Lord Of The Flies Quote Analysis

Brandon Tran

Mrs. Marsden

Honors ELA 1

4 May 2018

No matter how civilized a person is, that person always has darkness in his or her heart. With that being said, there is time when a person could lose his or her moralities because he or she probably can not think of what is right for others. Even someone's actions can symbolize the loss of morality because if he/she takes an action that a civilized person would normally not do. That person will show the lost of morality due to poor judgment and savagery. Throughout Lord of the Flies, many characters lose their morality and innocence through tribal-like events as they experience their new society where no adults are there to help and keep them behaving as a civilization society. In Lord of the

Flies, William Golding examines how selfishness and evil causing humans to lose their morality through the use of characters and symbols.
William Golding examines how humans can lose their morality through the use of true evil from inside of characters who have a position in power. For an example, William Golding examines evil in human making them to lose their morality by using Ralph, the protagonist, in the novel. On pages 114-115 of Lord of the Flies, after trying to kill a boar, Jack and his hunters are chanting and performing a ritual, that get Robert almost killed. Ralph, choosing to participate in the ritual with purpose, is poking Robert with a spear and fighting other boys, greedily, to get near the action to hurt Robert (Golding). This revealment shows that Ralph loses his morality because he wants to get in to the action to participate in the made-up ritual. This piece of evidence would also show that evil in human nature can easily take over a human’s morality way of thinking what is right or wrong, it only causes Ralph to be more selfish to get what he wants. To support this clarification above, in the online database anthology, Doorways Through Walls: Lord of the Flies and The Inheritors, by Philip Redpath, he exclaimed that civilization denies that the darkness is in its heart. Ralph uses the adult worship to deny that there is darkness inside him but when Ralph tries to hide his true self inside of him during the hunt of a pig, he instead reveals his true nature because the desire to inflict pain on others was overwhelming him (Redpath). This critical analysis can be compared to the previous evidence because Ralph uses reason and rationality to deny the beast inside him, which he shows that he really wants to hurt Robert instead he can choose not participating. This analysis shows that morality can also be lost from the darkness that creeps through men’s hearts, just like Ralph, who tries to participate in the brutal ritual in order to show his power. Besides Ralph, William Golding also examines how selfishness and evil in humans can cause them to lose their morality by using Jack, an antagonist of the novel. Throughout pages 48 to 52 in Lord of the Flies, William Golding writes that Jack goes hunting by himself with a spear and only tattered shorts. Although he finds the pig’s trail and the pig itself, he fails to directly hit the pig with his spear, Jack goes back to Ralph. Ralph, seeing Jack, makes him furious and complains to Jack that he and his hunters are not helping to build shelters and go off hunting. Jack tries to counters this about the hunter’s and his desires to kill pigs but Ralph complains that Jack didn’t even get the meat. Seeing this as an insult, Jack makes an excuse and Ralph again asks him for him help with the shelter, which causes Jack to get even angrier and ignore Ralph’s offer (Golding). This clarification shows that there is selfishness in Jack because all he can think about is to kill the pig so every person will look up to him as a greatest hunter and a hero who brings them meat. When Jack tries to explain his desires to hunt and kill pigs, he ignores the fact why shelters are also important for survival. By ignoring the fact that making rescue signal fire and shelter are the most important, Jack loses his morality by deciding that hunting is more significant than anything else. To support the above analysis in the anthology, Lord of the Flies: Fathers and Sons, the author Patrick Reily argues that Jack shows selfishness when he hunts. Jack wants to do whatever he wants to do for himself, not what he has to do for others. He desires to have the pleasure of hunting which is exciting for him instead of keeping watch of the signal fire (Reily 113). This analysis from Patrick Reily shows that William Golding examines the ways that humans can lose their morality because of selfishness by using characters like Jack and his hunters. This analysis shows that Jack’s selfishness can commonly be found in human nature, which causes him to demand things that he wants to do more than the best interest for others or in front of overall survival of the whole group. From the previous analysis, Jack ignores the fact that the boys are in need of a safe shelter over meat at that specific time. A safe shelter is the first priority for the whole group to survive, but Jack thinks of his own selfish needs before that.
Although, human morality can be found through the use of different characters, William Golding also examines how human morality can be lost through the use of symbolism.

