Lord Of The Flies And The Most Dangerous Game Analysis

William Goldning’s Lord of the Flies is an allegorical novel where literary techniques are utilized to convey the main ideas and themes of the novel. Two important central themes of the novel includes loss of civilization and innocense which tie into the concept of innate human evil. Loss of civilization is simply the transition from civilization to savagery; order to chaos. The concept of loss of innocense is a key concept to innate human evil because childhood innocense is disrupted as the group hunted animals and even their own. Through the use of literary techniques these ideas are seen in the passage where Simon confronts the “Lord of the Flies.”

The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, is an allegory that connects the boys’ behavior in the novel to the basic behavior of human nature. In the novel, the boys fear a wild beast that has the potential to kill them off. However, Simon, a quiet boy, finds that the beast is not an animal that everyone should fear, but is a part of each boy himself.

“When you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may know that your society is doomed”(Rand). This was stated by Russian-American novelist Ayn Rand; the extract relates to the novel William Golding wrote called Lord of the Flies. Golding wrote about a group of schoolboys trapped on an island from a plane crash. The boys had to figure out how to survive without grownups. Trying to survive was difficult because they had to have common sense and order. They lose those traits throughout the book which resulted in selfishness and corrupt behaviors.

What went wrong in the Lord of the Flies? Some may say Jack and some may say Roger, but what are the real reasons for the downfall of the boys? They are, the loss of hope, the loss of order, and the passing of time.

“We all have a social mask, right? We put it on, we go out, put our best foot forward, our best image. But behind that social mask is a personal truth, what we really, really believe about who we are and what we 're capable of” (Phil McGraw) one once said. In Lord of the Flies the characters wear a social mask that opposes their true feelings. Written by William Golding, the story revolves around a group of boys who become stranded on an island and must depend on themselves to survive. They elect a chief, a boy named Ralph. However, as the story progresses, the group become influenced by Jack, an arrogant choir chapter boy. Intriguingly, although they desire to be with Jack and join his tribe, the boys remain with Ralph for most of the story. The rhetorical triangle, which analyzes a speaker or writer based on three ideas- ethos, pathos, and logos-, helps many to better understand the children’s actions and mentality; ethos focuses on the credibility and ethics of the speaker while pathos concerns how the speaker appeals to the emotions of the audience and logos is about the speaker’s use of evidence to appeal to the audience’s sense of reason. The boys stay with Ralph because of Ralph’s use of ethos but prefer to be with Jack because of Jack’s use of pathos and ethos which shows Golding’s message- humans were masks.

Throughout history, philosophers have wondered what essentially drives people to do certain actions. It is not clear whether these actions occur because humans are intrinsically good or bad. Nevertheless, the novel Lord of the Flies and several historical examples provide some insight into why human beings may be fundamentally bad.

Lord of the Flies, is a story of adventure through nature and the human conscious. A group of boys, stranded on an island, become savage instead of working together and start fighting each other. Golding’s use of the war allegory shows how children can become as ruthless as adults when put in the right setting. While on the island, personality traits surfaced, such as their savageness, their carelessness, their fear, their hunger power, and their childish pride. Golding uses a war allegory to show than man will naturally conflicts with others because of a thirst for power, fear of the unknown, and pride.

Simon is intellectual and begins to hint at a possible truth about the “beast.” For example: “As if it wasn’t a good island.” (Golding 53) Simon observes that it is as if the island was bad, and not the good island from when they first arrived. Something was haunting the island, and it began as soon as they arrived. The author uses Simon to indicate the island is good, however, it is a different story when it comes to what arrived on the island. As the novel continues, the reader begins to find out what it was, that was haunting the boys. For example: “ What I mean is… maybe it’s only us.” (Golding 96) This quotation shows how Simon is the first character in the novel to see the “beast” not as an external force, but as a component of flawed human nature. This shows how Simon's words are central to Golding's point that primitive human evil exists. The author makes Simon have a seizure and create the “Lord of the Flies,” providing insight about the “beast.” For example: “Or else, said the Lord of the Flies, we shall do you. See?” (Golding 159) This quotation provides the reader with the idea that the “beast” links itself to the negligence of the rules that society has placed, and how savagery tries to overtake civilization and purity. It is like saying “The evils inside the other boys and I will get

In both, “The Most Dangerous Game” and Lord of the Flies, disgusting violence is displayed through

On August 18, 2017, a man named Mark Johnson was mountain biking in Massachusetts when he crashed while rounding a curve on a trail. His bike tire was jammed into a pile of rocks, causing him to fall down a declivity. He was found by other bikers, but it was too late. Although some may argue that it is not completely his fault due to the fact that he was not expecting the pile of rocks to be the obstruction that led to his death, he had complete control over his decisions and actions to take the risk and mountain bike. Putting oneself in a similar situation with control of all decisions being made and all actions being performed means that he or she should be held accountable for their actions. This is prevalent in the characters and

The Lord of the Flies by William Golding follows the story of a group of young boys as they attempt to survive on an island without any adults. The boys soon struggle with staying in touch with civilization, and some lives were lost before they were rescued by a man in the British navy. Another text, "The Most Dangerous Game", by Richard Connell conveys the story of a man named Rainsford who got stranded on an island. While on the island, Rainsford meets a man called Zaroff who informs Rainsford that he has found a new animal to hunt. To Rainsford's horror, the new animal turns out to be humans, and before long Rainsford was set up to be Zaroff's new quarry. After three long days of being

The book, Lord of the Flies, by William Golding is an allegorical novel, set in the middle of a fictional nuclear war, on a deserted tropical island. When a plane chock full of schoolboys has a crash landing, the boys find themselves on an island without adult supervision. As one boy named Ralph, takes charge of the boys, there is a dispute over who is the better leader, Ralph, the clear choice, or the lead choirboy, Jack. Finally they vote in Ralph. As the book progresses we see some of the children start to have savage instincts such as not trying to get rescued and killing pigs in morbid ways. That starts the persisting question of to go savage or not. This theme continues throughout the book. The theme that caught me the most was the symbolism of the characters in this story.

He explains how communities band together and eventually crumble in Lord of the Flies using the plot, characters, writing, and style as allegorical representations of the destruction and savagery he witnessed in World War II. Golding attempts to convey to the reader the idea that civilizations do not thrive, humanity is evil at its core, and that societies are catastrophic. Golding’s novel is an allegory for unsuccessful societies and how those societies bring out humanity’s beastlike side. Allegories in general allow readers to extract from works of literature deeper meaning, guided by authors as they attempt to prove a point. Allegories are written for a singular meaning which cannot be an element in the novel itself; it is a useful and effective tool in literature and it is advantageous for authors to use to convey a thoughtful message to the

In the words of the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Our greatest evils flow from ourselves.” In other words, humans harbor an ever present looming evil nature within themselves. Evil is the force in nature that governs and gives rise to wickedness and sin, or the wicked or immoral part of someone. This concept of inner evil rising to the surface permeates William Golding’s dystopian novel Lord of the Flies, that evil exists in every human, proven through the characterization of the marooned boys. There is foreshadowing of the dangers of the boys’ inner immorality from one of the boys, Simon. As the novel progresses, evil starts asserts itself as the boys cast off their innocence and humanity, and turning against each other. Even the

“Isolation is a dream killer” (Barbara Sher). In the novel Lord of the Flies written by William Golding, kids stranded on an island must figure out how to survive. By hunting pigs and building shelters the kids tried to subsist on the island. Through the process of hunting, the kids became cruel, evolving to the point of being barbaric. Thus, through the barbaric actions of the boys and the outside world, Golding shows that savagery exists in all people.