What Are The Similarities Between Lord Of The Flies And Things Fall Apart

Things Fall Apart, a novel by Chinua Achebe, and Lord of the Flies by William Golding can both be compared because of their similarities in symbolism and themes throughout the literature. They both have strong symbolism in fire, whether it be symbolic of an idea or character. Both novels have ideas of “savage” people, in Things Fall Apart, the Igbo are thought to be savage by white settlers, and in Lord of the Flies, most of the island boys have appeared to go savage. The last similar theme between these two books is that of society falling apart due to some type of symbolic mask or object. In Things Fall Apart it is an ancestral mask and in Lord of the Flies it is a conch. Okonkwo, a character in Chinua Achebe’s, Things Fall Apart, is a

In Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo is commonly recognized as fire, even in his clan. “Okonkwo was popularly called the ‘Roaring Flame’ . . . . He was a flaming fire” (Achebe). Okonkwo was called this because of his quick temper, violence, and chaos that seemed to follow him. Although this caused him to be dominating and strong, virtues for a man of his culture, this also made him dangerous like a fire is. It is easy to see that when he beats one of his wives, Ekwefi, for not making him food and being back home in time. He beat her during Peace Week when there is supposed to be no violence, and he had to face the consequences after. In Lord of the Flies, towards the end of the book, a naval officer arrives on an island with dirty, confused, young boys on the beach and the land engulfed in flames. The little society that these boys had

In Achebe’s novel, an Egwuwu’s mask is forcibly removed, and the entire tribe went berserk because the mask was symbolic of their culture and what remaining peace and order they had left. In Golding’s novel, when the giant conch that was also symbolic of peace and civilization broke, the group of boys made their full descent into madness. “Enoch had killed an ancestral spirit, and Umuofia was thrown into confusion” (Achebe). The man who removed the Egwuwu mask, Enoch, caused an uproar in the culture. When nothing bad happened to him after doing this, the people were thrown into a world of confusion. The structural beliefs they had were proven wrong, and in return, their society was crumbling. In Lord of the Flies, the boys are fighting and Piggy and the conch end up being rocketed off of the cliff. The conch was an item that called order to the boys and was symbolic of that too. After the shell breaks Jack screams, “. . . . There isn’t a tribe for you anymore! The conch is gone-” (Golding). Even the boys knew that their private society was done for, it was shattered with the conch. Further after this event, the group became more and more wild, hunting and hurting each other, fighting like beasts. All sense of logic and rationality had completely vanished, and just like when the Egwuwu mask was removed, the remaining society crumbled.