Lord of the Flies Chapter 9 Structural Analysis
In his novel Lord of the Flies, William Golding writes an unsettling story about the horrific reality of human nature and the battle one faces between humanity and savagery when civilization is taken away. Set during World War III, a group of boys aged six to twelve years old are stranded on an island with no resources except the ones they can acquire from the island. The boys create a civilization with rules for themselves in order to survive. As the novel progresses, the civilization unravels and the boys’ humanity lays on a fragile line, bordering on savagery. In his novel, Golding uses many structural elements to achieve a specific effect on the reader. One specific example is in the haunting passage in which the boys are overcome by bloodlust to kill the Beast and eventually murder one of their own, Simon. By using
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As the boys’ bloodlust increases, they chant, “Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!” The chanting continues as they pounce on Simon, ready for the kill. Golding intersperses repeated chanting throughout the passage as the boys got closer and closer to killing the “beast.” By doing this, Golding shows how determined the boys were on killing the beast. The repeated chant is a constant reminder of their final goal, to brutally kill the beast. This causes an unsettling feeling for the reader because the closer Simon’s murder gets, the more the boys’ bloodlust increases. The continuous chant about spilling the beast’s blood implies a horribly brutal and bloody death for Simon as the boys cannot recognize the difference between Simon and the Beast in their animal-like state, causing the reader to feel unsettled about the future and Simon’s fate. Thus, by repeating the chant of the boys, Golding emphasizes the increasing bloodlust as the boy’s pounce on their prey, Simon, creating an unsettling
Even though Golding had an enormous amount of symbols throughout his novel, Simon is the first to recognize the complication posed by the beast and the “Lord of the Flies” that is, that the monster on the island is not a real, physical beast, but rather a savagery that lurks within each and every human being. As a final point, the loss of social structure within civilization can lead to the demise of the boys on the island whether it's between Ralph vs Jack, the boys vs the island, or even Simon vs
It may have taken millions of years for humans to evolve enough to create the sprawling civilizations known today, but it only takes a few months for a group of civil, educated boys to regress back into savagery. In his novel Lord of the Flies, author William Golding depicts a group of young British boys getting stranded on a deserted island sans adults. The boys must look out for themselves, forming a basic governing system and trying to survive. But the challenge soon proves too much to handle, and order deteriorates. William Golding conveys the universal theme of civilization vs. savagery in his novel Lord of the Flies using the literary elements of plot, setting, and characterization.
In William Golding's novel, "Lord of the Flies", Golding provides several varieties of moods and tones. One identified most throughout the novel would be man's inherit evil. This could be represented by the savagery actions and lack of civilization on the island. In the novel "Lord of the Flies", Golding conveys man's inherit evil by savage behavior and the loss of civilization.
In Lord f the Flies, a group of young choirboys are stranded on a deserted island after their plane was shot down and crashed, and the boys interact with many different types of elements that symbolize distinctive thoughts and ideas. In William Golding’s most famous novel, Lord of the Flies, Golding expresses law, intellect, and purity through his characters.
William Golding’s first novel, Lord of the Flies, presents his pessimistic views on society and our primitive instincts. He demonstrates this through the setting of an inhabited island where a group of British schoolboys have been stranded. The entire story becomes a symbol for the theme Golding is developing, about the darkness within humanity. Within Lord of the Flies, William Golding highlights the flaws of society back to the flaws within human instincts, through the characters of Jack, Roger and Simon.
In the novel, Lord of the Flies, William Golding is able to use his outstanding writing abilities utilizing metaphors, symbolism, and other literary devices to establish a hidden message throughout the novel. The hidden message that Golding builds on is that there is a natural evil inside every human being, which is suppressed in an organized society through laws, rules, and punishment. The young boys in the novel are on an island all by themselves. There is no punishment for their actions, therefore allowing that evil to come out of most of the boys. All humans have an innate evil within them and that evil is brought out when there is a lack of civilization and consequence as seen in Simon’s murder,
Throughout Lord of the Flies, Golding shows his views of the inherent evil of humans. He shows how humans can be in such a savage state, practically mimicking the way of life of their prehistoric ancestors. He exemplifies this with acts of carnage carried on by the young stranded children. It all started with a slight urge to hunt down a pig and then continued on to murdering another human being. Golding shows his views best at the end of the book with the boys being rescued by a Navy crew, which would go on to war it self.
