The Consequences of War
War is defined as armed conflict between different nations or groups of people. In the novel The Lord of the Flies, the characters face a war of their own. The novel takes place on an island in which a group of British schoolboys are stranded after being the only survivors of a plane crash. The boys have to work together in order to survive and be rescued from the island. However, they are eventually divided because of contrasting opinions and begin fighting amongst each other, which causes them to feel the repercussions of their actions. Lives being lost, nature being destroyed, as well as civilization falling, and people losing their innocence and descending into savagery are some of the consequences of war that the boys felt firsthand while on the island.
One of the consequences of war is the loss of the value of life that results in the loss of life. In Lord of the Flies, two of the main characters die, Piggy and Simon. As seen in the book, the quote, “Simon’s dead body moved out toward the open sea”, is contributing to the death of Simon (Golding 154). Simon was the most innocent boy in the story and unfortunately the first to die. Ralph and Piggy were so grieved with themselves, claiming that they had done nothing wrong, but actually had. Seen that they are bothered within themselves in what they did, Ralph speaks up to Piggy saying, “Piggy, that was murder. I wasn’t scared.”(Golding 156), with Piggy responding, “We was scared! Anything might have happened.” (Golding 156). These quotes that were spoken by Ralph and Piggy are showing that they really did care for Simon, they just did not realize it until the lost him due to the fighting of all the boys. Near the ending of the book, Piggy lamentably...
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...ives being lost, nature being destroyed, civilization crumbling around you while the people fall into the hands of savagery, and this causes people to lose their innocence. The boys on the island come to realize at the end that they have lost precious lives, destroyed the beauty of the island, and also seen that the civilization that they once had was gone. As the book says, “Like a bomb!” (Golding 28), the world is slowly becoming savage. If the world were to be like the lives of the boys while they were on the island, the world would be a disaster, and would be chaotic. Consequences of war is truly the main reason of why these boys fell apart with lives being lost, nature being destroyed, and the civilization crumbling right in front of their eyes in Lord of the Flies by William Golding.
Works Cited
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. New York: Penguin, 2006.
Lord of the Flies, a book written by William Golding, published by Faber and Faber and winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature is a story that talks about a group of school age boys who have landed on an unknown / uninhabited island during the second world war. Throughout their stay on the island they find ways to survive, such as finding and hunting for food as well as building basic needs like shelters and a fire. At a certain moment in the book two of the main characters, Ralph and Jack declare a war between each other because Jack refuses to have Ralph as the group’s leader for another second. This then leads to the division of the group as well as many scenes in which one sabotages the other. An example of this is when Jack’s tribe steals
Throughout the novel several different characters are introduced to the reader, such as Ralph, Jack, Simon and Piggy. With all these characters presented to the reader, one can get to see into their minds-eye, which allows the reader to analyze their character. In this case one could examine their basic morals and distinguish between the person’s natural instinct to rely on civilization or savagery to solve their problems. The author of the novel, William Golding, had a “first-hand experience of battle line action during World War II” which caused him to realize, “[that] The war alone was not what appalled him, but what he had learnt of the natural - and original- sinfulness of mankind did. It was the evil seen daily as commonplace and repeated by events it was possible to read in any newspaper which, he asserted, were the matter of Lord of the Flies” (Foster, 7-10). This being said by Golding leads one to the central problem in the novel the Lord of the Flies, which can be regarded as the distinction between civility and savagery. This can be seen through the characters that are presented in the novel, and how these boys go from a disciplined lifestyle, to now having to adapt to an unstructured and barbaric one in the jungle.
The novel Lord of the Flies by William Golding is about a group of boys that were on a plane crash in the 1940’s in a nuclear War. The plane is shot down and lands on a tropical island. Some boys try to function as a whole group but see obstacles as time goes on. The novel is about civilization and social order. There are three older boys, Ralph, Jack, and Piggy, that have an effect on the group of younger boys. The Main character Ralph, changes throughout the novel because of his role of leadership and responsibility, which shapes him into a more strict but caring character as the group becomes more uncivilized and savage
In conclusion, there were obviously many problems on the island in William Golding’s story, Lord of the Flies. The first thing that went wrong on the island was that there were no adults on the island. Without adults on the island, the kids have no one to give advice, and no one to keep them in check. The second thing that went wrong on the island was that there was no good form of government on the island. Without a good form of government, the boys all turned to different dictatorships, and everyone knows that those almost always end in multiple deaths, and this story is not an exception. The last thing that went wrong on the island was that there were only boys, and of course they did what boys do, and that is fight, just like any other boy in the world. In the end, there were a few boys that didn’t live to see a military man come and save them.
William Golding, the author of the novel The Lord of the Flies, lived through the global conflicts of both world wars. World War II shifted his point of view on humanity, making him realize its inclination toward evilness. His response to the ongoing struggle between faith and denial became Lord of the Flies, in which English schoolboys are left to survive on their own on an uninhabited island after a plane crash. Just like Golding, these boys underwent the trauma of war on a psychological level. Ralph, one of the older boys, stands out as the “chief,” leading the other victims of war in a new world. Without the constraints of government and society, the boys created a culture of their own influenced by their previous background of England.
