William Golding's Lord Of The Flies

Lord of The Flies is a 1954 classic written by the Nobel Peace Prize-winner, William Golding. It was published by Faber and Faber on September 17th 1954. It is a simple story with lots of symbolism and wisdom behind it. The novel is about a group of young boys that try to initiate a civilized system with which they can govern themselves, after being stranded on an isolated island. The book portrays the boys’ departure from the innocence of childhood and their acceptance to the cruelty and harshness of life. The story takes place on an island near the Pacific during a time of war. A plane carrying British schoolboys crash lands onto this island, and because no adults (“grownups”) survive, only the boys are left to look after themselves. All

For instance, on the first few days on the island, the boys were so overwhelmed with their new found sense of freedom that they did not think to worry about the important matters at hand. They were naïve, full of false hope, and absolutely certain that they would be rescued. Most of that was driven by their childhood innocence. However, the hope and blind belief that they would be rescued began to fade as fear drove its way into their minds. It began with the “littluns” (the younger boys of the group), and spread to the “biguns” when talk of an unknown “beastie” began to spread. As reality and fear settled in their minds, some of the more rational boys of the group lead by Ralph began to take matters seriously. They started a fire on the mountain using Piggy’s spectacles (in case a ship were to pass by, it would spot the island easily), built shelters to sleep in, gathered fruit from trees, used coconut shells to collect water, and that slowly drove hope back into their hearts. Eventually as a rivalry forms between Jack and Ralph forms due to differences in priorities and values, Jack tries to convince the boys to join him in his lifestyle of reckless fun and no rules. He hunted pigs and cooked them over a campfire to show them that it is possible to live a carefree and adventurous life on the island without all the stressing rules that Ralph had enforced. This caused an uproar, and

The main symbol is the conch shell. The conch shell was found by Ralph and Piggy at the beginning of the book and it was used to call meetings and maintain order within the group. It symbolizes civilization and order, and is eventually destroyed near the end of the book, symbolizing that all the order had been lost and the shell was stripped of its value. Another symbol was piggy’s glasses (spectacles). His glasses were a symbol of the importance of knowledge and reason. The glasses were used to start the mountain fires and were also destroyed at the end by Jack. The beast (also referred to as the “beastie”) is yet another symbol found in the book that symbolized the animalistic nature of humans. It was imaginary but it was believed to be real by many of the boys. The most important symbol in the story, however, is the lord of the flies. The lord of the flies is the head of the pig (sow) that Jack had killed. Jack had severed the head and put it on a stick as a “gift” to the beast. When Simon confronts the head, it speaks to him in his mind and it whispers to him about “the cynicism of adult life”. It not only symbolizes the power of evil in the world but is also displayed as a Satan-like figure that brings out the evil in each