The novel “Lord of the Flies”, written by William Golding, follows a group of british schoolboys on their fight for survival. After their plane crashed on an island, the boys must work quickly and alert someone of their whereabouts. The main character, Ralph, opens the story as “a fair boy” meaning the favourite or the most promising of a group. Leading the boys was a job Ralph took on proudly and all was sain in the world. The boys aren’t on the island long before the idea of order starts to fade. The island when through a force of change that changed all of the boys, especially Ralph. Ralph ,originally being a beloved leader, is overcome by the others boys behavior and the powers of the island, then becomes opposite to when he first …show more content…
While approached by Simon and a littlun named Perviel, they start to share the terrifying story of a “beastie” that lives on the island. Ralph is reluctant to believe that a beast is on the island and feels it is a distraction from what the boys should really be doing. Once told about the beast Ralph says, "I 'm chief. We 've got to make certain [that there is no beast]. Can 't you see the mountain? There 's no signal showing. There may be a ship out there. Are you all off your rockers?"(6,238) This shows that Ralph is wanting to get back to what is important and is not concerned with a beast. As the story progresses and the boys are on the island longer, they start to not rebel against the rules and Ralph. The order Ralph had created within the group has started to diminish and the boys have become lazy and refuse to do their jobs. After demanding and pleading for the boys to work and explaining their jobs importance, the boys continue to stray from the rules. Wanting guidance and intelligence Ralph turns to Piggy, the smartest of the boys, for help to get the rest of the boys back in order. Ralph starts to notice some brutal behavior going on between the boy, for example, when the boys were fearful of the beast, they chanted in a circle, “ Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!” This being a very brutal chant and they soon after Simon is killed by the other boys. Ralph refuses to take any responsibility or remorse for this act and this also shows how
Ralph's civilization guides him to build a fire signal. Ralph tells the boys, "We can help them find us. If a ship comes near the island they may not notice us. So we must make smoke on top of the mountain. We must make a fire" (Golding 38). Ralph explains that smoke can signal to passing ships to let them know that they are on the island. Ralph's sense of leadership leads him to go looking for the beast. The narrator explains Ralph's emotions, "His mouth was tight and pale. He put back his hair very slowly... He forced his feet to move until they carried him out on to the neck of land" (Golding 105). Looking for the beast frightens Ralph, but he does it anyway to protect the group. Ralph takes responsibility for his mistakes. Although he physically did not kill Simon, Ralph took responsibility to taking part in his murder. Ralph realizes what he has done and discusses with Piggy, "That was Simon... That was murder" (Golding 156). Ralph realizes that he had just taken part in the killing of his friend. In conclusion, Ralph's self-image of civilization, responsibility, and leadership lead him to built a smoke signal, searched for the beast, and took responsibility for killing his
Simons dead body moved out toward the open sea” (Golding 154). In The Lord of the Flies, Golding refers to the boys as Beelzebub, a powerful demon in the bible that was very dangerous and feared almost like a powerful savage. In one of the big plots of the story is when Jack and his hunting crew goes and murders Simon and when you are a child you are raised to not murder anyone in this world; therefore the boys lose their human nature and murder Simon. The real problem the boys experience on the island is that they succumb human nature; therefore their solutions of authority structure by a dictatorship versus the conch and ultimately they fail.
Ralph's character comes back stronger than ever before in the final chapters of the novel. At this point, like Simon had before him, Ralph becomes aware of the savagery existing within all the boysincluding himself. "That was Simon," he admits to Piggy, recalling the barbaric act he took part in. Even upon Piggy's death, Ralph still manages not to let the savagery overwhelm him, only momentarily considering joining Jacks tribe for safety. His firsthand knowledge of his aptitude for sin builds his motivation to throw down the Lord of the Flies near the end of the novel. By the time he finally realizes the evil on the island is within the boys themselves, it is too late for Ralph to fight for anyone but himself.
All our personalities compare to a character from Lord of the Flies, and I found myself to be an ENFP or an idealist; someone most comparable to Simon. An ENFP or an idealist personality displays characteristics of being extroverted, intuitive, feeling and perceiving which. Furthermore, passionately concerned with positive improvement, being kind, warm, sympathetic, distracted and motivated were all trait described in the personality test for the ENFP. Due to our selflessness, how introverted and extroverted we are, and how we can think both logically and emotionally, makes Simon and I most similar.
Throughout William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, Ralph, the fair leader, responds to his unique setting in many ways. At first, Ralph is ecstatic to be on the island and to have freedom from society’s rules, adult oversight, and authority. However, he soon finds that an irrational fear of a beast threatens to cause chaos amongst the boys. When all rules are forgotten and savagery reigns without authority, he takes it upon himself to enforce the island’s laws in an effort to maintain order and morality. In the end of the novel, Ralph starts to lose the specific character traits that define him as a productive leader as the boys around him turn savage and civilization fades from their society. As the novel progresses, Ralph takes a turn for the worse as he forgets his core principles and is tempted by savagery.
Even good people can do terrible things if put in certain situations. In Lord of the Flies by William Golding, innocent boys become cruel murderers when they were stranded on an island with no adults. This was the result from the actions of the characters, change of behavior, and symbolism.
