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Mask In Lord Of The Flies

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According to the FBI, there were 1,490 murders involving knives in 2013. On the other hand, the number of amazing dishes produced by Gordon Ramsay were numerous. The point being, a knife can be used to cook or to kill. Its utility is wholly dependent on who uses it. Similarly, a mask is only as good as the person who uses it. There are several cultures with rich history involving ceremonies with masks; meanwhile, masks have gained a negative connotation after years of popular culture’s misuse. In horror movies and dystopian novels, the usage of masks to symbolize mob mentality is common. This holds true even in Lord of The Flies, where Golding uses physical masks, i.e. camouflage, to express the children’s innate savagery and submission, whereas …show more content…

In “Richard Cory” by Edwin Robinson, the titular character uses a metaphorical mask to conceal his depression and troubles. He wears it due to his desire of upholding the expectation of the townspeople. Cory, someone who was wealthier and blessed with riches, lived separately from the townspeople. Hence, whenever Cory “went down town / we people on the pavement looked at him” (Robinson 1-2). Adequately intelligent, Cory realizes the jealousy of the commoners with their gazes constantly resting upon him, so he utilizes a mask. When realizing that he is considered superior to the townspeople, he is pressured to maintain the mask of perfection so as to not offend them. Even more, Richard Cory is forced to uphold the farce of happiness due to the envy of others. The townspeople “thought that he was everything / to make [them] wish that [they] were in his place” (Robinson 11-12). Cory is aware of what the townspeople coveted: his wealth, knowledge, his mannerism and his glamour. Therefore, Cory is unintentionally excluded by the townspeople due to the respect and admiration they exhibit, making it a difficult task for Cory to ask for their help. Therefore, whilst having control over the mask, Cory is still pushed between the devil and the deep sea. Richard Cory chooses to wear a metaphorical mask of perfection, but due to the envy and expectations

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725 Words | 3 Pages

Some people in high school are pretending to be at a big masquerade party. They wear masks pretending to be someone different from who they really are, and convince the people around them to see there mask as their true self. Many of the teenagers in the book Bronx Masquerade by Nikki Grimes wore masks to hide who they really were. The students revealed their true identities and how they felt by writing and performing poetry on Open Mike Fridays in their English class. The main character, Tyrone Bittings, is a judgmental, confident, observant teen that reveals who he truly is through learning and listening to poetry.

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178 Words | 1 Pages

Shakespeare once said “All the world’s stage and all women and men merely players” and throughout the tough times, we’ve learned to mask ourselves according to different characters in order to gain society’s approval that we solely forget to seek acceptance from ourselves. In the short story, “Everyone Talked Loudly in Chinatown” by Anne Jew, Lin puts on different masks as she interacts with her family and in school to live up to their expectations. While in the short story “The Kid Nobody Could Handle” by Kurt Vonnegut, Jim had accepted society’s view that he had forgotten about how he views himself, unlike Gene from “I Go Along” by Richard Peck, who had forcibly put on a mask despite knowing his true potential. All of these characters had

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267 Words | 2 Pages

He wants people to avoid thinking that developing only one true self identity is healthy. A mask allows an individual to see his or her full potential by not having a true identity. Masks have multiple identities based on the certain situations and environments (circumstances) the person is having(undergoing). I agree with Gergens interpretation (assertion) and his psychological

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802 Words | 4 Pages

Such personification mirrors Dunbar’s use of figurative language, which relates the poems in more ways than one. Dunbar touches on human features such as cheeks and eyes in his poem but also uses a spiritual element to advance his point of view. Furthermore, “We Wear the Mask” was written in 1896; a period in American history that was post-slavery but still had widespread discrimination. The spiritual connotation within Dunbar’s poem can allude to African American churches and/or the hymns slaves sung on plantations. Nevertheless, the struggle of African Americans is a symbol of both presented

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1218 Words | 5 Pages

People act differently when they are with certain people than when they are alone. Some will call this act a “mask.” This metaphor is used because people cover up who they truly are or what they really feel with their actions; similar to the way a mask covers up a person’s face. This idea of a mask is explored in Paul Laurence Dunbar’s poem, “We Wear the Mask” and readers can see examples of “masks” in Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. People often wear masks to hide something about themselves that they are not proud of or hide their emotions and fears they do not want others to know.