A demonstration will be the death of the conch/Piggy. In pages 170 to 181 in Lord of the Flies, William Golding writes that Piggy holds and announces that he has the conch, which dials the volume of the savages to hear what Piggy has to say. Piggy announces that the savages can be savages or be civilized as Ralph to gain rescue. Volume from the savages starts to rise up and as Ralph tries to restate Piggy’s question, Jack and his hunters form a wall with spear ready to charge. Roger on the other hand, pushes a lever with a boulder on it, causing Ralph to dodge the boulder, but Piggy to be crushed along with the conch. Jack proclaims this moment as a consequence for not joining his tribe and exclaims Ralph’s tribe is gone (Golding). This demonstration shows that the conch loses its power when Jack and his hunters lose their morality because of greed for power. Also, they begin to take over all the power and destroy any rules or anyone standing in their way. When Piggy dies and the conch explodes, in the conflict between civilization and savagery, savagery prevails because killing Piggy and destroying the conch shows that morality is lost and so is civilization. To assist this verification in The Symbolism of the Conch, Ian Kinkead-Weekes and Ian Gregor states that the conch is the symbol of democracy and freedom of speech, it stands for civilization. When a person holds the conch to speak he is giving his thought for discussion which may benefits the whole group. The conch loses power when Jack rejects it and symbol of democracy also dies when Jack forms his tribe for attack. The conch is what the hunter tribe does not like because it stands in the way of choosing civilization over savagery. The outcome is that the conch explodes into a multitude of fragments, which ends civilization (Weekes and

Gregor 80). This statement shows that since the conch symbolizes as democracy and civilization, the more and more the conch is being rejected, the more civilization starts to crumble causing savagery to become more dominant. Destroying the conch symbolizes as the hunters moralities to be lost because of power over human life, which is shown in the previous analysis when the savages retaliate with a boulder onto Piggy’s head. Not only does William Golding examines the lost of human morality through the death of the conch but also through the symbolism of the killing of the sow. On page 135 from the novel, Lord of the Flies, William Golding write that, when Jack and his hunters are chasing the sow, the sow fell from the heat of the sun and the boys throw themselves at her, stabbing her with spears and Jack’s knife. The sow is in fear and squeals in terror until Roger leans his whole body onto the sow’s rear part which causes her horrified squealing into the hunters’ loud screaming (Golding). This example shows that humans lose their morality through the thrill of the sow killing/pig hunting. As the boys continue to stab and pierce their spears into the sow’s flesh, the more innocence inside of their civilized selves disappears, showing that they become more manly by showing the action of rape. To support this analysis, Berthold Schoene-Harwood on Destructive Masculinity in Lord of the Flies from Harold Bloom’s anthology, states that the idea of pig hunting give the boys the motivation to remove their civilized-selves and feelings that are prevented them to kill lived animals and to become more manly (Schoene-Harwood 69). This statement shows that characters in the novel lose their human moralities by having the desire to become more manly. When Jack and his hunters are killing the sow, they use the actions of rape which causes their innocence and moralities to be lost because they can only have the desire to be manly and to get rid of the their civilized selves, pig hunting such as the sow killing is the way to help satisfy the growing motivation to get rid of their fear of killing live animals.
William Golding examines how human morality can be lost through the use of characterization and symbolism. William Golding shows how human moralities by using two main characters Jack and Ralph. Ralph shows how he loses his morality through the pig ritual by trying to deny his civilized self but is overpowered by the desired to hurt and abuse other, while on the other hand, Jack shows how he loses his morality through his argument with Ralph by showing that he demands to do whatever he feels like to do. He only wants to hunt and gather meat and he doesn’t care for any things else even things that are important for the group survival. He shows selfishness and evil for power that he makes major influences on his hunters and they obey his demands. William Golding shows how human moralities change by using the symbolism of the death of the conch and the killing of the sow. The death of the conch symbolizes as democracy and civilization being lost which demonstrates the death of Piggy. On the other hand, the killing of the sow/pig hunts represents as the boys the freedom from their civilized moralities to have the desire to become more manly. Human morality can be lost due to the descent into savagery, no matter how civilized a person can be, there is always a chance of darkness that creeps up into any person’s heart, causing them to be more savage-like.