Lord of the Flies Essay A civilization is an advanced habitat of many levels and a dignified social structure. A place where its inhabitants live by rules, made so people stay in order, with a purpose to everyone's life. A job, so everyone can succeed and pursue their own form of happiness. As depicted William Golding's Lord of the Flies, when one is alone on an island with nothing but the companionship of a group of boys, one resorts to its savage behaviors, dark powers to control the mind. In this time of need and desperation, wisdom and good-heartedness is ignored, only the purest form of savagery accepted. In civilization, one relies on one another, and when food is scarce, a new leader is born. Golding expresses many symbols to explain …show more content…
He shows his power in many way, although the need for power was ultimately developed by fear. Fear of being alone on an island, and the fear of never being rescued. He had to hide from his true self, not being able to accept the nature he had adapted, behind a "mask", to stay "liberated from shame and self consciousness" (Golding 64). Jack's method of dealing with this fear is power. The new group that Jack formed gave him power, the control over a group of boys that would have to follow his command. Jack was the provider for the boys, and in time of survival, one always looks up to the person that can provide food and warmth. Jack's next savage act was the hunt. Jack's group of hunters was not simply hunting for food and survival. They were fighting the devil that was controlling their emotions and state of being. Jack and his hunters did not simply kill the pig. They raped it. After they had chased the sow like bloodthirsty savages, Roger grapples his spear and stabs the stick "right up her ass" (Golding 135) The bloodlust had completely taken over Roger and his state of being, and the satisfaction in toying with one's mangled body overpowered him. Roger's "desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering" (Golding 114-115). Roger's love of murder and violence made him a center of Jack's tribe, giving him a "leadership" role in the group of savages, whose desire was to kill, …show more content…
Piggy was the "Athena" of the book and guided the boys throughout their time on the beach. Piggy was a guardian of the group, trying to keep the boys following the right path. He brought knowledge and wisdom to the boys, but the bloodlust embodied in the savage group of hunters could not accept him. Piggy was the only one to realize that the beast was controlling their minds, and that the beast was "not with claws and all that" (Golding 84) His wisdom fought fear with its fists, and didn't let Piggy plunge into the bloodlust of Jack's tribe. Piggy's use of the conch was a sign of civilization, a rule to the group. Although nobody took his words seriously, he followed the first cardinal rule, established by Ralph in the beginning. Piggy preached the rules of civilization, the job that every boy had to follow, in order to stay civil and orderly. He was consistently ignored by the boys, his words taken with a pinch of salt. Piggy was Ralph's prime supporter, and helped him in times of need. He went against everyone to lift him, “Which is better –to be a pack of painted Indians like you are, or to be sensible like Ralph is?” (Golding 180) and support his ideals, being able to understand the true good. The significance of Piggy's death ended all signs of civilization, as Ralph was left alone on the island, with a pack of animals on his life. When Roger rolled the boulder down the mountain, the final
When William Golding published the renown novel Lord of the Flies in 1954 readers were aghast at the critical standpoint Golding took on human nature. Golding undermined human nature into what readers viewed as bare savagery. Golding developed characters that started to view violence as an everyday thing. Violence is evident when the gang of boys yelled “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in.” This dehumanizing line exemplifies the inborn evil in the boys. Golding’s message was to place emphasis on the evil in human nature and he clearly conveyed that with Jack and his tribe; the complete opposite of Ralph’s tribe.
They often obey his destructive orders just to avoid being punished. Jack tells Ralph, after Roger kills Piggy, “ ‘See? See? That’s what you’ll get! I meant that! There isn’t a tribe for you anymore! The conch is gone—’ -He ran forward, stooping- ‘I’m chief!’ ” (Golding 181) Jack threatens Ralph and the boys by reminding them of the consequences of not succumbing to his authority. They are physically and emotionally tormented, forced to participate in Jack’s violent acts. As time goes by, they willingly join in on Jack’s brutal endeavors, such as hunting Ralph down in an attempt to sacrifice him to the beast. He
As soon as they realise what must be done to survive on the island, jack has the desire to kill a pig for meat. This is the first sign of his savagery. Soon his urge to kill a pig turns into the desire to kill and hunt other living
Without civilization, man would turn to savagery. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, he succeeds in showing that civilized man is inherently tied to society, and without it, even children will turn into barbarians. The lack of a civilized society on the island eventually causes the boys to become savages in the worst way.
