Literary Elements Of Symbolism In Lord Of The Flies By William Golding

Piggy's glasses were used many times throught out the novel, where the boys of the island in fact found good use in them, and treated his glasses as a symbol of discovery,innovation, and source of civilization on the island such as creating the fire. Once piggy's glasses break, the innovation, and civilization is gone.

Firstly the reason why the glasses are so important to the novel is how it enables a smart logical boy named Piggy to see and performs tasks.This is shown in the text when Jack steals Piggy’s glasses and Piggy becomes immobile without it. “His voice shrieked of terror as Jack snatched the glasses off his face… I can hardly see!.. Jus’ blurs,

He planned and eventually took Piggy’s glasses from Ralph’s group, and the glasses were the only way the boys knew how to start a fire. Ralph and Piggy were one of the few left who were not savage and cared about keeping a fire alive to be saved. The author writes, “You go away, Ralph. You keep to your end. This is my end and my tribe. You leave me alone.’ … ‘You pinched Piggy’s specs,’ said Ralph breathlessly. ‘You’ve got to give them back.’ ‘Got to? Who says? ” (176). Jack did not realize the importance of keeping the fire going, and by not giving the glasses back to the few people who still cared for the fire, makes their chances of being saved even slimmer than before. Jack’s decisions will only benefit himself and keep him in power, another act of being selfish, but does not want his actions to be

"His specs-use them as burning glasses” (Golding 40)! This quote was said when Ralph and Jack were trying to figure out how to start the fire. As the boys figure out how to use the lens to create fire, the idea of the glasses representing power increases. The glasses also seem to increase their chance of survival. The spectacles represent the kids’ only way of achieving the fire, by reflecting the sun’s rays. "Piggy's glasses flew off and tinkled on the rocks"(Golding 71). In this quote, Jack hit Piggy on the head, resulting in the fire. This caused the glasses to be broken. When the glasses broke, it represented the last tie of humanity the boys

Piggy’s glasses also foreshadow the death of the boys. They represent knowledge and wisdom. When the glasses were perfectly intact, the boys had no life threatening issues or cases of savagery. However, once Jack and his tribe killed a pig, Jack slapped Piggy, causing one of the lenses to break. This represents the breaking point in the story, where some of the boys start to succumb to savagery, and eventually murder Simon. Then as soon as Jack steals Piggy’s glasses and destroys the other lens, all of the boys officially become savages and soon after horribly kill Piggy himself. In a way, Simon’s experiences with seizures and faint spells foreshadow his death. For example, the novel states in the first chapter, “Then one of the boys flopped on his face in the sand and the line broke up. They heaved the fallen boy to the platform and let him be.” This disability makes him significantly weaker than the other boys on the island. Being the weakest link, he would be the most likely person to be killed, whether on accident or on purpose. And, finally, Piggy’s name itself foreshadows his

In the beginning of the Lord of the Flies we are introduced to two young boys, who have survived a tragic plane crash. The aircraft was an evacuation plane and it was transporting the group of boys out of England. One of the boys named Piggy is trying to catch up to the other boy, Ralph. Piggy is described as being very fat and shorter than Ralph. He wears “thick spectacles” (William Golding 7) and he is the first to determine that they are on an island. Piggy is also the one that knows how to use the conch shell and comes up with the use of it, which is to call everyone else to the beach. He believed the conch created order. Once the conch had been used we are introduced to more boys and they gain interest in Piggy’s glasses. They discover that Piggy’s glasses can start fires and they refer to them as “burning glasses” (Golding 40). The boys also rejoiced when they discovered that his glasses could create the fires. They proclaimed, “His specs - use them as burning glasses!” (Golding 38). The spectacles symbolize Piggy’s intelligence, which distinguished him from the others. Without the glasses Piggy would be blind and he would not know what to do. Although Piggy is portrayed as being physically weak and not having a great chance at survival, he is the only one that seemed to know a few survival skills. He is the one that created the fire, sundial and shelter. Without his glasses he would not be ‘intelligent’. His appearance and personality cause him to be shunned

