We all have a mask that we wear to conceal our faces, or sometimes even our evident personalities/identity. This is demonstrated by Jack’s “mask” or his other identity because when he has his mask on he feels safe because he doesn’t have to hold back anymore. The mask I wear is presumably the one I wear around my family. This mask is one that I use when I am around my family, so they don’t realize who I actually am inside. It conceals my gloomy side or, on some days, my ecstatic side. Overall, in the book “The Lord of the Flies” everyone has a mask, which can be related to in real life. Look around you, I mean everyone has a metaphorical mask, whether it is on right now or not. Resembling Jack, I have a mask I put on everyday to convince people
Lord of the Flies has several themes that are the key to understanding of literature. Three of the themes of this novel are the fear, courage and lastly survival. Fear has been surrounded throughout the entire novel. With the amount of fear because of an apparent beast, many of the people on the island have changed. Most of the boys have become more violent throughout the novel and have no sense of direction as what to do next. Jack was one of those people who had changed majorly throughout the novel. Courage is one of the most important things to have mentally and physically when you’re stuck in an unknown island. Ralph’s courage in the book became strong when he had lost two of his close companions in Simon and Piggy. Survival is the best theme in this novel simply because of the lack of tools and the laziness of the people throughout the book. These themes show how great and wonderful this book is, and if you read it thoroughly, you will understand the perils and the adventure of Ralph, Jack and the rest of the boys in Lord of the Flies.
Jack Merridew is the devil-like figure in the story, Lord of the Flies. Jack is wicked in nature having no feelings for any living creature. His appearance and behavior intimidates the others from their first encounter. The leading savage, Jack leans more towards hunting and killing and is the main reason behind the splitting of the boys. It has been said that Jack represents the evilness of human nature; but in the end, Jack is almost a hero. With his totalitarian leadership, he was able to organize the group of boys into a useful and productive society
In Lord of the Flies, the boys believe that there is a beast on the island. In order to camouflage themselves, they paint their faces. The face paint allows the boys to free themselves from their old life and identity. This is the outlet Jack has been looking for to lose the old world. The paint also allows the boys to identify with each other. This is particularly important to Jack. He was already a sociopath before the novel started. As he smears the paint on, he begins to snarl and dance around. “Jack planned his new face. He made one cheek and one eye and one eye socket white, then he rubbed red over the other half of his face and slashed a black bar of charcoal across from right ear to left jaw. He looked in the pool for his reflection, but his breathing troubled the mirror” (Golding 62). When all the boys start painting their faces, it makes them feel less guilty and shameful over the brutal killing of the pig. The boys use the face paint to disguise themselves. This can be compared to the character Mulan in Mulan when she has to change her entire appearance to look like a man because if she appears to be a woman she can not fight in China’s war. At the beginning
In Lord of the Flies, there’s a good amount of imagery that shows the darkness and the lightness. The dark and light in Lord of the Flies is repeatedly used over and over to show the bad and good side of a specific person or thing. Jack’s mask shows a feature of dark and light imagery. When Jack creates his mask, he covers half of his face with red clay and the other half of his face with white clay. “...slashed a black bar of charcoal across from right ear to left jaw” (Golding 63). This shows how half of Jack’s personality is on the “dark” or “evil” side while the other half is on the “light or “good” side. Also, when Jack calls Roger over to see the mask Roger saw darkness. “…opened his eyes and saw him a darker shadow crept beneath the
There are many possible interpretations of the word 'hero': sometimes it simply means the main character of a story, sometimes it denotes a person with a strong character who acts decisively, and sometimes it can mean the person we most admire in a story or who is the greatest force for good. Golding's Lord of the Flies has no clear hero but there are three major characters that could be seen as the heroes of the book.
The mask he wears could also be the link between actor and character. This is a similar idea in Six Characters as well with the fact that it is a blurred line often between who the actor is and who the character in the play is.
We can see other evidence of this conflict within ourselves, with the masks that Jack and his hunters put on. We are informed that Jack “ rubbed the charcoal stick between the patches of red and white on his face” The mask represents the dark line (charcoal) between good (white) and evil (red) within ourselves. These masks also let the boys hide from their conscience; we can see this when we are informed, “The mask was a thing on it’s own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self-consciousness.” We can see that the mask releases Jack from rational behaviour, which helps him, assert power.... ...
An archetypal story is one which follows the archetypal theory, having hidden symbols and roles which must be played, for example, a scapegoat, an outcast and a villain. In the novel The Lord of the Flies, written by William Golding, the main characters can have more than one of these roles, for example Piggy who is the sage as well as the scapegoat.