Momentarily after Piggy was killed, his limbs “twitched” like a “pig’s after it has been killed” (181). Comparing Piggy to an actual pig reveals how the savages are beginning to hunt and kill each other like they are pigs. Additionally, having Piggy’s name be Piggy was a foreshadow to this moment, where there was no difference between him and an actual pig prey. Likewise, the tribe “watched Ralph to see what he would do next” after the twins were tied up (179). Here, Ralph is portrayed almost as a wild animal that the savages are observing and just waiting when to pounce on him. In addition to this, after the conch was smashed, Jack “viciously” hurled his spear at Ralph “with full intention” (181). This implies that Jack is hunting Ralph, like he is the new pig. Ralph is his next prey, now that Piggy, his last prey, is dead. Lastly, through all of his frustration, Ralph accused Jack of being a “beast and a swine,” suggesting that through trying to stop and kill the beast, he has let out his inner darkness and become the beast, yet developed the qualities of a pig at the same time (179).
Piggy, now weakened, is no longer able to aid Ralph in his struggle to lead the group. Without the voice of adulthood that is Piggy, Ralph loses his moral guidance and begins to make bad judgments. The greater Piggy's will to escape and claim salvation so Ralph is drawn into the confusion and misguided pleasures of The Beast". As each pig is killed so a small part of what Piggy represents is corroded away.
1. Given that Piggy represents society and its rules, he must have found his situation on the island disturbing at the least. At first, there is no organized social structure of any kind; no position of leadership existed. There was an absence of rules. This must have been very disturbing to Piggy. Then, as the story progresses, a sort of chain of leadership emerges with Ralph being voted as “chief.” “Ralph raised his hand for silence. ‘All right. Who wants Jack for chief?’ With dreary obedience the choir raised their hands. ‘Who wants me?’ Every hand outside the choir except Piggy’s was raised immediately. Then, Piggy too, raised his hand grudgingly into the air. Ralph counted. ‘I’m chief then.’”(LoF p21). Then, a little bit later, Ralph brings up the idea of rules: “Jack was on his feet. ‘We’ll have rules!’ he cried excitedly. Lots of rules! Then when anyone breaks them-’”(LoF p33). When the “hunters” kill their first pig is when we start to see signs of a more primal society, or lack thereof. They repeat the chant, “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood.” Piggy obviously if fed up with Jack and his hunters, asking, “What are we? Humans? Or animals? Or savages? What’s grownups going to think?’”(LoF p.91). And then, Ralph’s authority is challenged by Jack. Jack first disregards the rule of letting the person with conch speak without interruption. Then he directly challenges Ralph, saying, “And you shut up! Who are you, anyway? Sitting there, telling people what to do. You can’t hunt, you can’t sing-’”(LoF p91). From this confrontation is goes downhill on the island. On pg. 114, a “game” gets a little out of hand, when Robert pretends to be the pig, and the others pretend to hunt him, but then they become more serious and actually hurt him. He is not killed, however. Eventually, Jack and some of the other boys split apart from Ralph and his “group.” Jack and his hunting band kill another pig savagely, reveling in its agony. The “peak of their decline” was when they killed Simon, calling him a beast, during the storm. Then Piggy is killed, and the conch is shattered, and that is when I consider them to be at the absolute lowest in society: nothing more than savages.
Jack uses fear to pull people to his side. And Piggy’s fear for his wellbeing but Roger is different. He fears civilization. At the start of the book, it states, “There was a slight, furtive boy whom no one knew, who kept to himself with an inner intensity of avoidance and secrecy” (18). Already, Roger has a secret that no one knows about. In chapter four: “Roger gathered a handful of stones and began throwing them. Yet there was a space round Henry, perhaps six yards in diameter, into which he dare not throw. Here, invisible yet strong, was the taboo of the old life.” (64,65). This quote gives more detail about Roger’s secret. At this point, Roger is still influenced by society’s rules of his past life. It is not until the last hunt for pigs. Where he shows his true nature, and forgets his fears entirely. Instead indulges in his sadistic love of torture. “Roger found a lodgment for his point and began to push until he was leaning with his whole weight. The spear moved inch by inch and the terrified squeals became a high-pitched scream.” (149). Furthermore, Roger has darker skin than the other boys and at the time the book was taken place, darker-skinned people were considered a lower class and was mistreated because of it. Roger does vicious things because he was mistreated and the anger is finally getting to him, which turns him into civilization’s worst nightmare.
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.
Golding uses the conch shell, which Ralph and Piggy find, to demonstrate a source of leadership and order within the civilization. As the conch becomes a source of authority and assembly, it “becomes no less than the basic challenge to the Tribe to choose between democracy and anarchy, civilization and savagery” (Gregor). As order decreases within the civilization the boys are forced to choose between Ralph, who symbolizes order, and Jack, who symbolizes savagery and chaos. The boys quickly join forces with Jack, which is their first step of their decline into savagery. One of their final falls into savagery was when Roger rolled the boulder into Piggy and “the conch exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist” (Golding 181). By the conch breaking, order on the island was completely gone and the physical violence began to increase as chaos started to occur. In Kathleen Woodward’s article, “On Aggression: William Golding’s Lord of the Flies,” Woodward says that “children require strict supervision and constant discipline, for without these, they pose a serious threat to the adult world” (Woodward). As the rules for the adult world were made to keep order so were the rules and tasks that Ralph had assigned. Rules are cru...
