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About the Author • William Golding was born in Cornwall in 1911. During WW2 he joined the Royal Navy and took part in the sinking of the Bismark and in the Normady landings on D-Day. One of his goals was to look for an explanation in the nature of human beings, in their capacity for brutality and inhumanity – ideas he explores in LOTF.
Allegory • Allegory: is a form of extended metaphor, in which objects, persons, and actions in a narrative, are equated with the meanings that lie outside the narrative itself. The underlying meaning has moral, social, religious, or political significance, and characters are often personifications of abstract ideas as charity, greed, or envy.Thus an allegory is a story with two meanings, a literal meaning and a symbolic meaning.
LOTF as an allegory • LOTF can be read on different levels. There is the story that has the literal meaning, and the symbolic meaning. There are several ways in which the story parallels the rise of Hitler (or the rise of any dictator). Another aspect of LOTF is the use of mythand fable.
LOFT as Myth • A myth is an ancient traditional story of gods and heroes that has evolved over time and that embodies popular ideas and beliefs.
LOTF as Fable • A fable is a story with a specific moral or message, usually made up by one person (such as Aesop). • http://aesopfables.com/
Biblical Allusions • A biblical allusion is to use an image or reference from the bible in everyday language that has nothing to do with the original use of the image or reference. • Some biblical parallels in the story include Simon as a Christ-like figure, the island as the Garden of Eden. The message of the story is that evil is a powerful presence whose influence in us all must be recognized.
Chapter One: The Sound of the Shell: • The novel begins in the aftermath of a plane crash in the Pacific Ocean during an unnamed war. Ralph insists that his father, a commander in the Navy, will come and rescue them. Piggy doubts that anybody will find them, and suggests that the boys should gather together. • Ralph finds a conch shell, which Piggy tells him will make a loud noise. When Ralph blows the conch, several children make their way to Ralph and Piggy.
Jack Merridew, who leads a group which he addresses as his choir. Jack, a tall thin boy with an ugly, freckled complexion and flaming red hair, insists that he be the leader because he's the head boy of his choir. They decide to vote for chief: although Jack seems the most obvious leader and Piggy the most obviously intelligent, Ralph has a sense of stillness and gravity. He is elected chief, but concedes that Jack can lead his choir, who will be hunters.
Chapter Two: Fire on the Mountain: • Ralph announces that they are on an uninhabited island, but Jack interjects and insists that they need an army to hunt the pigs. Ralph sets the rules of order for the meeting: only the person who has the conch shell may speak. Jack relishes having rules, and even more so, having punishment for breaking them.
Ralph suggests that they build a fire on the top of the mountain, for the smoke will signal their presence. When they gather enough wood, Ralph and Jack wonder how to start a fire. Piggy arrives, and Jack suggests that they use his glasses. Suddenly, one of the trees catches on fire, and one of the boy screams about snakes. Piggy thinks that one of the boys is missing.
Chapter Three: Huts on the Beach: • Ralph complains that the boys are not working hard to build the shelters. • Jack says that Ralph is chief, so he should just order them to do so. • Ralph tells Jack that most of his hunters spent the afternoon swimming. • Ralph notices that the other boys are frightened. Jack says that when he is hunting he often feels as if he is being hunted, but admits that this is irrational.
Chapter Four: Painted Faces and Long Hair: • The boys quickly become accustomed to the progression of the day on the island, including the strange point at midday when the sea would rise. • The smaller boys were known by the generic title of "littluns.“ • The littluns spend most of the day searching for fruit to eat, and since they choose it indiscriminately suffer from chronic diarrhea.
Maurice, remembering how his mother chastised him, feels guilty when he gets sand in Percival's eye. • Roger picks up a stone to throw at Henry, but deliberately misses him, recalling the taboos of earlier life. • Jack thinks about why he is still unsuccessful as a hunter and he wants to find some way to camouflage himself. After painting himself, Jack seems liberated from shame and self-consciousness.
