Lord of the Flies: A Tale of a Fateful Trip
Man has never quite found a truly perfect paragon in himself. Through some fault of his own he can never achieve the high ideal of perfection that he seeks to attain. The 'Divine' Michelangelo, named so by his contemporary biographer Giorgio Vasari, never called his masterwork of the Sistine Chapel ceiling finished. When it was unveiled Pope Julius II fell to his knees in prayer at the sight of this 'divine work of perfection.' Michelangelo, who never claimed himself to be a painter, never accepted his work as a masterpiece, claiming that it was "full of flaws" produced by his own imperfections and sins. William Golding attributes this universal flaw to the evil produced by man. Never before had man's evil been shown as it had during WWI. The viciousness of man was apparent to all the world in the creation of the atomic bomb and in a war that concerned the whole earth. In response to this unveiling of evil, Golding created The Lord of the Flies. In this work of fiction, Golding hinted that even the youngest of all individuals- adolescent boys-are capable of inescapable evil. He also suggested that this evil pervades into even the most saintly and corrupts all that it comes into contact with. In The Lord of the Flies Golding uses different characters in the novel to show the influence of this evil upon society and to represent the most the four basic aspects of human nature.
Ralph is an attractive boy and a natural leader; the well-adjusted, athletic boy who might easily become the idol of his peers. First mentioned as "the boy with fair hair," Ralph emerges as a child of fortune endowed with common sense: the sort of child who naturally fosters grace, s...
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...nds the pragmatic conflict of good and evil that exists in man, and unlike Simon and Piggy, he is resourceful enough to elude death and to carry this knowledge back to civilization. On the mainland, Ralph will be a man of reason aware of the darkness that lurks in man-even in the most innocent person.
Works Cited.
Baker, James R. "Why It's No Go." Critical Essays on William Golding. Ed. James R. Baker. Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1988.
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. London: Faber and Faber, 1958.
Hynes, Samuel. "William Golding's Lord of the Flies." Critical Essays on William Golding. Ed. James R. Baker. Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1988.
Kinkead-Weekes, Mark, and Ian Gregor. William Golding: a critical study. London: Faber and Faber, 1997.
Moody, Philippa. Golding: Lord of the Flies, a critical commentary. London: Macmillan, 1964.
Evaluation of the Success of the Evacuation of Children from Major British Cities during World War II
Ralph has several positive characteristics but he also has several crucial weaknesses that prevent him from being the perfect leader. In chapter one the boys decide who they want to be leader. The boys decide on Ralph, “”Vote for a chief!”…every hand outside the choir except Piggy’s was raised immediately. Then Piggy, too, raised his hand grudgingly into the air.” (Golding 18-19). From the very beginning Ralph is seen as the leader. He becomes the one the boys look up to and depend on to make decisions in their best interest. Ralph has natural leadership skills. Landing on the island with no adults to take control, the boys chose to follow the one boy who seems to be doing something productive, Ralph. An example of Ralph being purposeful and productive is when he blows the conch to get the attention of all the boys on the island and bring them together for a meeting. When Jack and his choir find the other boys gathered he asks where the man with the trumpet is, Ralph replies, “There’s no man with a trumpet. We’re having a meeting. Want to join?” (Golding 16). Ralph asks Jack and the choir boys to join the meeting because he wants all the boys to work together so they can be rescued as soon as possible. Other than his leadership and purposeful qualities, Ralph is also hard working. When tasks are given out to the boys, such as building shelters, hunting, gathering food, the hard work of most boys turns into play and exploration leaving Ralph to do most of the work by himself with little help from others. When the other boys gave up on their tasks Ralph continued working, this proves his hard work. Leadership, purposeful, and hard working are all positive qualities that helped Ralph succeed in the novel, but Ralph also had some majo...