Piggy’s glasses symbolize reason and innovation throughout the novel; Golding most commonly associates them with the old camp on the beach. Piggy uses his glasses to help the other boys “see”, both physically and intellectually, the best and most reasonable way forward. However, any time they are removed from the beach, chaos is sure to ensue. The first time, when the boys go to the mountain to light the signal fire, Jack and the other boys pry the glasses off Piggy’s face so they can use them as burning glasses. While this does help to start the signal fire so they can be seen by a ship, it traumatizes Piggy since even at this point in the book, Jack scares him. Despite the good intentions for the fire, it soon goes wild and even results in the death of a littlun.

now all lead to destruction of the boys government. The conch that piggy found at the

While trying to determine the agenda for starting the fire, Jack exclaims, “‘His specs—use them as burning glasses’… Jack snatched the glasses off his face…‘I can hardly see!’” (Golding 40). The boys use Piggy’s glasses because it allows them to have more creative ideas and become more knowledgeable. They use his glasses for one purpose only: to create a rescue fire in order to save themselves.

For example, throughout the entirety of Lord of the Flies, William Golding uses symbols to advance the plot of the novel. These symbols, whether they are characters, objects, or ideas, hold the power and ability to change the course of the story. The symbols can hold many different meanings and can conflict with one another, with this new issues arise which further develops the plot of the story. As said before, Mr. Golding uses symbols in his story Lord of the Flies to control the destiny of the boys.

Now that Jack is the new leader, he became increasingly greedy and mean and exiled Ralph and Piggy from the rest of the group and left them with nothing, except the symbolic origin of fire, Piggy’s glasses. But instead of using fire to divide the group they really needed everyone to come together to create a controlled fire so they can get off the island. While Ralph and Piggy were away Jack tried to create a signal fire, but instead he created a bonfire that ended up burning a quarter of the island down. Piggy walks up to Jack and told him (because he was mad): “‘You got your small fire all right.’ ...the boys were falling still and silent, feeling the beginnings of awe at the power set free below them” (55). Jack knew they needed a fire, but in reality Jack did not understand how destructive a fire can be, and ended up killing one of the members of the group with the fire he started. With the group divided and life in danger, the symbolic meaning of fire is displayed in this quote because it demonstrates the order and or chaos that is on the island and how nearly all of the social structure on the island could be lost as quickly as the time it takes to snap Piggy’s glasses in half.

Once his glasses break many of the actions made by the rest of the boys are unintelligent and show the true savages that boys can be with each other. In the book Piggy is like an adult figure that stops the boys from being such savages. When the boys are attempting to start a fire to cook food and stay warm, Ralph grabs his glasses and hold them up to the sun and it starts a campfire. Without Piggy’s intelligence the boys would probably have killed each other and if there were only a few boys left then it would be challenging for the military to find the boys. The military would see all the dead bodies and think there were no survivors from the plan crash.

Williams Golding’s book,Lord of the Flies, is an allegory. An allegory is when a story or poem have a hidden meaning, usually a moral. A symbol could also be another definition for allegory. One example from Lord of the Flies could be found in the very first chapter “The Sound of the Shell”. The shell or “conch” as the boys had decided to call it is allegorical because they use it as a way of calling for the other boys after they found out they have crashed and are stranded at an unknown island. ”

Piggy’s glasses were the first sign of technology used on the island, and it allows the boys to transform the environment to fulfill their needs. Piggy and his glasses provide intellect to the boys; without his glasses, things will become disruptive in the society. While Piggy’s glasses were still intact, the group created fire that brought them out of their troubles and into a “partyish” behavior (133). From the sapling Ralph used in the beginning of the novel, to the spears the boys made for hunting, technology was vital for survival and allowed them to accomplish duties. Even simple substances such as clay were innovatively used by Jack and his hunting crew to hide / mask themselves from the pigs.

William Golding agrees with the theme when he writes, “Ralph stood away from the pile and put the glasses into Piggy’s groping hands.” (pg.24) In writing this, William Golding is trying to explain to us that Ralph is standing up for Piggy, who is not liked by the group, by giving him back his glasses from Jack who stole them. This shows that Ralph has not given up on Piggy, as he is another survivor trying to make it out alive. Moreover, William Golding states, “‘I got the conch.