Evaluation Of The Lord Of The Flies

Evaluation of The Lord of the Flies

Lord of the Flies is a 202 page long adventure story written by William
Golding in 1954 about a number of boys marooned on a tropical island and left to fend for themselves. While on the island, they discover quite a bit of evil within themselves.
A few years after World War 2, a planeful of boys as young as 5 or 6 but most no older than 11 or 12 crashes near an uninhabited tropical island. As soon as they land, one of the eldest assumes leadership of the others, but not before befriending an overweight, asthmatic boy nicknamed Piggy. Ralph takes control of the boys and organizes a small expedition up the mountain. He meets
Jack Merridew, the chief antagonist. Jack is then a leader of choir boys, but will soon turn into a leader of savages. On the mountain, Jack hunts but does not kill a pig. He vows to kill it the next time. On their return, Ralph holds an informational meeting and informs the boys that they will be safe, but that they must start a signal fire and set up temporary shelters until help can be found. A rumour of a beast is heard, but is quickly discounted as a nightmare.
It will later be a major theme in the book. On the mountain, fire is created, but only through the use of Piggy's glasses. After Jack goes off to hunt and comes back, Ralph discusses the problems of people not working with Jack. Simon goes into the jungle alone and contemplates. The boys become used to the daily tasks on the island. The small children play all the time while the older ones do most of the work. The first flash of Jack's future warrior/hunter position as leader is shown as he comes back to camp with his face painted. A ship is spotted, but they find that the signal fire on the mountain has gone out, and the ship passes them by. Jack finally kills a pig, but Piggy criticizes him. In return, Jack slaps Piggy and breaks one of the lenses on his glasses. Ralph warns Jack to stop this destructive behaviour. Jack starts roasting the pig he had killed earlier. Jack does not initially give Ralph any food, but he does finally get some. Ralph calls an assembly after the feast. He verbally attacks all the boys for their neglect for the daily tasks that must be completed such as building shelters and keeping the fire lit. The fear of the beast grows even larger. Piggy begins t...

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... government and rules must be carefully imposed to preserve order, like Hobbes, I would also be interested in knowing what his other philosophical positions were as he wrote this novel. Finally, I would be interested in knowing what particular event he witnessed or was part of in real life drove him to write this book. Could it have been an experience he had in
World War II? What could have been so bad as to inspire a book of this passionate intensity?
Although I disagree with Golding's view of the world as basically evil, his book is certainly a good argument for that position. It shockingly reveals that none have innocence and even the best among us can be brought down to a near-beast state, as even Ralph was by the end of the book, consigned to mindless running from the evil. I find it interesting how Golding made the Beast, the Lord of the Flies, the apparent evil in this book and the focus of the hunter's search, but in fact the Beast is the hunters themselves and the evil they represent. I think that although the brutality in the book may be a bit much for some, I do not think that Golding would have been able to get his point across without it.