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How fear is significant in lord of the flies
Analysis of Williams Golding's Lord of the Flies
William Golding Lord of the flies analysis
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Fear is something me can’t control, it is naturally in us which cause humans to act on their instinct. The beast in the Lord of the Flies by William Golding is represented by fear from the very beginning when the boys first ended up on the island until they were saved by the naval officer. Putting a group of English boys on an island when the last thing they can remember is enjoying their flight on the plane, would instantly cause a sense of unplanned fear. Other concepts like war and innate human evil are based of and caused by fear itself. War begins when two opposing forces fear one another’s power. For example, the constant power struggle between Ralph and Jack because of their fear of each other and what the other was capable of. Innate human evil is the natural evil inside of every human, fear can control your want to oppose to a certain person or idea. The beast in the Lord of the Flies is fear because fear is the cause and drive of the boys basic struggle for survival. Most of the book is revolved around the fear of the unknown. Having this fear of the unknown can cause a young boy to image something he doesn’t know much worse than it actually is. Causing them to believe in something they base off of fear, which Jack comes back with, “The thing is- fear can’t hurt you more than a dream. There …show more content…
The boys constantly struggle for power because of fear of the other’s authority. The liluns coming up with new ways to describe the beast because if random objects on the island. The attempts to keep the liluns’ fear in control when the big kids are struggling with their own fear. All these examples are what fear does to you. Fear controls your actions whether you like it or not, like when the boys attacked and killed Simon in a frenzy and having an overall fear of the beast itself. Fear is the base of almost all of the boys decisions and the true representation of the
In the novel, The Lord of the Flies, it is shown when the boys are having a feast after they killed their first pig and the rain comes. When the boys start to fear that the rain wouldn’t stop they see a creature emerging from the woods. Not knowing the beast was actually simon, “out of terror rose another desire, thick, urgent, blind. ‘Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood’… It came darkly, uncertainly. The shrill screaming rose before the beast was like a pain” (Golding 152). In the quote the boys are viciously killing Simon because they think that he is the beast, they are in fear which demonstrates that fear causes one to think irrationally and act upon it. It is this very quote that proves that fear will drive one’s decisions and actions because it caused the boys to act without thinking, ultimately leading them to kill Simon due to the fear of the beast. Overall, this establishes how fear drives one’s decisions and actions. Along the same lines, the topic of how fear influences a person's actions and decisions is also seen in the movie Castaway. The main character, Chuck Noland is stranded on the island by himself, he can’t start a fire, he can’t find food, and can’t find water. This leads him to feel helpless and afraid
In the Lord of the Flies fear takes over the boys and cause things to go downfall. The boys in Lord of the Flies might be afraid of the beast, but that fear turns out to be more dangerous than any beast could possibly be. The Lord of the Flies even says to Simon that “Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you?
Fear is a present topic in Lord of the Flies and the acrostic, False-Evidence-Appearing-Real, directly relates to chapter 9. In Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, a group of young boys were stranded on an island. At first they incorporated the civilization that they grew up with into their lives, but as time progressed they began to accept a savage lifestyle that came with consequences. In chapter 9, while the biguns and littluns gathered in a group, chanting and dancing, Simon came down the mountain after finding out the beast was actually a dead man in a parachute. Because it was dark and Simon was unrecognizable, the boys feared him to be the beast and killed him. If the boys had not been so afraid of the beast then they would not have been prompted to kill Simon. In chapter 9 of Lord of the Flies, William Golding employs diction, repetition, and animal imagery to convey the theme that fear can cause savagery to develop in anyone.
... middle of paper ... ... The frenzied state they are in is being caused by the beast, a symbol of fear. The barbaric way the boys attacked Simon without a moment of restraint shows that the beast had summoned their inner evil, primal, and savage minds.
One of many prominent themes in William Golding's novel, the Lord of the Flies, is Fear. From the very first chapter, until the last, fear plays an important role in this text. It is the only thing, which stops the boys from acting rationally at times, from questioning curious circumstances and it physically hindered so many of the boys, so many times. The active role of fear in Lord of the Flies, was intentionally used by Golding, because he knew what images it would create. Fear is described by Mirriam- Webster's English dictionary, as To be uneasy or apprehensive'. This feeling is mutually experienced by all of the boys on the island in many different ways. Initially the boys have an obvious fear of being alone, which then brings upon the fear of what we know as the beast, or as the littluns refer to is, as the beastie'. While this fear continues for the whole of the novel, we are also exposed to three other incidents of fear. The first of these is the civilised fear of consequences, displayed only when the children are seen as young civilised boys, in the earliest chapters. The final two are of a different nature, with those fears being the loss of power, the fear of rejection and the fear of being in the minority. All of these different fears, then relate back to the character, and as was expertly planned out by William Golding, influences the characters attitudes and behaviours.
