Reciprocity between the setting and action brings great meaning and compelling thought to both William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies and the short story “I Only Came to Use the Phone” by Gabriel García Márquez. For within the storylines of these two works, setting dictates the actions, ideas and moral decisions made by the characters. As the settings transition, they directly influence character decision-making, but in ways only the reader sees.
The Beach represents a place of balance and democracy. From Lord of the Flies, the quote “‘Let’s vote –’ This toy of voting was almost as pleasing as the conch” (22) shows how gratifying the boys find it to be creating a democracy on the peaceful beach. And while the beach is also where Jack declares his independence from the group and splits off, he does so in a nonviolent way, without threatening physical harm. Even when harsh words are exchanged, the reader sees these events as non-aggressive, civilized events that accentuate the peacefulness of the beach. The open setting of the beach, with its “shimmering waters” (10) and “miles of length” (18) is reinforcing the characters to get along and to act more civilized.
Additionally, the beach is a creative environment and one of survival. The beach is where the boys formulate their best ideas for survival, such as building shelters, and maintaining a fire for heat and to signal ships.
Castle Rock displays the opposite effect. For, on the other hand, at the setting of Castle Rock, ideas for survival are pushed aside for more defensive, unnecessary measures, like that of the giant boulder for protection, or the many wasteful feasts. There is still a creative environment, shown in their military strategy and traps, but it is not ...
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...ings of love for her. This loss of great feeling for Maria that Saturno experiences is significantly similar to the loss of morals following Marias’ stay in the Sanatorium. Marquez uses this loss of feeling to show that, when in the Sanatorium, no emotions can be felt because the need for survival is so much greater.
Throughout both Lord of the Flies and “I Only Came to Use the Phone,” the interplay between setting and actions of the characters is influenced by the constant change of setting and opportunity. With great leaps in moral changes and stimulating ideas on a basis of setting, these two pieces of writing give the reader great inside aspects into the characters’ thoughts.
Cited works:
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. New York: Coward-McCann, 1962. Print.
Márquez, Gabriel Garcia. Strange Pilgrims: Twelve Stories. New York: Knopf, 1993. 71-91. Print.
The whole island is in the shape of a giant square with white sandy beaches full of people sunbathing, swimming and fishing right on the shoreline. From the end of the hot pavement parking lot to shore of the beach is an ocean of soft white sand. The pearlescent white sand seems to know how to invade every nook and cranny almost as if it enjoys it. Walking around the beach on the fluffy whiteness surrounding the parking lot, the seagulls are fighting over scraps of food on the ground. “Sandy beach ecosystems provide invaluable services to humankind. Their functions have been exploited through history, with significant anthropogenic effects (Lucrezi, 2015)”. This white sandy beach is a beautiful refuge from the mundane grind of everyday life. The smell of the misty ocean air mixed with the sound of seagulls hovering above and kids playing is a tonic for the mind. The feel of the sand between their toes and the waves crashing over them as people swim in the water, or the jerk of a fishing pole when someone is catching a fish makes Fred Howard Park one of the best places to relax. Standing on the beach looking out on the water, people are kayaking and windsurfing. The lifeguards watching vigilantly in their bright red shirt and shorts, blowing their whistles when they see someone being unsafe. After a long day of swimming and laying around visitors head back over the soft white sand to the showers, in order to rinse off the menacing sand that clings to everything like a bad habit. Everyone rushes over the hot pavement burning their feet to reach their cars so they can put away their beach paraphernalia which is still covered in the white sand, nearly impossible to completely leave behind, so when they get home it serves as a reminder of where they were that
Lord Of The Flies is possibly one of the most complex novels of the twentieth century. This complexity and depth is evident when the characters are compared to the psychological teachings of Freud. The book shows examples of this psyche in the characters Jack, Piggy and Ralph and how they change during their time on the island.
William Golding’s novel ‘The Lord of The Flies’ tells the story of a group of English boys isolated on a desert island, left to attempt to retain civilisation. In the novel, Golding shows one of the boys, Jack, to change significantly. At the beginning of the book, Jack’s character desires power and although he does not immediately get it, he retains the values of civilized behaviour. However, as the story proceeds, his character becomes more savage, leaving behind the values of society. Jack uses fear of the beast to control the other boys and he changes to become the book’s representation of savagery, violence and domination. He is first taken over with an obsession to hunt, which leads to a change in his physical appearance This change of character is significant as he leads the other boys into savagery, representing Golding’s views of there being a bad and unforgiving nature to every human.