The Presentation of the Deaths of Simon and Piggy in William Golding's Lord of the Flies
In the Lord of the Flies, William Golding uses characters to convey the main idea of his novel. The story begins with a war, and a plane carrying several young boys, who are being evacuated, is shot down from the sky. There are no adult survivors; however; the boys were brought together by Ralph blowing on the conch shell. They formed a tribe to stay alive. Slowly the stability and the sense of safety in the group started to deteriorate, similar to the downfall of societies during World War II. They are not only hunting animals now, but they are killing each other like savages in order to stay alive. This action of killing is like Hitler during World War II and his persecution of Jews during the Holocaust.
Lord of the Flies is a story of hardships, death and ultimately, survival. The island on which the boys are on presented many difficulties. In this situation, there was no time for fun and games, work was much more important. The group consisted completely of pre-pubescent young boys and the thing that destroyed their democratic ways was the allure of having lots of fun, swimming, feasts and other enjoyable activities. If the splitting of the groups, i.e when Ralph and Jack went their separate ways, the bloodshed would have been prevented. But when the decision came to be made, the promise of "..having fun.." from Jack was too much for most of the boys, and that decision they made turned them into the bloodthirsty savages who murdered two innocent boys.
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
In chapter 10 Lord of the Flies by William Golding, readers are shocked to see Simon’s death come about in such a grotesque fashion. When Ralph talks to Piggy about the murder to make himself feel better, Piggy refuses to acknowledge his partake in the “accident”. Ralph confronts Piggy, “At last Ralph stopped. He was shivering. “Piggy.” “Uh?” “That was murder.” “ You stop it!” Said Piggy, shrilly. “ What good’er you doing talking like that?” He jumped to his feet and stood over Ralph. “ It was dark. There was that- bloody dance. There was lightning and thunder and rain. We was scared!” “ I wasn't scared,” said Ralph slowly, “ I was- I don't know what I was.” “We was scared!” said Piggy excitedly. “ Anything might have happened. It wasn't- what you said.” He was gesticulating, searching for a formula.
Deterioration of civilization has been speculated by the human race for centuries. As a result of these prophecies of chaos, William Golding wrote the novel Lord of the Flies in 1954. The story concerns a group of schoolboys that have been beached on an island from the crash of a plane. Without any adult guidance, the children must last and construct a civilization of their own until rescue arrives. Unfortunately, the schoolboys are quickly struck by the corruption of their attempt of an orderly and innocuous civilization. Various atrocious occurrences take place in the novel once the society starts to decline; from bullying, to endeavored murder, to indisputable murder. In my opinion, the deterioration of the boys’ civilization on the island is attributed to the existence of subsequent distrust, the need to survive, and tribal alliances.
The Lord of the Flies is an ultimately pessimistic novel. In the midst of the cold war and communism scares, this disquieting aura acts as a backdrop to the island. The Lord of the Flies addresses questions like how do dictators come to power, do democracies always work, and what is the natural state and fate of humanity and society, getting at the heart of human nature in a very male-dominated, conflict-driven way. The war, the plane shot down, and the boys' concern that the "Reds" will find them before the British, shows Golding's intention of treating the boys' isolated existence as a microcosm of the adult military world.
Not just a World War, any war. Wars begin between citizens of the same country, over artificial boundaries and misunderstandings. All these things ultimately come down to one thing; power. In Lord of the Flies, power is an unavoidable force for the boys. As the boys are getting rescued, Golding writes, “On the beach behind him is a cutter, her bows hauled up and held by two ratings. In the stern-sheets another rating held a sub-machine gun.” (Golding 201). Finally, the boys are being rescued by civilization. A naval officer finds the boys at the end of their chase, with his navy ship in the backdrop. Golding can have have anybody find the boys; a fisherman, a cruise ship, a helicopter flying overhead. Instead he chose a naval officer. He makes it very clear what the ships intentions are, pointing out the “sub machine guns” hanging off the side of the ship. While the boys are immersed in their own war on the island, a much larger one is playing out in the real world. Machine guns are mercillious killers, with no purpose other than to kill. Kind of like what the boys have become; tools of a bigger picture. Golding uses this imagery to reinforce his message that the desire for power is hardwired in human nature, but humans have just used the veil of civilization to justify their actions. Along with the naval ship imagery, the officer has some sharp words for the boys: “ 'I should have thought that a pack of British boys-you're all British, aren't you?- will have been able to put up a better show than that-' "(Golding 201). The officer is showing his disappointment that the boys have resorted to such violent ways. Especially clean cut British boys. In an instant, the boys are no longer savages. They are just little boys who took a game too far. The naval officer is also insinuating that British boys especially should not act like that. As if British boys are inherently better than all other boys, which Goulding clearly
It is clearly seen that during the early half of the Nineteenth Century, many people and groups of people promised many things to others for support in wars or revolutions. Most of these promises were never meant to be kept, nor where they kept. As seen in these documents, Russia, Mexico, and the Middle Eastern territories of the Ottoman Empire all experienced turmoil during this time. England and France had their eyes set on Ottoman land for after World War I, whereas Mexico was dealing with their own revolution and Russia was experiencing their own political change.
The final scene in Lord of the Flies is one of despair. At the end of chapter twelve, the boys are found by a naval officer. Unfortunately, he has found them too late. Being taken back home is not going to erase all that happened on the island. Their sins and moral crimes will follow the group until the end of their lives. Ralph has lost all hope in mankind. He now knows how cruel and selfish humans can be: “Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of a man’s heart, and the fall through the air of a true, wise friend called Piggy.” (202). Before the island, these children were living in blissful ignorance; this event was their disillusionment. Not only has the group had an affect on each other, but they have greatly impacted the island