Civilization is compromised when rules become unnecessary and the children?s state of mind has changed for the worst. In Lord of the Flies, the conch shell and signal fire represent civilization, but as the children lose interest in having a leader, and following rules, these objects lose their meaning and savagery takes over. ?We may stay here till we die,? (pg.9) was a very powerful quote, because from the beginning of the novel, Golding is foreshadowing their future on the island. Another example of this is their painted faces and tribal dances, which happen when they?ve killed a pig. A force greater than they can control seems to take over their humanity, and because children haven?t been exposed to think for themselves, they don?t know between right and wrong. Therefore, society hasn?t conditioned them to be evil, but the evil resides within them naturally.
Civilization is the process by which a society or place reaches an advanced stage of social development and organization. In other words civilization is when people have order and they follow the laws. In the book Lord of the flies by William Golding, Civilization is a major theme. It’s about a group of boys who got stranded in an island because of a plane crash. It is up to the boys to keep their civilization and to keep away from their inner savagery. In the book Lord of the Flies, William Golding uses the conch and face paint to show that civilization controls savagery but doesn’t completely eradicate it.
Civilization is the condition that exists when people have developed effective ways of organizing a society. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the characters Ralph, Piggy and Jack are liable for the disregard for civilization at the end of the novel. Piggy is accountable for the lack of civilization because he makes excuses for the other boy’s savagery. He places too much faith in what society should do and, although he complains about the boys’ reckless behaviour, he does nothing to stop it. Ralph is responsible because he makes the mistake of giving Jack power; he is unable to control the other boy when Jack starts to become savage and he is prone to fleeting lapses in self-control. Jack is responsible because he blatantly disregards the “rules” of the island. He forcibly takes items from the other boys - namely Piggy and Ralph - and he focuses on satisfying his immediate needs, instead of thinking of the future. The complete disregard for civility at the end of Lord of the Flies is a result of the three main characters’ inability to see things from a perspective different to their own.
In the novel, Piggy represents intelligence and rationality because of how he thoroughly thinks through all situations that he faces and due to his exceptional ability to create simple solutions to any problem. At very beginning of the novel, shortly after emerging from the wreckage of the crashed plane, Piggy and Ralph first meet each other. As the pair walk along the beach, Ralph finds a conch, which gives Piggy the idea of using the conch to “‘call the others. Have a meeting. They’ll come when they hear us’” (Golding 16). Even after the initial shock of crash-landing on a presumably deserted island, Piggy is able to gather his wits and realize that their best chance of survival to gather all the boys and get some kind of organization established. Although Ralph found the conch initially, he was only attracted to it because it looked like “a worthy plaything” (16). Piggy however, unlike Ralph, immediately thought up a novel idea of how to use the conch to better their situation, by using it to gather everyone else, and to assess the overall predicament they found themselves in. Piggy was focused on long-term survival and sustainability rather than the short-term entertainment that the conch presented. People who have high levels of intelligence often possess extremely rational thinking methods. The Beast had begun to terrorize the mountain, particularly in the vicinity ...
Ralph and Piggy’s sense of responsibility and maturity initially brings to the island a voice for everyone, calling for a brotherhood among the boys in order to survive and eventually be rescued. Early on the novel reads “There was a stillness about Ralph's as he sat that marked him out: there was his size and attractive appearance; and most securely, yet most powerful there was the conch.” (Golding Pg. 22). This quote describes the presence Ralph promoted on the island early on in their adventure. He encouraged equal say amongst the boys through the conch. In order to speak, one had to have possession of the symbolic shell. The shell representing the Parliamentary government in which they had left at home. Furthermore, Piggy, gaining an influential voice through Ralph, shouts his concern to the immature reckless boys “The first thing we ought to have made was shelters down there by the beach... Then when you get here you build a bonfire that isn’t no use. Now you been and set the whole island on fire.” (Golding pg. 47). Like Ralph, Piggy’s responsibility and ability to plan for the future contradicts the actions of the boys, which in turn is the main reason for the separation between Jack and Ralph. Ralph and Piggy strive for a civilized way of life, yet find Jack leading an indirect revolt against any attempt to maintain order. Ralph and Piggy represent the good, civilized world in which they