Book Cover Meaning

The relationship between the beast and the school boys is played out through the conversation between Simon and the Lord of the Flies. The Lord of the Flies or pig head tries to intimidate and forewarn Simon calling him,”just an ignorant, silly little boy”(184) and scoffs at Simon for thinking the beast is “something you could hunt or kill!” (184) Golding uses this symbolic beast, the Lord of the Flies, to reveal the truth to Simon which is that “they”(184) the boys on the island are the real beast. Before Simon faints the Lord of the Flies warms Simon that

To begin with, the personalities of the boys Ralph, Jack, and Piggy on the island are each represented by the beast as the boys try to kill the beast. A representation

The twins start to say that the beast has both teeth and eyes and claws but they could not have possibly seen the beast that up close and personal without getting hurt or killed. The twins say, “It was furry. There was something moving behind its head- wings. The beast moved too-. That was awful. It kind of sat up. The fire was bright. We’d just make it up- more sticks on- There were eyes- Teeth- Claws” (Golding 100).This quote shows that if people believe the twins saw and found the beast, other kids may go and try to find it which can be very dangerous. This relates to the beast because if they saw the beast, why do they still believe Simon and Piggy when they say they should be scared of themselves or in all the boys on the island. While, Ralph and Jack both see it as a boar which is a totally different point of view than the twins. The text states, “That was not the beast. That was the boar. I hit him. Why didn’t you grab him?I tried” Golding 113) This quote shows that Ralph and Jack both see the beast as a pig which means it is not just one individual person seeing this, its two so more people may believe them more. This relates to the beast because it shows how all the boys on the island all have different point of views towards the beast and what it

No one would think kids could turn to cruelty, but in this book, you can see how human nature turns people against each other. Not all the boys turned to savages, but there were times when there actions were questionable. Take Ralph for example, he was probably one of the least barbaric of them all, yet he still joined in on the murder of Simon. While most boys were oblivious to their descent into savagery, people like Ralph realized this ongoing turn, “I’m frightened. Of us. I want to go home, Oh God, I want to go home” (Golding 157). The boys change into savagery was not gradual, and even some of the boys, such as Ralph or Simon, noticed this trend, and as young boys it frightened them to realize the fact that they were altering towards inhumanity. As well, the book represents that evil is in all of us. The Beast, which was the main source of evil in the book, was not real. It was only a figment of the boys’ imaginations. While the Beast wasn’t a physical thing it represented

Throughout the whole novel, the beast progressively grew, later symbolizing the inner savagery of humans without discipline. In the infancy of the novel, the boys started to recognize a strange beast like creature that had shaken and alarmed them. One of the boys declared to the others- “But if there was a snake we’d hunt it and kill it. We’re going to hunt pigs to get meat for everybody, and

The Youngins, are well, young. These boys are all alone, on an island, so if anything they do not understand happens, they have to have an excuse. Thus the Beast comes into play. The boys are scared of the beast at night also, because this is when they cannot see what's going on. Thus blaming the beast for everything. Ralph laughed, and the other boys laughed with him. The small boy twisted further into himself."Tell us about the snake-thing." "Now he says it was a beastie." "Beastie?" "A snake-thing. Ever so big. He saw it." "Where?' "In the woods.” "He says the beastie came in the dark."(35). The younger boys, are very scared of the so called “Beast” even claiming to see it. But, they are scared just more than just the fact that there is something on the island. It is the fact that they can not explain everything that is happening on the island. So, it is safe to say, that in Lord Of the Flies, the Beast means way more than just a literal monster, and resembles all the problems that are happening, to the

Initially, the “beast” is a manifestation of fear. According to the text, “ the darkness of night and forest with spirits and demons… previously only appeared in their dreams…” ( Document A: The Terrors of the Unknown). To clarify, these young boys, with no adults to comfort them, are afraid of the darkness and projecting their fears

At one point, a dead pilot lands on the island, which the boys (specifically SamnEric) mistake for the beast they already feared (document D). At this point in the story, the beast begins to represent war. This new “beast” came after Ralph wished for a sign from the grownup world in chapter 6. It symbolizes that even the adults can’t help them, quite possibly because they are no better. As stated earlier, everything the boys do is influenced by their perception of the existence of a beast. When Golding writes the beast to represent war, the boys actions are related to war (document C). This first shift in the meaning of the beast occurs as the boys are beginning to divide, as Jack begins to undermine Ralph. The beast symbolizes war; the boys are consumed by the beast, and the boys are eventually consumed by

