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The Walking Dead Allegory

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Stories of the twenty-first century revolve around central themes or morals. For example, The Walking Dead is a narrative of how people in post apocalyptic societies prioritize close ones rather than strangers. A way novels address morals is through the structure of an allegory. Allegories depict for readers exactly what the author intends to convey through his writing. Each part of an allegory demonstrates a different part of the author’s message. Concepts existing outside of the novel, perhaps philosophical or metaphorical, are addressed through the novel in order to explain an indefinite idea or to shed light on a lesson the author teaches. One example of an allegory is the work Lord of the Flies. William Golding’s Lord of the Flies is …show more content…

World War II’s shocking and brutal battlefields exposed to Golding the sinister nature of humans, which he proves throughout Lord of the Flies. An example of human savagery in the novel is during the dance when “at once the crowd surged after [the beast or Simon], poured down the rock, leapt on to the beast, screamed, struck, bit, tore” (153). Encouraged by the chant and the excitement following painting each other’s faces, the children fiercely attack Simon. The islanders forget how to restrain themselves; they lose their childlike, lighthearted nature that is prominent at the beginning of the novel and they transform into barbarians because they are intensely killing and slaughtering Simon. Striking Simon, the boys are alarmingly malevolent, corresponding to Golding’s belief of humans in their natural state as evil. Further, savagery is present when the novel describes that “Roger ceased to be a pig and became a hunter…[there was] the throb and stamp of a single organism (152). Golding chooses here to show the inhumane part of humans themselves. Specifically, he characterizes Roger as monstrous as he does not refer to him as a human being while the boys rejoice in the circle. Golding begins the demonization of the kids who are the only humans on the island and it …show more content…

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

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