Savagery In Lord Of The Flies Essay

In the novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding, there seems to be an overarching theme of survival and savagery. It is evident that the novel takes place on an island where the boys who are stranded covet all of their basic and higher level needs based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Thus survival is an obvious topic that greatly contributes to the character’s development throughout the story, and the same goes for savagery There are many examples of these, Ralph has a leadership role that contradicts these ideas, and Simon mirrors this because he mimicks Ralph, but he is a bit shallow because he has a hard time making his own decisions. Finally, Jack has a specifically intriguing relationship with these ideas, revealing major themes that

This trumps all of his other priorities and leads him to make poor decisions. Jack and his hunting crew is in charge of keeping the fire on the mountain going, but he decides that hunting the pig is more important, so he allows the fire to go out, just as a ship passes(Golding). This ruins their chance of being rescued at that time. Jack is focusing on the pig because it according to Maslow, it is a physiological need. However, they already seem to have a decent supply of food, including fruits and plants that are plentiful. So if his physiological needs have already been met, he should be focused on achieving the safety needs, which includes being rescued. This suggests that although finding food and water are extremely important, focusing too much on it can be damaging. No matter how many pigs he catches, he will still be stuck on that island. He already has food, but it is a deficiency need that is already met, therefore after he has obtained food, he should no longer focus on it. One interpretation is that Jack is greedy aspects in his personality. This leads him to want the best imaginable outcome at each level of needs. Thus, he is striving for perfection at the bottom and not able to move up until excellence is achieved. He is focusing on the pig is because it statisfise his cravings rather than getting by with the average fruits and plants that he are simple to