In Lord of the Flies, the boys in the tribe, face a major loss in their identities. Golding shows the loss in Bill’s identity when he writes, “Really thought Ralph, this was not Bill. This was a savage whose image refused to blend with that ancient picture of a boy in shorts and shirt” (Golding 188). Golding shows that names and appearance are not the only part of identity, for although this person is still called Bill and resembles Bill, it is not Bill. While trapped on the island, Bill and all the other boys have changed into savages. They have lost their child-like innocence and identity while on the island. Jack, a five-year-old boy, in the book Room by Emma Donoghue also faces a similar loss of identity. Jack has lived an unimaginable life. He has lived in one room his whole life. He was born in this room and has no idea of the world outside of this room. His mother, known as Ma, on the other hand, does know about the world outside, for she is kidnapped, and impregnated by her kidnapper. When Ma finally tells Jack about the outside world, he is confused, and Ma cannot think of the right words to explain it. When she tells this to Jack, he relates it to the book Alice in Wonderland and he thinks, “Alice says she can’t explain herself because she’s not herself, she knows who was this morning but she’s changed several times since then”
Give him a mask, and he will tell the truth” – Oscar Wilde. Initially, Golding used these masks as a simple tool for the boys to use for hunting, but soon enough, these masks were used by the characters in the text to hide behind and camouflage from prey. But as Jack’s dictatorship role became more define, so too did the real intentions of the masks. As this group formed under the collective goal to hunt for meat, each member would gain a mask, so as to be allowed to partake in the hunt. But this also was a sign that they were now a part of the group, and that no longer were they a Jerry, or a Tommy, but now they were a hollow, faceless person, who was now the eyes and driving life force of the group. Any new action from now on, that the individual undertook, could no longer be linked to that single person, but was now linked to the whole group. Also, all actions had to be justified to be “for the greater good of the group”. This allowed the boys to do much more daring deed than before. Although they were still confined to the limits at which the group found acceptable, it still allowed them to steal the fire, trample shelters, and beat others. This is due to fact that if a small number of people from the group found that action acceptable, then the whole group would have to agree. Therefore anyone could do unspeakable actions. “The mask was a thing of its own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and
People are privileged to live in an advanced stage of development known as civilization. In a civilization, one’s life is bound by rules that are meant to tame its savage natures. A humans possesses better qualities because the laws that we must follow instill order and stability within society. This observation, made by William Golding, dictates itself as one of the most important themes of Lord of the Flies. The novel demonstrates the great need for civilization ion in life because without it, people revert back to animalistic natures.
William Golding's “Lord of the Flies” uses fear to control and take over the boy's life. Fear is the idea of a potential threat that can turn a person into someone they did not know they were, because of fear they turn to a divided society, into hatred, leading into murder. The boys used to live in a civilized community but once fear and the idea of isolation hits, they are left with a divided society because they do not have any idea how to maintain civilization. Jack makes it final that he is “not going to be a part of Ralph’s lot” (Golding 127). Two groups have formed because of the fear of isolation and disagreement that is shown throughout the book.
In Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, we find a group of British boys stranded on a tropical island while the rest of the world is at war. Their plane has been shot down and they find themselves without adults to tell them how to act. As they struggle to survive, they encounter conflicts that mirror the decayed society from which they have come. We see Golding's theme come about as we watch the boys begin to lose their innocence and let their natural evil overwhelm their otherwise civilized manner. While formulating the theme of the story, Golding utilizes much symbolism, one of these symbols being the masks, or painted faces, that the boys wear. The masks, and painted faces, became a producer of evil circumstances, give a sense of anonymity, and represented the defiance of social structure.
The mask is one of the most powerful symbols in Lord of the Flies. It symbolizes freedom from all of civilization’s measures, violence and hatred. However, it also represents leadership, and the new society in which the boys have made for themselves, based on violence and the nature of the human soul being free for the first time in these children’s lives. Though the mask makes many of the boys feel free, they only continue to lower themselves into a pit of regret, destroying everything they have worked for and hurting others who they could formerly trust.
When attending a masquerade, a person is expected to wear a mask. In fact, it’s looked down upon if a mask isn’t worn. But, what if for some people that mask never came off? In A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen, each character has constructed their own metaphorical mask that they set firmly in place every morning when exiting their bed. Each character: Nora, Torvald, Kristine and Krogstad all have masks that they put in place when speaking to each other. Throughout most of the play, it is clear that all of the aforementioned characters have multiple facades that they use when speaking to one another; often switching quickly as they begin speaking to someone else. Henrik Ibsen’s use of the masquerade serves as an extended metaphor to show the masks that the characters use in their everyday lives.