In Lord of the Flies, Golding extensively uses of analogy and symbolism like the dead parachutist in Beast from Air to convey the theme of intrinsic human evil through the decay of the character’s innocence and the island itself. In this essay, I will view and explain Golding’s use of specific symbolism to explain the novel’s main themes.
William Golding explores the vulnerability of society in a way that can be read on many different levels. A less detailed look at the book, Lord of the Flies, is a simple fable about boys stranded on an island. Another way to comprehend the book is as a statement about mans inner savage and reverting to a primitive state without societies boundaries. By examining the Lord of the Flies further, it is revealed that many themes portray Golding’s views, including a religious persecution theme.
“Adults run the world; and there is war, and enmity, and destruction unending.” (Peter David) Throughout the novel, the boys in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies consistently admire the life of adults. Ironically, Golding’s imaginary island is a microcosm of the adult world- both destined to be destroyed. Golding reveals this microcosm through conflict and characterization.
In “Lord of the Flies” William Golding delivers a realistic fiction story in a way no other author can. He tells a story about a group of boys stranded on an island struggling between the forces of good and evil. The story is carried by powerful diction, frightening detail and insightful imagery to show how the shell is a symbol of good that is used by Ralph to show the boys responsibility while the sow`s head is a symbol of evil that is used by jack to instill fear in the boys.
As time progresses in both Lord Of the Flies and “I Only Came To Use the Phone”, the characters show definite sings of savagery. The authors of these stories show the change from civilization and reduction to the characters’ basic, primitive nature. In the beginning of Lord Of the Flies, the young boys are deserted on an island due to their plane crashing. Once on the island, they find each other and begin to assemble. They come together as a big group and elect a leader. There are other boys in charge of certain tasks that need to be accomplished. A conch shell found on the beach is used as a way to call a meeting. This reaction to sudden change shows an instinct in humans that, when something goes wrong, people try to keep as normal of a schedule as possible. The boys use this make-shift kind of government because they realize that they need some type of structure in their lives.
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.
Setting is a place or a certain location where an event is about to take place. It is used to create a vivid image for the reader and to better understand the characters and the certain situations the characters face in a story. Furthermore, the setting also gives further insight about a character’s thoughts, feelings, and reactions to what is happening around them. By learning about the setting in a story, the reader will be able to understand how the setting relates back to the character and to the story itself. In Amy Tan’s short story “A Pair of Tickets” setting is used to emphasize the discovery of self-identity as well as heritage and culture for the protagonist Jing-mei.
When the children become stranded on the island, the rules of society no longer apply to them. Without the supervision of their parents or of the law, the primitive nature of the boys surfaces, and their lives begin to fall apart. The downfall starts with their refusal to gather things for survival. The initial reaction of the boys is to swim, run, jump, and play. They do not wish to build shelters, gather food, or keep a signal fire going. Consequently, the boys live without luxury that could have been obtained had they maintained a society on the island. Instead, these young boys take advantage of their freedom and life as they knew it deteriorates.
When viewing the atrocities of today's world on television, the starving children, the wars, the injustices, one cannot help but think that evil is rampant in this day and age. However, people in society must be aware that evil is not an external force embodied in a society but resides within each person. Man has both good qualities and faults. He must come to control these faults in order to be a good person. In the novel Lord of the Flies, William Golding deals with this same evil which exists in all of his characters. With his mastery of such literary tools as structure, syntax, diction and imagery, The author creates a cheerless, sardonic tone to convey his own views of the nature of man and man’s role within society.
Much of history’s most renown literature have real-world connections hidden in them, although they may be taxing uncover. William Golding’s classic, Lord of the Flies, is no exception. In this work of art, Golding uses the three main characters, Piggy, Jack, and Ralph, to symbolize various aspects of human nature through their behaviors, actions, and responses.
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. Great Britain: Cox & Wyman Ltd, Reading, Berkshire, 1954. Text.
The work being criticized in this paper is the Lord of The Flies. The Lord of The Flies, by William Golding, is about the faults in human society as well as in human nature and it achieves this through its heavy use of symbolism. Many smalls symbols go into creating the overly larger picture and overall theme.