In William Golding's Lord of the Flies, the island represents a microcosm. In the beginning of the novel the boys elect a leader and establish rules, in order to survive. Even though rules were set, they get broken by the evil within each boy. When the boys begin to neglect their assigned tasks on the island, society starts to fall apart. The boys stranded on the island and their actions are similar to the larger world. The boys decide that the first thing they ought to do, to be rescued, is to have a chief and to make rules. The boys want to belong to a group with a leader to feel safe. They decide to have some sort of Government. They chose to have one chief to follow. Once Ralph is selected as chief, he starts assigning jobs and tasks. …show more content…
They were scared, and everyone else was doing it. They felt that if they acted like everyone else, they would feel safe and protected. Jack's hunger for power grew throughout the novel, coming to the point were he threatened people to join his tribe. The boys have no one to tell them what to do and, most importantly, what not to do. They do not understand what is right and what is wrong. Even when they do realise that their actions are wrong, they try to cover them up, using fear as an excuse. Summing up, the evil within each boy is triggered upon the bare exposure to terror. Just like in the real world, they need to be reminded of what is good and what is not, to stay civilized. However, when the boys neglect their jobs, society falls apart. In the beginning of the novel, the boys assign each other jobs. For example Ralph is the Chief, Jack is the head of the hunters, some boys are responsible for the fire, and other for building shelters. The boys need each other to do what told, to stay organized and to survive. Yet some boys decide to put their own needs before the ones of the group. In the larger world people depend on farmers and on the police to maintain society alive. The problem in The Lord of the Flies is that there was no one to reinforce the laws that Ralph had set. Slowly the boys ditch their jobs and society begins to …show more content…
Everyone needed to work together to build the shelters, instead only Ralph and Simon ended up building them. They did not do as great as they could have, if more boys would have assisted. Without the help of all the boys, nothing was accomplished. Jack takes advantage from the boy's laziness, and creates a fearful atmosphere leading the group into a false idea. He also splits society into two when he makes the boys choose in between him and Ralph. Most of the boys are scared of Jack, and what he is capable of doing and decide to follow him. Other boys just believe that Jack was fighting for the right thing, and that hunting should come before safety, yet several boys decide that Ralph has good intentions. This situation is a real life situation, just like when we vote for a Government, but what the boys did different was having two Governments run at the same time. Ralph and Jacks tribe were just like a civil
‘A chief! A chief!’ ‘I ought to be chief,’ said Jack simple arrogance, ‘because I’m chapter chorister and head boy. I can sing C sharp.’ Another buzz. ‘Well then,’ said Jack, ‘I—’ He hesitated. The dark boy, Roger, stirred at last and spoke up. ‘Let’s have a vote.’ ‘Yes!’ ‘Vote for chief!’ ‘Let’s vote—’ ‘Him with the shell.’ ‘Ralph! Ralph!’ ‘Let him be chief with the trumpet-thing.’ ‘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.’ (22-23).
This is a story about a group of British schoolboys who survive a plane crash only to find themselves the only survivors and are forced to hunt for food, create shelter, and develop their own kind of civilization in order to survive. They conform to the ways of the British government that they know and apply those standards to establish their own type of government. This starts a rivalry against Ralph and Jack, both fighting for the position of chief. When Ralph is voted chief by the boys this of course sets of Jack. Throughout the story he becomes more violent and aggressive and soon rules over the boys. They conform to Jack's demands, mostly having to do with his power of intimidation, however it all comes down to fear. Jack was able to use their fear to keep them on his side and made them feel a sense of belonging and importance. It also may have helped that the food was on Jack's side as well. This shows however, that because they have conformed to societal pressures, the boys have lost their sense of individuality and
One of the main characters, Ralph, was very likeable to everyone and was almost immediately elected as the leader of the tribe, with the only competition being the leader of the choir boys, Jack. Even though Ralph just wants to get home, he remains to look strong and tough to the other boys, to try and keep things as civilized as possible. So, Ralph decides that; "We've got to have rules and obey them. After all, we're not savages. We're English, and the English are best a...
One of the main themes in William Golding's 1954 novel Lord of the Flies is that without civilization, there is no law and order. The expression of Golding's unorthodox and complex views are embodied in the many varied characters in the novel. One of Golding's unorthodox views is that only one aspect of the modern world keeps people from reverting back to savagery and that is society. Golding shows the extreme situations of what could possibly happen in a society composed of people taken from a structured society then put into a structureless society in the blink of an eye. First there is a need for order until the people on the island realize that there are no rules to dictate their lives and take Daveers into their own hands. Golding is also a master of contrasting characterization. This can be seen in the conflicts between the characters of Jack, the savage; Simon, the savior; and Piggy, the one with all the ideas.
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.