Imagine flying on a plane and crash landing on an unknown island with a select group of people. How would humans deal as a result of this horrific situation? Is cruelty and violence the only solution when it comes down to it? In Lord of the Flies, William Golding explores the relationship between children in a similar conflict and shows how savagery takes over civilization. Lord of the Flies proves to show that the natural human instincts of cruelty and savagery will take over instead of logic and reasoning. William shows how Jack, the perpetrator in the book, uses cruelty and fear for social and political gain to ultimately take over, while on the other hand shows how Ralph falters and loses power without using cruelty and fear. In Lord of
Fear motivates many people to act upon matters, right or wrong. This emotion has been important in many events in both works of literature, and in the real world. It has forced military geniuses into retreat, and influenced them to plan another method of attack. Fear can be both a positive and a negative acting force in one’s life, a quality that can motivate one to success as well as to downfall.
“No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit for doing it” (Andrew Carnegie). Lord of the Flies was written by William Golding. It describes the struggles of English boys who are stranded on an island during World War II and become uncivilized the longer they are on this island. William Golding describes, in Lord of the Flies, how one boy, Ralph, becomes a great leader by his thoughts, actions, and appearance.
Whether it is because of your body, surroundings or mentality, self destruction is inevitable for every human being. William Golding shows how civilized humans in spite of their best efforts will ultimately be responsible for their own destruction in Lord of the Flies. This is shown through Jack, Roger, and the concept of fire.
In William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies, and Kendra Cherry’s article, “The Milgram Obedience Experiment”, the comparable fear factor, and naive mindset of individuals put under dire circumstances leads to the corruption of society and rise of evil in humans. Fear factors are an influential resource, and useful tactic leaders use to instil dominant power in their citizens, if this power is abused, evil and chaos occurs. For example, in Lord of the Flies, when Samneric get captured by Jack, Jack terrorizes them, snapping, “What d’you mean coming here with spears? What d’you mean by not joining my tribe?” the twins try to escape but fear takes over their morals and they, “...lay looking up in quiet terror” (Golding 182). As Jack threatens
The Power of Fear Fear is an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain, or a threat. The power of fear can lead to one’s destruction. In Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, he uses fear to demonstrate the evolution of the protagonist Okonkwo. Achebe uses conflict, irony to demonstrate the influential aspect of fear in his well-known novel, which is examined by Robert Bennett in a literary criticism. Achebe uses internal conflict within his protagonist to demonstrate the power of fear.
Most children, especially infants, do not know what is real and what is not real due to all the scary movies they watch, the scary stories they are told, and the nightmares they have. Therefore, they need an adult to remind them of what is real and what is imaginary. But since there are no adults no the island to remind the boys of these things, they are scared. All the fear that evokes from the boys causes chaos. " ’He still says he saw the beastie. It came and went away again an' came back and wanted to eat him--’ ‘He was dreaming.’ Laughing, Ralph looked for confirmation round the ring of faces. The older boys agreed; but here and there among the little ones was the doubt that required more than rational assurance,” (Golding 36). The little boy who said he saw a beast spreads fear among the crowd of boys, especially the little ones. Ralph tries to remind them that the beast is not real, but the boys don’t believe him since Ralph is not an adult. The fear that is still among the boys causes them to believe that there really is a beast and causes growing chaos throughout the novel. The growing chaos transforms the boys into savages and causes violent behavior. This factor and the other two factors, peer pressure and the boys’ desire to have fun, caused them to transform into
To reiterate, fear links to constant fear of conformity, secretive behavior, and obsession with religious teachings that protect the conservative views of the society of Waknuk. What I have learned in The Chrysalids by John Wyndham is that fears affect perception, your perception changes according to your psychological state and it affects your behavior as well. People reflect regarding their fears all the time and as they feel that they will come upon them, they start becoming apprehensive. When an individual is afraid of something, they may experience unusual judgment that they would have never made before which all the main events that occur in The Chrysalids relate. The main thing I learned was the two powerful emotions that result our actions is fear and love.
In closing, fear can make people act in ways that are unfamiliar to them, whether their fear is valid or imaginary. In reply to fear, people may act defensively by being violent, fear can either stop one from doing something, or it can make one behave in an absurd unpredictable behaviour. As revealed, fear is demonstrated in the “Lord of the Flies” in three major ways: Simon’s lack of fear, Ralph’s fear of being isolated, and Jacks vast fear of being over powered by Ralph. Evil and fear is brought to the island by the boys themselves believed Golding. The world will essentially always have the same problem until every human being on the earth is unblemished, until there is no more evil or fear in the world. Obviously fear isn’t over rated.
One of the main problems that the boys had on the island was the beast. In their minds the beast was a terrible creature that was out to kill them. Their fear of the beast ruined Ralph’s chances of trying to restore civilization on the island. Jack and his hunters wanted to hunt down the beast and kill it thinking that it was something that they could kill. Little did they know that the only thing that they should’ve been afraid of was themselves. Golding was trying to show the reader that the worst beast that exists is the...