Ralph's actions as a character in the novel assist in reinforcing Golding's point that the prevalent force within man is evil. While Ralph struggles, albeit unsuccessfully, to maintain a civilized society on the island, he repeatedly tries to resist the temptation of evil inside him. As the island descends into chaos under Jack's tyrannical regime, the rest of the boys on the island let their hair become longer, at the same time becoming increasingly vicious. Ralph tries to ignore the temptation of having long hair, trying to push it back to maintain the good he has inside him. Ralph wants to “have a pair of scissors” to cut his hair, but the hair is coaxing him to let evil dominate (109). ...
Ralph is one of the few boys who realize that the only way to survive is through peace and order. Because he summons the boys at the beginning of the novel with the conch he and Piggy find, they look upon him as the most responsible of the boys and elect him as a chief over the humiliated Jack. Ralph creates a stable and peaceful society for the children to live; this significantly bothers Jack because he wants to have fun and do things that he never did back in the civilized society. Jack is eventually successful of pulling nearly all of the children out of Ralph’s control to form savages. Ralph represents the civilization, and Jack represents the primitive society.
He blows the conch and summons the deserted children together” (Li & Wu 1). While all the boys are interested mainly in playing and setting out to satisfy their own needs, Ralph is focused on building shelter and keeping a fire going to facilitate their rescue. As one can see, Ralph is “the representative of civilization and democracy, lives by rules, acts peacefully, and follows moral commands and values the good of the group, who dramatically reveals the condition of civilization and democracy in Golding’s time” (Li & Wu
William Golding’s novel ‘The Lord of The flies’ presents us with a group of English boys who are isolated on a desert island, left to try and retain a civilised society. In this novel Golding manages to display the boys slow descent into savagery as democracy on the island diminishes.
group of adolescent boys. The boys are forced to learn how to live on the land
The novel “Lord of the Flies” was written by William Golding to demonstrate the problems of society and the sinful nature of man.
William Golding’s Lord of the Flies portrays the lives of young British boys whose plane crashed on a deserted island and their struggle for survival. The task of survival was challenging for such young boys, while maintaining the civilized orders and humanity they were so accustomed too. These extremely difficult circumstances and the need for survival turned these innocent boys into the most primitive and savaged mankind could imagine. William Golding illustrates man’s capacity for evil, which is revealed in man’s inherent nature. Golding uses characterization, symbolism and style of writing to show man’s inhumanity and evil towards one another.
Golding has a rather pessimistic view of humanity having selfishness, impulsiveness and violence within, shown in his dark yet allegorical novel Lord of the Flies. Throughout the novel, the boys show great self-concern, act rashly, and pummel beasts, boys and bacon. The delicate facade of society is easily toppled by man's true beastly nature.
"Review: Second look at William Golding's 'Lord of the Flies'." All Things Considered 29 Mar. 2004.Literature Resource Center. Web. 8 May 2014.
Ralph’s power at the beginning is secure but as the group succumbs to their savage instincts, Ralph’s influence declines as Jack’s rises. This is due mainly to the cruelty and violence that goes on in the story. This cruelty reveals that Ralph’s commitment to civilization and being rescued is so strong that he will not allow himself to change his morals and become cruel like the others. The cruelty in this novel also shows that Ralph is a very intelligent character. His intelligence can be proven because there was a point in the novel when he hunts a boar for the first time and he experiences the thrill of bloodlust. He also attends one of Jack’s feast where he is swept away by the frenzy and participates in the killing of Simon. This is a very tragic moment for Ralph because this is when he realizes the evil that lives within himself and every human being. It is the cruel acts that happen in this novel that reveals Ralph’s character of being intelligent and being able to think deeply about human experiences. He even weeps when getting saved because of his knowledge about the human capacity for
The ability to create characters of depth plagues many a contemporary writer. Many of those writers should look to William Golding for expertise on this issue. Golding diverges from the path of contemporary authors and sets an example of how character development should be accomplished in his novel, Lord of the Flies. Golding's Ralph exemplifies this author's superior style of character development in this novel.
I didn’t want to look back but I did! There I saw the ghost just as
Golding's theme is not just the obvious evils of the boys' society; it includes the notion that the boys are a microcosm of society. While readers may be able to ascertain his theme immediately prior to the ending, the connection to th...