Loss Of Innocence In Lord Of The Flies Essay

Savage Hair
Hair, murder, and a pig head on a stick. They may seem as though they have nothing in common, when in William Golding’s highly acclaimed novel Lord of the Flies, they all represent the loss of innocence and the descent into savagery. In Lord of the Flies a group of young boys are stranded on a deserted island after a failed evacuation. While on the island, the boys face the relentless brutality of human nature, the unforgiving heat, and reality of death and mankind. In Lord of the Flies, Golding delves into very heavy themes, one of the most prominent being the loss of innocence. Golding strengthens the loss of innocence by using many different literary techniques: symbolism in many forms, his noticeable shift in tone, and the

In the beginning he uses lighthearted and easygoing words and motions, often having them swimming around and acting almost carefree, as seen in the line “Ralph danced out into the hot air of the beach and then returned as a fighter-plane, with wings swept back, and machine gunned Piggy.” (11). Here the boys are seen having fun and making jokes, with no real fear or realization of their current situation and how truly deserted the are. The word “danced” has the connotation of happiness and grace, and is used in a happy and fun moment, and “wings swept back” make it seem as though Ralph is a free bird, flying through the air. Both dancers and birds are often seen as having grace and complete innocence. However, all happy and joyous words are carefully excluded from much of the latter half of the book, as the boys are later depicted dancing around pig corpse, taking something graceful and beautiful, and turning it into a satanic and dark moment, especially when they talk of killing her and slitting her throat. “Jack began to clean his bloody hands of the rock. Then he started work on the sow and paunched her, lugging out the hot bags of colored guts, pushing them into a pile on the rock while the others watched him,” (136).The boys are clearly losing their sanity and their humanity. Jack very calmly wipes blood off his hands and pulls out a bag of old pig guts, clearly they given way to savagery and

They ate most of the day, picking fruit where they could reach it and not particular about ripeness and quality. They were now used to stomachaches and a sort of chronic diarrhoea,”(59). It is clear that the littluns fear nothing and are at a complete relaxed stage in their life. They are unconcerned with anyone or anything else and their only conflict is themselves and nature, seeing as they gorge themselves and become very sick from doing so. Unfortunately, later in the book the man conflict is man vs man, during which time two boys are killed and another is hunted as a sport, which causes the entire island to burn (yet another symbol of their loss of innocence). “Ralph fastened his hands round the chewed spear and his hair fell. Someone was muttering, only a few yards away toward the Castle Rock. He hear a savage say “No!” in a shocked voice; and then there was suppressed laughter. He squatted back on his heels and showed his teeth at the wall of branches. He raised his spear, snarled a little, and waited,” (194). Here Ralph is being hunted by his former tribe mates, and he has completely given up his innocence and gave way to savagery (hence why his hair has fallen, his innocence is gone). It is seen here that there is