William Golding’s novel ‘The Lord of The Flies’ tells the story of a group of English boys isolated on a desert island, left to attempt to retain civilisation. In the novel, Golding shows one of the boys, Jack, to change significantly. At the beginning of the book, Jack’s character desires power and although he does not immediately get it, he retains the values of civilized behaviour. However, as the story proceeds, his character becomes more savage, leaving behind the values of society. Jack uses fear of the beast to control the other boys and he changes to become the book’s representation of savagery, violence and domination. He is first taken over with an obsession to hunt, which leads to a change in his physical appearance This change
William Golding is heavily influenced by his service to the royal navy and the events of World War One. “Human beings are savage by its nature, and are moved by urges toward brutality and dominance over others”. This is a recurring issue in William Golding’s, Lord Of The Flies. Not only where characters demonstrate elements of human nature beyond civilized human beings as they were struggling in a society with no rules nor civilization, but also as the novel is Golding’s attempt to trace the defects of society back to the defects of human nature. The world is an evil place within which living without fear would be a dream come true. The fear inside the boys had a major negative impact on the dramatic change of human nature
When Golding really wants things to be noticed, he repeats them and makes them stand out. One of the main things They repeat is “Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood! Do him in!” (Golding 175). The boys chanting this over and over as they rip simon apart show how the fear and savagery can take over. Jack wants to be big and bad and in charge. He took a small, normal fear, and turned it to something terrible. He wants to hunt and to kill to prove his worth, and they say this to egg each other on. To remind them that this is okay because it is ‘the beast’ and ‘the beast’ is bad, but the savagery they created is so much worse than any beast could ever be. This shows how hard it really is to go back and fix civilization, especially when someone was murdered because of the
In the Lord of the Flies, William Golding composes a tale about a group of British schoolboys who crash into an abandoned island without any adult supervision. Their own power is the one thing controlling one another on the island, and after a while, the gentle and friendly schoolboys evolve into more evil, confused humans, influenced by war, violence, and survival of the fittest. Golding showed Biblical signs throughout the novel, which compares the positive side of people with evil, and in the text, the boys grow and emerge into totally different people from the beginning. From the oldest to the youngest kids, all of them are influenced by the acts of each other and the World War going on, as the novel is placed in the 1950’s, a time of fear
The Lord of the Flies by William Golding is an allegory that explores the instinctual evil humans possess and how this evil manifests into our societies. The book demonstrates this through young boys who are stranded on an island due to a plane crash. Despite their best efforts, the lack of adult guidance inhibits the boys from maintaining an orderly society. The boys turn to their survival instincts, many of which are evil. The lack of order exposes the internal savagery within the boys, resulting in an understanding of the flaws within all humanity. The Lord of the Flies uses the innocence of young boys to show the societal impact of human errors through their lack of adult supervision, the desire to inflict violence, and the need for authority over others.
The Lord of the Flies by William Golding is tale of a group of young boys who become stranded on a deserted island after their plane crashes. Intertwined in this classic novel are many themes, most that relate to the inherent evil that exists in all human beings and the malicious nature of mankind. In The Lord of the Flies, Golding shows the boys' gradual transformation from being civilized, well-mannered people to savage, ritualistic beasts.
In the book, Lord of the Flies, William Golding demonstrates the true evil human nature through children that are abandoned on a desert island. In the novel, Golding shows how that the children can not organize themselves, which represents the true chaos of our civilization without leadership. In Lord of the Flies, Golding uses the boys to depict anarchy and the downfall of civilization by emphasizing the lack of structure amongst the children.
In The Lord of the Flies by William Golding there are many symbols and themes present that influence the boy’s actions on the island. Fear and the fragility of civilization are two motifs that coerced the boy’s actions and behaviors, while also leading them into the destruction of themselves and their environment.