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What Does The Beast Mean In Lord Of The Flies

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Golding’s Lord of the Flies has a major character development of one of the most thought provoking and important characters in the novel. It’s whether you choose to believe this character as an actual character that will help you understand the true meaning of the Beast. In truth, the Beast is the figment of imagination in almost all the boys and through the irrationalities brought through fear of it; they proclaim on all sorts of ideas of what the Beast may be. I for one believe that the Beast is a character as it represents fear and the savagery inside us all and is a major idea in the novel rather than a reoccurring theme. However, I believe that one particular derivation of the Beast means much more than should have been expounded upon. Simon’s Beast …show more content…

I believe that the Beast’s second name and the title of the novel, Lord of the Flies actually means something. Lord of the flies, what does this mean? It can easily be explained as the pigs head on the double sided stake with the flies flying around it. But, there could be more to it. Much like Simon’s Beast was pertaining to us as humans so too with the meaning of the Beast. Think about it this way. The Beast is all controlling. It is considered to control the lives of the children of the island, much like the boogeyman who kept children at bay with their behavior. The Beast frightens the children and creates irrationalities with in them all. One can say it rules them. That’s the key word; rules. If the Beast rules then it must be a ruler. Ruler is synonymous to the word lord. So here we have a connection. The Beast rules and so must be a lord. Now if the Beast is a lord, who are its subjects? If we pay attention to the title of the book we see the words lord and flies. We have established what or who the lord is but the flies are still unknown. It’s simple, the flies have to be ruled by the Beast and those that are controlled by the Beast are non-other than the

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