Power In Lord Of The Flies Quote Analysis

Meanwhile, Ralph values the group over himself, and wants everyone to have a say in any decisions made. Jack gets fed up with his lack of power, so he decides to try to become the leader. He asks if anyone wants to come with him, and says, “Hands up?’ said Jack strongly..... ‘How many think –’ His voice trailed off. The hands that held the conch shook. He cleared his throat, and spoke loudly. ‘All right then.’ …. The humiliating tears were running from the corner of each eye. ‘I’m not going to play any longer. Not with you’”(127). Jack acts like a little kid in this scene. This hunger for power demonstrated by Jack has made him corrupt, so much that he will not tolerate being with the others if he can’t be the leader. Jack tries to portray an image of manliness, but it is evident that it is not true when he starts crying. Qualities like this are why Jack is incapable of being the leader. Overall, Ralph is able to handle the power that he is given in a more mature way than Jack.

As a base of human desire and need, power has always been one of the number one desire of mankind since the dawn of time. To place yourself above others, or gain control over your followers or a situation brings safety and comfort to a leader. A well written example of this concept lies within the twisted world created by William Golding in his, “Lord of the Flies”. Throughout the story, Jack seeks power above all else, and stops for nothing in this lustful quest of dominance. We can get a glimpse of Jack’s desires through his iron grip within his choirboys, how he clashes with Ralph, and how Jack’s actions bring about a deeper symbolism underlying within the story.

Every human being has things that are not perfect within them. Almost all of these things we can not control. Even with these traits, people have learned to live together in peace and harmony with each other. There are so many different faults that a person can have. This does not mean faults on the outside, those do not matter, but on the inside, rather. One may want to put something off, not help when it is needed, or say ‘I’ll do it later.’ Someone else might be scared, fearful of what is ahead, or timid. Or, any other person might be thinking their way is the only way, and anyone who does it wrong is incorrect. All of these traits are faults of our own human nature, and there is nothing we can do about it. Fear, judgement, and procrastination--all are faults that we can not control as human beings.

(Violence) "Ralph too was fighting to get near, to get a handful of that brown, vulnerable flesh. The desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering.” (Golding 114-115)

The power-hungry will often feel the need for absolute control, hardly ever getting what they desire, they will often be portrayed as crazy and vicious. The same can be said for Jack; all he wants is to be the leader and make the decisions, but Ralph is the one in control. Jack’s desire for power is ruining his own image, and the well being of the other boys. Without the supervision of adults his morals and values took a turn for the worst.

Power is key part of the book “Lord of the Flies”, the topic of power in the book can relate to a quote by Martin Luther King, Jr., “I am not interested in power for power’s sake, but I’m interested in power that is moral, that is right, and that is good.” In the book there are two characters that can somewhat relate to this quote, one character affirms the quote and one refutes it. Ralph is the character that affirms the quote he uses his power to help the community not use his power to command the community. Some actions that Ralph takes that shows are “If we have a signal going they'll come and take us off. And another thing. We ought to have more rules. Where the conch is, that's a meeting. The same up here as down here.” This shows how Ralph tries bring the

People today believe that to be powerful you have to be known and rich. While that may be partly true, an individual is powerful if they possess the ability to show responsibility, courage, determination, and initiative.

William Golding’s Lord of the Flies presents a story of a group of boys who become stranded on an island together, and in their struggle to survive; some begin to fight for power. Having power makes them feel in control of their situation; however, this power struggle quickly begins to consume them. Golding uses the power struggle between Ralph and Jack, the two main characters, to illustrate the power struggle between good and evil.

People are controlled by Society in many ways, such as the clothes they wear, and the music they listen to. It all depends on the society. The way people are controlled by society is by the rules that are made, like when Sam n’ Eric became traders it was a rule that they could not leave Jack’s tribe.With the bad society the boys are in on the island, When Piggy gets knocked off the cliff and died the boys were not upset, they were angry and continued to try and kill each other. Since there are no adults on the island they have to take care of themselves which turns into them trying to hunt and kill each other.

Sometimes whats ideal in a situation is not what the truth of the situation and can cause your ideals to be lost. In William Golding’s novel, “Lord of the Flies”, he demonstrates a shift in some of the characters from the thought of idealism to the reality and truth of the world. Ralph is a good example of this shift, he starts out thinking the island will be a fun place and they’ll have fun waiting to be rescued, but soon he realizes that there is going to be more hardship and struggles to keep up the moral and hope of rescue. In the book Ralph wanted to keep everyone safe and get them off the island, but Jack wants to be a leader and messes up his plans, making it so that Ralph is alone in his plan to get rescued.

“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.

The conch was used to call meetings and whosoever held it, had the power to speak. Jack starts to disobey the conch because he is turning more and more savage-like. “[T]hey closed in on the struggling pig, knowledge that they had outwitted a living thing, imposed their will upon it, taken away its life like a long satisfying drink,” thought Jack. As the story progresses, Jack realizes he wants to kill pigs, not keep fires going for rescue. Jack shouted, “We don’t need the conch anymore.” At this point in the novel, Golding is showing the reader that because Jack is lusting for power, he is turning into a ferocious monster. By turning into a savage, he has lost all sense of civilization and democracy.

As Jack is devolving, there is notable point where it speeds up. Jacks reaction after seeing himself with a mask on is described as "He looked in astonishment, no longer at himself but at an awesome stranger" (Golding 68). Golding uses this archetype to help Jack descend to a lower level. Jack doesn't feel the pressure of society when he wears a mask allowing him to be more susceptible to his urges. In addition to masks, the conch is symbolic to law and order. The boys at the end of the book haven't completely gone crazy because the conch was still an order enforcing figure on the boys. However, when the conch finally breaks the boys lose it and are fine with killing Ralph and following

After all, what influence does power have on people? It is clear that power varies by definition, but should it have any effect when experienced? Several researchers suggest that power is defined as a relevant approach to obtain some future apparent benefit. According to Polity, “In the state of nature as Hobbes describes it, where trust is nonexistent, one is forced to act as if one's gain were always another's loss” (Read, 1991). In other words, one’s gain must come at a different person’s expense. Following that, power is said to relate to conflict. In the book Lord of the Flies, William Golding illustrated how Jack’s gain of power came at Ralph’s expense. In the beginning, Ralphs was in charge of the group of the boys, but Jack eventually took over and lead to a great conflict between the two.

Certain people act differently when they have so much power because they never know what to do with it. In Lord Of The Flies by William Golding there is many ways of showing that people abuse power. In the novel Ralph is the leader and he was picked by all the boys that are in the island with him. Jack was one of the boys who turned wild and wasn’t fair with any of the boys and he wanted to become leader and take over and turned all the boys to kill. People shouldn’t have so much power or citizens shouldn’t feel afraid of those who have that type of power. People abuse power because it makes them think they can do so many things if they take over and win all that power. When someone has all that power they abuse it by being in control and just being a leader and they would want more and more power.