While the boys are under Jack's control, they quickly went back into how they started when they first got there. However, Ralph was able to keep the boys under control by holding meetings. At the meetings, a sense of order is instilled because the boys are not allowed to speak unless they have the conch shell. "I'll give the conch to the next person to speak. He can hold it when he's speaking." (p. 31) By making this rule, he gains respect from the boys and becomes for confident as a leader. Ralph uses his power to tries to make the boys better people. He shows his by building them shelters. "They talk and scream. The littuns. Even some of the others." (p. 53) Ralph is saying that the boys need the shelters because they are afraid and the shelters will help the boys feel more secure. This shows he has better knowledge of people making him a better leader than Jack who does not understand this. Jack does not realize that the boys need to feel secure and need someone in control.
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.
In Chapter 8 Jack says “He’s like Piggy. He says things like Piggy. He isn’t a proper chief.” He says this because Jack thinks his point of view is the right one, and it can only be the right one. This is similar to dictatorships in the past when people believe their right and anyone who doesn’t agree is the enemy. Later in the book Jack tries to get more followers by promising them psychological needs. Jack states “We’ve killed a pig and we’ve got meat. You can come and eat with us if you like.” Jack is trying to take away any of Ralph’s remaining supporters, so that Ralph is forced to follow him when all he has left is Piggy, Samneric, and a few clueless littluns. Later in this book Ralph is on his own a few hours after Piggy dies, he is considering joining Jack’s tribe because he will have food and protection. In the forest he thinks about the thought of eating fruit, and then remembering the feast and that maybe they would let him back. After that he realizes that the hunters killed Piggy and Simon, so they would kill him
Ralph tries to resists the urge to become a savage through out the book. Almost all of the other boys become hunters and forget what is important. In the beginning, all of the boys come to the assemblies and decide that Ralph should be the chief. Ralph is the authority figure of the group. He was the one who kept reminding the boys that the fire is the important thing(chpt 4). The hunters let the fire go out and a ship just happens to come along. Because the fire is out, they lose a chance to be rescued.
The book Lord of the Flies by William Golding is an exhilarating novel that is full of courage, bravery, and manhood. It is a book that constantly displays the clash between two platoons of savage juveniles mostly between Jack and Ralph who are the main characters of the book. The Kids become stranded on an island with no adults for miles. The youngsters bring their past knowledge from the civilized world to the Island and create a set of rules along with assigned jobs like building shelters or gathering more wood for the fire. As time went on and days past some of the kids including Jack started to veer off the rules path and begin doing there own thing. The transformation of Jack from temperately rebellious to exceptionally
Jack fails to realize that the boys need security, stability, and order on the island Jack was a leader of the choir before the boys landed on the island. These boys, who were in the choir, still want to follow Jack; however, they have no discipline at all. The only thing that is on Jack’s mind is hunting. He doesn’t care about anything else, except capturing and kill the pigs for some food.
In the novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding, symbolism and allegories were used to show how the children who are stranded on an island have a huge struggle with civilization and savagery. Ralph, Piggy, Jack, and Simon are the ones in the novel that struggle with this the most.
Under Jack's rule, the boys become uncivilized savages. They have no discipline. Ralph, however, keeps the boys under order through the meetings which he holds. At these meetings a sense of order is instilled because the boys have to wait until they hold the conch to speak. When Ralph says, "I'll give the conch to the next person to speak. He can hold it when he's speaking." (Golding 36) he enforces his role of leader by making rules and gives the boys the stability of an authority figure, mainly himself. By doing this he wins the boys respect and confidence in his leadership abilities. Ralph uses his authority to try to improve the boys' society. By building shelters he demonstrates his knowledge of the boys' needs. When he says to Jack, "They talk and scream. The littluns.
From the very beginning it can be seen that the boys have already begun to divide into two groups. When Ralph calls the first meeting the boys have together by summoning them with a conch shell, he decides they should vote on a leader. A boy named Jack Merridew thinks that he should be the chief because he is "chapter chorister and head boy." (22) Another boy nominates Ralph for leader, because he is the one that called for the meeting. When it comes time to vote, the choir members vote for Jack, while all the other boys vote for Ralph. After he is elected leader, Ralph tells Jack that he is in charge of his choir. Jack tells Ralph that they will be the hunters, and Ralph agrees. This causes the boys to be divided into one group led by Ralph, and the hunting group made up of the choir members, led by Jack Merridew.
Ralph first takes on the position as leader at the beginning of the story, when the rest of the boys vote him in as chief. He carries this position until Jack and his fellow hunters break away from the group. Ralph makes it his job to set out the rules to organize a society. Ralph always thinks of what is best for everyone and how they will all benefit from his decisions. Rules and standards are set when Ralph is the chief. He orders the group to build the basic necessities of civilization, shelters, and most importantly to keep the fire going, in hope that they will be rescued and return to humanity. "But I tell you that smoke is more important than the pig, however often you kill one" (Golding 75). Jack, on the other hand, takes on the idea of every man for himself. He does not care about making homes, only about hunting. When Jack is the leader, evil takes over and all good is destroyed. Under Jack's power both Simon and Piggy are killed.