If the boys would think for themselves rather than listen to others’ opinions, then maybe they would have chosen to follow Ralph’s civilized ideas to survive on the island. Jack’s tribe, who kills a hog and offers its head as a sacrifice to the beast, attracts more and more boys for its ambition and beast frenzy. Meanwhile, Ralph, speaking in a moral manner, tries to convince the boys to think for their own survival. Jack slanders Ralph by saying, “He’s not a hunter. He’d never have got us meat. He isn’t a prefect and we don’t know anything about him. He just gives orders and expects people to obey for nothing" (126). The three characters Ralph, Piggy, and Simon are excellent examples of staying true to what one believes in, even though it may be tough avoiding popular
Ralph, the elected leader of the group of British boys in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, strives to take the civilized society to which he is accustomed and apply it to society on the island on which he and the other boys are stranded. As leader, this task seems simple – tell the other boys what they each need to do and expect them to do it. Ralph fails to realize the difference between the rest of the boys and himself.
They continue with their savage ways of hunting and looking for a beast, rather than worrying about other responsibilities. Ralph tries to reason with Jack about many topics such as the signal fire being their only chance of rescue (Golding 176). Ralph knows that if they want someone to rescue them, keeping a signal fire lit at all times is their best shot. Jack seemingly does not care about this at all. He and his group abandon the fire and go hunting for pigs (Golding #). This is quite alarming as he has already lost sight of getting off the island. Roger kills Piggy with a boulder that simultaneously destroys the conch, leaving Ralph as the only representation of civilization in any form (Golding 180-181). Ralph is one of the few alive that cares and understands that civilization and order are important. He strives to save the group, but he cannot save the group unless they help themselves. Instead of being productive and unable to get their priorities straight, the remaining boys are more worried about killing Ralph than getting off the
The boy’s,including Piggy, stop thinking clearly and start doing what seems right at the time without thinking about the consequences. When something bad does happen the boys do not accept it and do not about what they have done. An instance of this is when Simon is brutally slain by the boys at their feast. The next day when Ralph and Piggy talk about what happened, Ralph thinks rationally about what they had done and participated in while Piggy does not think clearly and blames Simon for his own death saying, “Coming in the dark--he hadn’t no business crawling like that out of the dark. He was batty.
Ralph asks the boys to build huts and find food. In the process of doing this the boys, and littluns goof off, and Ralph is infuriated. Making him lose his temper and altering his personality with the patience he had for the boys. Although Simon does help Ralph build the huts and find food, Ralph doesn't find that it is enough and thinks that everyone ends up doing the work very wrong. During this event it shows Ralph becoming aggressive with the boys, and the things that go on, on the island. In chapter Ralph calls a meeting discussing the rules and character Jack becomes loud and tries to take over the meeting and leads off with a group of boys and his “choir”. Leaving Ralph alone angered and with fewer boys.
While attending the feast, all the boys beat another boy, Simon, who was mistaken to be a beast on the island, to death. Ralph realizes he enjoyed killing Simon and battles within himself to discover what drove him to murder. Ralph loses his friends to Jack’s tribe, either by murder or capture and is left alone. He evades Jack and the tribe, until discovered by a naval officer, who was searching for the source of commotion on the island. As the boys are rescued Ralph weeps for the death and lost of innocence that occurred on the island. In Lord of the Flies, Ralph changes as he recognizes the loss of innocence and destruction of law and order on the island. Ralph’s government is dismantled and the rules become obscured as the boys begin to enjoy hunting and murdering. Ralph is unable to draw the boys back together after Jack leaves, in contrast to him rallying the boys together shortly after crashing on the island. These changes contribute to Ralph's symbolic reference as the icon for law and order, leadership, and the temptation of
Piggy then says, "That little' un that had that mark on his face – where is – he now? I tell you I don’t see him" (Golding 46). Ralph then realizes he needs to be more stern and aware as a leader. Ralph sees a ship and runs to the top of the mountain, only to find out that the fire has gone out. Ralph starts to rant, "There was a ship. Out there. You said you'd keep the fire going and you let it go out!" (Golding 70). This is unusual for Ralph, as a leader, to get so angry at Jack for letting the fire out when Jack went to go get meat. This is a negative change because the others might look at him differently. Sam and Eric see a freaky looking creature and tell Ralph that it is a beast. The biguns go look for the beast and when they get to the castle no one wants to go in, so Ralph says, "I'm chief. I'll go. Don't argue" (Golding 104).
Upon returning, Ralph declares that there are no adults on the island and they will have to organize themselves in order to get off the island and yet still survive. Additionally, he also announces that the conch shell from then on will be used to speak and if you are in possession of it the rest of the assembly must stay silent and listen. In the midst of the gathering, a young boy with a mulberry-colored mark steps forward in fright. He says that he saw a snakelike creature the previous night and calls it the "beastie". A wave of terror falls over the young ones which lead the older boys to reassure them that it was simply just a nightmare he must have had. After Piggy's statement about the fact that no one knows where they are, Ralph decided
Although Ralph, Piggy, and Jack obtain a solid amount of knowledge, Simon is the one who sees the darker sides of things. He realizes the beast is not something that exists in the jungle. Rather, it already exists inside each boy’s mind. It is the amount of savagery and evil that slowly overwhelms the boys and leads to further complications.