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794 Words | 4 Pages

In the book the Lord of the Flies the masks that Jack’s group uses helps them overcome their fear of killing the pig by hiding their true feelings. When Jack volunteers himself as the leader of hunting he doesn’t realize that he would have to overcome new challenges. Masculinity “masks” and the clay masks they wear in the Lord of the Flies are basically just “things trying to look like something else” (Golding 63). Jack explains to his group of hunters that the masks they were going to wear are so they can look like something they are not or to hide what is keeping them from killing a pig. This shows that they are trying to push away their true selves and by looking like something else they can make a character of who they choose to be based on the reason they put the “mask” on.

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914 Words | 4 Pages

In Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, masking, and signifying serve as methods of survival for the narrator, as well as ways for malicious outsiders to take advantage of the narrator. Dr Bledsoe is the head of school at the college he attends, who extorts the narrator, but also teaches him a valuable lesson on masking. Dr Bledsoe teaches the narrator about masking after the narrator messes up and takes a wealthy, white trustee of the college to a black part of town in order to show him

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696 Words | 3 Pages

He utilizes the mask when he says that “I was brought up in America but educated at Oxford…” (Fitzgerald ##). He wants everyone including Nick Carraway, the narrator, to know that he is a valuable and worthy person. However, it backfires when Nick Carraway says “I knew why

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497 Words | 2 Pages

When they wear the Mask; which is essentially face paint, the boys are able to hide their identity as a civilized human, and have the opportunity to release any evilness and savagery within them. The colors of the Mask are dark and frightening. Black, red, and white are the colors used for the mask. In the story, Golding talks about the Mask when he states that, “ beside the pool his sinewy body held up a mask that drew their eyes and appalled them… .He capered toward bill, and the mask was a thing of his own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self consciousness.

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1548 Words | 7 Pages

People put on mask whenever revealing their genuine identity or behavior can cause issues. They are afraid of the aftermath that their actions might cause. This is the situation one can see in The Canterbury Tales, Piers Plowman, and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight prologues. All of these literary works present different valuable societal issues. First in The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer gives us a description of characters and their flaws.

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2186 Words | 9 Pages

In Paul Simon's "Richard Cory," the poem's themes of facade are evident right from the very beginning. “They say that Richard Cory" establishes the poem's point of view as someone observing Cory (Simon 1), which can be easily missed if not carefully examined. As the poem progresses, the reader learns that the persona who narrates the story works in Cory's factory. The persona states, "But I work in his factory / And I curse the life I'm livin’"

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885 Words | 4 Pages

This means he could not hurt anyone and still look at himself in the mirror and see himself as innocent. Therefore, with the mask, he could hide who he really is, and he didn’t need to fear himself. “The rest are making a line. Come on!” ‘But-’ ‘We-’ ‘Come on!

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539 Words | 3 Pages

Lord of the Flies, a literature piece by William Golding, takes place on an abandoned island where English boys are left to fend for themselves after a plane crash. The symbol of face paint is present throughout the novel, representing how people assume different personalities by hiding their insecurities. In the beginning of Lord of the Flies, the concealment of the face paint represents how Jack disguises his insecurities. He discovers the concept of face paint after trying to come up with ideas to improve his hunting abilities. Soon after putting it on, Jack “looked in astonishment, no longer at himself but at an awesome stranger”(Golding 63).

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1218 Words | 5 Pages

Lastly, in Poe’s short story, the revelers have different ideas about the masked figure (Poe, 1842). Some guests are wary of the guest, they think he may have the plague, judging from his horrendous Red Death face mask.

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808 Words | 4 Pages

The speaker symbolizes society and everyone wears masks because we are afraid to be judged by others. Throughout this poem, the author uses various literary devices. Firstly, he creates imagery which drives the audience to visualize pictures in their minds. When he states: “My surface may

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