Piggy to start fires for meat. Golding writes: “‘We shall take fire from the others. Listen. Tomorrow we’ll hunt and get meat. Tonight I’ll go along with two hunters-’” displaying the difference from the beginning of the book when the

The second motif Golding uses to show the loss of innocence is the beast. Golding uses the beast to develop the loss of innocence by showing how the boy's fear of the beast progresses. At the beginning of the story when the boys are innocent, the beast is hardly a fear if at all, however, as their fear progresses, Golding shows them lose their innocence. Golding writes: “The beast was on its knees in the center, its arms folded over its face.” proving how scared the boys were of the beast, that they became so hysterical over trying to kill it to get rid of that fear that they didn’t recognize the fact that they were killing one of their own. The boys' fear drove them to do something that the innocent version of themselves could not have

Golding uses two motifs, the conch and Piggy’s glasses. The first motif is the conch. The conch shows civil vs uncivilized behavior because while the conch is in good condition and has a certain respect, the boys act civilized and follow the rules of the conch’s power. However, when the conch breaks, the boys start acting uncivil because they no longer have the authority of the conch to keep them in line and have a certain power over them. Golding writes: “Ralph smiled and held up the conch for silence.” and then “Piggy held up the conch and the booing sagged a little, then came up again to strength.” These quotes show the difference from the beginning of the book, when all of the boys respected the conch’s power, to the end of the book when they were acting uncivilized and not following any of the rules. The second motif Golding uses is Piggy’s glasses. Piggy’s glasses show intelligence and they are used to make a signal fire, however, at the end of the story they are stolen from him, and broken. Golding writes: “He was a chief now in truth; and he made stabbing motions with his spear. From his left hand dangled Piggy’s broken glasses.” This is important because it shows how when Piggy had his glasses to see, it was civil. It became uncivil when the glasses became an item of power and a desired object for the boys to fight over. It also shows the civilization difference from Ralph’s tribe to Jack’s