"The two boys faced each other. There was the brilliant world of hunting,
tactics, fierce exhilaration, skill; and there was world of longing and baffled
common-sense." A quote showing the two main contrasts of the story.
Savageness, and civilization. This, is the Lord of the Flies, a book written by
William Golding. The Lord of the Flies has some interesting and deep thoughts,
pertaining to the theme, plot, characters, and setting in this novel. William
Golding did not just start writing a book; he took his time and worked out every
little matter, to make sure the book was entertaining, and most of all, did not
bore the reader. The Lord of the Flies begins with about 20 pre-adolescent boys
who are on an airplane, and the airplane crashes on an uninhabited coral island
in the Pacific. The airplane crew has been killed, and the boys are left on
their own. They start to collect themselves into a society of food gatherers
under an elected chief, Ralph. Ralph is about 12 years old, and has a very
sensible, and logical personality. At first, the boys create duties to follow,
and they live amicably in peace. Soon however, differences arise as to their
priorities. The smaller children (know as littl'uns) lose interest in their
tasks; the older boys want to spend more time hunting than carrying out more
routine duties, such as keeping the signal fire on the top of the mountain
going, and building shelters. A rumor spreads that a "beast" of some
sort is lurking in the forest, and the children have nightmares. Jack, (A
ruthless, power-hungry person), promising to fulfil the children's desire for a
reversion to the ways of primitivism, is chosen as the new leader, and the
society splits into two sections: those who want to hunt and soon become
savages, and those who believe in rational conduct, and a civiliized manner.
Ralph, the rational leader, soon finds himself as the outcast with Piggy, (a
fat, non-athletic, logical type, boy). Simon, one of the more rational boys,
finds out the secret of the "beast", and sees that it is only a dead
parachuted pilot. He goes to the hunting group, and before he can say anything,
they kill him by accident. Piggy is later killed by Jack when he accused Jack of
stealling his glasses, which Jack did do. At the end of the story, Ralph finds
himself all alone, and Jack sees the opportunity to track him down and rid
himself of his nemisis. Jack gives orders to his savage group to hunt down
Ralph, and Ralph finds this out. Just as Ralph is about to be killed by the
"savages", a naval officer arrives with a rescue party. The 'world' of
the Lord of the Flies is projected as a very realistic and plausible story to
comprehend. If the reader found this specific world filled with people who do
not talk or act in the ways that he or she is used to, he or she may decide that
the characters are unbelievable, and unreal. In Lord of the Flies, Golding has
shown that the characters are quite believable, and that their experiences are
at least possible. The characters talk with a bit of broken and slang-like
English, and have the characteristics and personalities of normal
pre-adolescents. A few quotes from the novel to demonstrate the realistic
talking of kids, and not heros from fairy tales, are these: "Look i'm gonna
say this now...." or, "when are we goin' to light the fire
again?" This shows the realism of the novel. The boys are also not
impossibly brave, but only as brave as they want to be. They are no cleaner than
boys can be with no soap available, and they like to play, but not work. They
are not very responsible, and almost all are afraid of the dark. The plot is
also very reasonable, except that there is no nuclear war going on in the world.
But that does not make the story implausible, for there could easily be one.
There are a myriad of strengths contained in this novel. The main points are
basically the structure of the plot, theme, and setting. A remote jungle seems
to be a very effective setting to establish the main theme about savages. It
focusses on simple things, and would be much more effective than a great city-scape.
Golding uses the jungle so he can focus on such fundamental themes as the
conflict of good vs. evil. Golding also uses suspense in this story, with the
beast as a shady character, plot twists, and unanswered questions at the
beginning like, "Will they be able to make contact with other human
beings?", or "Will they be able to keep the group and human
rationality together?" Another very good example of suspense is when the
pig's head (the Lord of the Flies) begins talking with Simon. It makes the
reader wonder if the speech given by the Lord of the Flies is actually of
diabolical origin, or is it just a figment of Simon's imagination? It could be
either. These next strengths will be dealing with the commentaries on the
themes, and plot developments in the story. Slowly during the story, two parties
begin to form. One being the hunting one, and one being the rational one. This
was a good way to show how the human civilization is slowly braking up. Soon, as
the primitivism of the boys becomes more prevalent, Jack turns on a fellow
human. As the story develops, the symptoms begin to show more and more, until
the party becomes savages, and want to hunt down the last rational person,
Ralph. Also, the development of the reversion to primitivism slowly creeps up on
each individual in the story. At first, Roger, a 12 year old boy, could not
throw stones at another human being, for he was restrained by the habits of
civilized behavior. Later on, he throws a boulder on top of Piggy, and kills
him. Golding says that "It was some pulse within his soul, like the
destructive power of prehistoric man who kills his victims with primitive
weapons. This was a fantastic way to portray the change from civilization to
primitivism. Another good point that Golding established is that he didn't
create the two forces to be equal forces. Ralph was physically stronger, but was
no match for Jack's violent personality, and group. The evil force was made to
be predominant over a good force. This presents an unexpected event, because the
reader would think that the "good guys" always come out stronger.
Golding also shows the characters' motivation to get of the island. This is
described when Ralph says, "Look at us! How many are we? And yet we can't
keep a fire going to make smoke. Don't you understand? Can't you see we ought
to--- we ought to die before we let that fire go out?!" Golding's style of
writing this book was exceptionally good, and most of all, different. He writes
the book in a way that the reader understands it, and that the reader can
actually visualize what is going on. His use of satire also illustrates good
style, and makes the book more entertaining for the reader. He uses satire with
creating the character, Piggy, and by criticizing the faults of each character
during every chapter, he is using satire. Golding also used solid descriptions
that were very effective towards the reader. The best one would be when Simon
dies, 'Somewhere over the darkened curve of the world, the sun and moon were
pulling; and the film of water on the earth was held. Softly, like a silver
shape beneath the steadfast constellations, Simon's dead corpse moved out
towards the open sea.' The ending of the story was very suitable for the story's
plot. Some people may have thought that this ending might have been too abrubt,
but actually, it was supposed to symbolize a sort of scenario such as a country
in the state of anarchy. There is utter chaos and disorder, but once the
government steps back in, every senseless act is underlooked, and the people
start over in a more civlized manor. Another scenario it may be a fight at
school. The children who are very naive and primative, are fighting; but when a
teacher or elder steps in, the students finally realize what they have done, and
they calm down to more mature people. This represents the dog chase at the end
of the story. Once an elder steps in, the 'abrupt' realize what they are doing,
and they stop immediately. There may only be one real weakness the is towards
this book. It is that this book is a fictional tale, but it is written in such a
realistic way, that some people tend to criticize the book for it's fictional
parts that may be a bit unbelievable. This problem is come acrossed so minutely
in the story, that many people will even overlook it. An example might be the
part when Jack and the savages are chasing Ralph, and then right when Ralph is
about to be good, he is bailed out by the naval officer. This may be a little
unreal, but it does make the story more exciting. There are actually a few
themes and meanings of this story. One smaller meaning may be the terms of fear,
and what it does to people. But the primary meaning of The Lord of the Flies is
its description of the nature of man. This is an attempt to trace the defects of
society back to the defects of human nature. The moral is that the backbone of a
society depends on the ethical nature of the individuals who founded it, and not
any government, or politics. The whole book is symbolic in nature, except at the
end where adult life appears, dignified, and capable of leading a civilized
group. This theme is probably one of the most important ones in life, teaching
humans as a civilization, that they must not let their irrational side, that man
cannot control, take over the rational side. There can be no happy solution to
the problems of man's society because the natural defects of human nature shape
the future after their own imperfections...