Initially, the beast can represent fear. The beast is simply a pigment of the young boys imaginations, “The younger children first, then gradually the older ones… begin to people the darkness of night and forest with spirits and demons which had previously appeared only in their dreams or fairy tales.” The boys externalized their inner fears with objects from the outside the world, resulting in the creation of the “beast”. In Document B, the young boy with the mulberry-colored birthmark, claimes to have spotted

It is very clear that the beast is fear. It states that the children externalize their fears by making them “come to life” (Doc A). It also says in document B that “he” -the little boy with the mulberry birthmark shape- “was dreaming… He must have had a nightmare. Stumbling about among all those creepers.” As you can imagine, this is all fright. The children

It’s very common for children to fear monsters, but it didn’t come as a shock when in Lord of the Flies by William Golding, a group of children were stranded on an island in the midst of a war. Consequently, the children’s fear started to develope into the mysterious figure called the “beast”. The beast has multiple symbolic meanings behind it.

In Document 1, it says, "The younger children first... begin to people the darkness of night and forest with spirits and demons... They externalizations these fears into the figure of a beast." The author of this document describes how the fear of the children - starting with the youngest of them - resulted in a "beast" being created as a figment of their fears. In Document 2, an excerpt from chapter 2 of Lord of the Flies, it describes a boy with a birthmark covering his face describing a "beastie" he saw. In the book, the boy whispers his thoughts into Piggy's ears, who then says it aloud for the rest to hear, "He wants to know what you’re going to do about the snake-thing... Now he says it was a beastie... A snake-thing. Ever so big. He saw it." The boy also mentioned that the "beast" he saw turned into vines in the trees when day came. This is an example of the boys externalizing their fears; the boy with the birthmark was overrun with fear during the night, and thought he saw a snake-like beast in the trees, but it is implied that what he saw was only vines. In Document 2, it later describes Ralph as feeling as though he was "facing something ungraspable". This "something" he was facing was fear and irrational thinking. Though the boys think there is a beast with them on the island, it is only their fears being externalized as an imaginary

He talks of a slithering object at night that tries to get him while he is asleep. There are many other accounts of a beast, even a pig’s head and a parachutist who did not make it. The Beast represents the fear that the boys have and everyone. The Beast is altered or changed depending on the boy who speaks of it because they are all scared and afraid of what might be out there or what might come to be. However, after Simon is killed and the parachutist is gone, they believe the beast is gone.

The boys project their irrational fears as a derivative of their immaturity, in an attempt to identify a realized external enemy. Literary critic Lawrence S. Friedman explains, “Too immature to account for the enemy within, the boys project their irrational fears onto the outside world. The first of these projections takes the shape of a snakelike “beastie,” the product of a small boy’s nightmare.” (233) The boys’ irrational fear of the unknown, one of a small boy’s nightmare, only serves to exemplify their immaturity in handling situations like this. It is a stepping stone to events to come, prophesied by Simon. In addition, the character of Simon alludes to the fact that there evil ‘beast’ can really be traced to their internalized innate evilness. Simon argues, “maybe there is a beast… What I mean is… maybe it’s only us.” (Golding 89) While all of the boys attempt to explain the phenomena of the ‘beast,’ Simon is the one who realizes that the boys themselves are the evil ‘beast’ they perceive. There is no external force, the ‘beast’ only serves to be a placeholder for the boys’ true primal nature. However, it is Simon’s death, at the hand of the boys themselves, that only serves to prove that evil truly exists in all of these boys. Friedman suggests, “The ritual murder of Simon is as ironic as it is inevitable. Ironically, he is killed as the beast before he can explain that the beast does not exist. His horrid death refutes is aborted revelation: the beast exists, all right, not where we thought to find it, but within ourselves.” (236) His death is truly the tipping point, a point of no return for the boys. After his killing, Simon’s philosophy of inner evil is realized. It is clear that his own philosophy is what ultimately leads to Simon’s death, as unfortunate as it may be. It is reflected of the group’s fear of the unknown, and their

Published in 1954, Lord of the Flies was author William Golding’s first attempt at writing. It would eventually go on to become one of the most successful novels of his time and helped establish him as one of the best British novelists of the twentieth century. At first it did not do very strong in sales, but later became a bestseller in the United States as well as Britain, even awarded the esteemed Nobel Prize for Literature. “Don’t judge a book by its cover” is a common English idiom reiterated around the world, and it means you should not judge the value of something without properly assessing it. However, that is only applied when a judgement or review is passed on the entire content of said item without studying it. In the case of the cover of Lord of the Flies, or of any literature in general, numerous amounts of information may be deduced or hinted at. The book has a cover page that is quite astonishing, is powerful enough to evoke emotions out of the audience, and provides a sneak peek into the plot itself.