Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Lord of the flies characters analysis essay
Lord of the Flies literary analysis
Analysis of characters in lord of flies
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Lord of the flies characters analysis essay
William Golding's Lord of the Flies "In 'Lord of the flies' Golding is clearly seeking to explore
fundamental human nature and this is apparent from the way in which he
portrays the slackening hold of civilisation on the boys can the
consequent atavistic regression. By reversing mankind's evolution, he
strips the boys to their essential nature."
Referring to three episodes in the novel, analyse the boys regression
into savagery and explore what Golding reveals about mankind's
essential nature.
'Lord of the Flies' was written by a man called William Golding and
was first published in 1954 and shocked the nation, as the thought of
the boys killing each other shocked the nation. The basic storyline is
about boys ranging from four to twelve, their plane crashes and they
are stranded on an island where they slowly descend to savagery. The
story mainly focuses on the elder boys, the main characters are Ralph,
Piggy and Jack. The boys live in a world that is in a nuclear war.
Golding was affected by the nuclear bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima
and this book showed that everyone had this evil and he stressed this
point by making the character's children. Golding believed that
without the hold of civilisation that all humans would descend into
this primal state to survive, but that this evil would also arise.
Golding thinks of the island as a sort of Microcosm of the world as if
trying to warn us what would happen if civilisation were to go
The first episode that I have chosen is one where the character Jack
goes hunting for pigs. We can tell that some time has past b...
... middle of paper ...
... there are different types of people, those that succumb to their evil
desires or those that resist the evil. It also shows us group
mentality that people can be like sheep or follow those because they
want safety.
Golding wrote this story to have many meanings both moral and
religious. I find myself agreeing with Golding on some aspects of the
novel. I believe that mankind doesn't have an essential illness but
that we do have the ability for great evil but also great good it is
up to us to choose. I think Golding was very clever to use children
instead of adults as this gets his message across to the reader better
then if it was adults because everyone, and especially when this book
was first published, associates children with goodness purity and
innocence. Overall I thought this was a very thought provoking book.
In Lord of the Flies, there are many characters, objects, and events that display the fact that when rules in society are absent, chaos is present. Within these events and objects are examples, which lead us to believe that absence of rules destroys organization and structure within the boys. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, Golding uses the conch shell, the fire, the beast, Simon’s death, and Piggy’s death to show that without rules in society, there will be chaos.
In William Golding's Lord of the Flies, the island represents a microcosm. In the beginning of the novel the boys elect a leader and establish rules, in order to survive. Even though rules were set, they get broken by the evil within each boy. When the boys begin to neglect their assigned tasks on the island, society starts to fall apart. The boys stranded on the island and their actions are similar to the larger world.
Golding, presents human nature as a contrast to the reality of the boys on the island.
Most people perceive children as being innocent, precious beings. Some believe that they are angelic. Put in the wrong situations though, they can become savage beasts. The innocence leaves their bodies and they are no longer precious. The survival of the fittest instinct kicks on and they can become killers. In the book Lord of the Flies the theme is that kids are not as innocent s they seem.
of the book is that a savage lurks within us all, but for some it is
William Golding was inspired by his experiences in the Royal Navy during World War II when he wrote Lord of the Flies (Beetz 2514). Golding has said this about his book:
Furthermore, it is clear that William Golding creates a world of increasing violence when taking accountability of the momentous characters in his novel. In the Lord of the Flies, Golding creates two characters who portray violent inclinations; Jack and Roger. Roger initially exhibits his hunger for violence when he “gathered a handful of stones and began to throw them”(62) at Henry. Yet, he threw them around him not to hurt him
Golding’s view of the world is that human nature is the key to cause corruption in society. Epstein’s article talks about how the island in Lord of the Flies is a microcosm of the world, inhabited by young boys, to represent the worldwide corruption. Golding
In the novel Lord of the Flies, the author William Golding shows the ideas of how outside forces impact human choices. Golding uses the conflicts in the book to present the ideas
Human nature is something many can make different cases for. Some believe that deep down we are kind and compassionate, that, if stuck on an island where social constructs have become irrelevant, we would persevere, and functionality would eventually find it's place without someone to enforce it. Others believe, like William Golding, that deep down we are not nearly as civilized as our society conditions us to be. That savagery and chaos reign over civility and peace. Literature can put into reality events that would force human nature to the forefront, making the reader consider the most extreme situation. Lord of the Flies being a prime example, as it has taught me things like, how if you don't speak up for what you believe is right, it might be too late. How the power of fear can shape a society entirely, and how rules only work when the person giving them is respected.
From the time that the boys land on the island, both a power struggle and the first signs of the boys' inherent evil, Piggy's mockery, occur. After blowing the conch and summoning all the boys to come for an assembly, an election is held. "I ought to be chief , said Jack with simple arrogance, because I'm chapter chorister and head boy"(Golding 22). After Ralph is elected Chief, Jack envies his position and constantly struggles for power with Ralph throughout the rest of the novel, convincing the rest of the boys to join his tribe rather than to stay with Ralph. Also, soon after the boys arrive at the island, Piggy, a physically weak and vulnerable character, is mocked and jeered at by the other boys. After trying to recount all of the liluns' names, Piggy is told to "Shut up, Fatty," by Jack Merridew. Ralph remarks by saying, "He's not Fatty. His real name's Piggy." All of the boys on the island, except for Piggy, laugh and make themselves more comfortable at Piggy's expense. "A storm of laughter arose and even the tiniest child joined in. For a moment the boys were a closed circuit of sympathy with Piggy outside."(Golding 21). The boys instinctively become more comfortable with one another after Piggy's mockery and create a bond, leaving Piggy on the outside.
The novel Lord of the Flies depicts a group of young boys stranded on an uninhabited island. However, there is tension for authority on the island and this leads to their ultimate downfall. William Golding emphasizes themes of savagery, loss of innocence and grief. I was astonished in the part of the novel when the boys were brainwashed. They completely lost all their vigilance as humans. I believe that many of the boys in the story were introduced as these common school boys, but times in your life can have a dramatic effect on your actions and physical doings. It was evident that these boys were mistaken to be innocent but they were not. It is a common mistake in our society to have children be labeled as pure, helpless human beings. I beg
The theme in Lord of the Flies by William Golding is the main focus of the novel and is essential to understand it. The theme is revealed by portraying the struggle between the human impulse of savagery and the rules of civilization as the characters in the book. Lord of the Flies can be seen as an allegory which explicates a philosophical meaning by the use of concrete representations.
When I finished reading William Goldings, the Lord of the Flies, I actualized two things;
Through a historical perspective, Golding uses events that happened in his own lifetime and shows it throughout the novel. The first is the background of the story, which is about a group of boys who are trapped on an island due to a plane crash during a war. This relates to