Ralph believes that he sees smoke along the horizon coming from a ship, but there is not enough smoke from the mountain to signal it. • Jack eventually does apologize about the fire, but Ralph resents Jack's misbehaviour. • Maurice pretends to be a pig, and the hunters circle around him, dancing and singing "Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in."
Chapter Five: Beast from Water • Ralph prepares an assembly and is very critical of the behaviour of the other children. • Jack, Piggy, Ralph and Simon discuss the fear and the beast. • Jack humiliates Simon when he tries to explain what he means about fear being something inside themselves, the evil that is in all people. • Ralph eventually loses control of the assembly and Jack leaves.
There are now two groups on the island and Ralph is reconsidering being chief (although Piggy and Simon both back him). • Scared and miserable, the boys are longing for a sign from the adult world – they are longing for the adult authority that would “make everything all right”. • Literary allusion: Three Blind Mice • http://www.rhymes.org.uk/three_blind_mice.htm
Chapter Six: Beast from Air • A pilot parachutes from an air battle and his dead body is carried to the mountaintop. • As his body is constantly moving as the breeze tugs his parachute, when SamnEric go to relight the fire they think it’s the beast! • The dead pilot is a reminder that the adults of the world are still fighting each other, although the “message from the adult world” is misunderstood.
The power struggle between Jack and Ralph continues with Jack rejecting the rules they’ve made. • Ralph manages to stand up to Jack’s challenge by reminding them of the importance of being rescued, but his hold on the leadership role is getting weaker. • Simon is the only one who doesn’t believe the twin’s story about the beast. • There is some foreshadowing about Piggy and Castle Rock….
Chapter Seven: Shadows and Tall Trees • See also: U2 song: Shadows and Tall Trees • Ralph is becoming disgusted with their appearance and the acceptance of their unpleasant condition as “normal”. • Simon reassures Ralph that he’ll get back all right. • Ralphs’ daydream tells us more about his background.
An important moment occurs with the pig – Ralph gains respect when he spears a pig, but not when he insists on the importance of living in a civilized manner. • The boys engage in a mock hunt and Robert is slightly injured. • The struggle of power between Ralph and Jack continues since Jack can’t cope with not being in charge.
Chapter Eight: Gift for the Darkness • Ralph is in despair and feels that the figure on the mountain has beaten them. He knows that without a signal fire they will never be rescued. • Jack is stung by a perceived insult to his hunters and uses the mood of fear and uncertainty to launch an attack to gain Ralph’s position as chief.
After he loses the vote, Jack leaves (and many others soon join him). • Only Simon appears to understand that the only way to rid themselves of their fear is to confront it and understand it – he wants to climb the mountain. • With Jack gone, Piggy is relieved and Ralph is more confident. • Jack is the “chief” of his own tribe and is very happy – his tribe follows him happier than does Ralph’s too.
Chapter Nine: The Lord of the Flies • Simon has an imaginary conversation with the Lord of the Flies. It tries to humiliate him and tells him he is just a silly little boy. • Golding uses the language of the schoolboy world of play and games to show the increasing level of savagery. The game of hunting becomes more and more vicious.
Chapter Nine: A View to a Death • The atmosphere of the story is like a storm building to its crescendo. Simon bravely climbs the mountain (alone) and discovers the true nature of the “beast”. • In an act of kindness and compassion, Simon loosens the parachute lines and sets the figure free before going down to inform the boys of what he has learned.
While Simon is learning about the beast, Jack is sitting like a primitive god, enthroned and garlanded. Jack has the power he has longed for and holds it through physical threat. • Simon’s appearance couldn’t have been worse timed – he appears during the start of the storm when the boys are at the most savage part of their “dance”, and he is killed by all in attendance.
Chapter Ten: The Shell and the Glasses • The horror of Simon's death is not the event in itself, but the role of Piggy and Ralph in the murder. The two attempt to justify their role in the death: they operated on instinct rather than on malice. • Ralph and Piggy still possess a moral sensibility; they realize that their actions are wrong and thus need to find some justification for their part in the murder.
Jack’s only solution to the problems that the boys face is to steal • The attack on Ralph and Piggy shows further movement away from civilized behaviour. • Here the violence used to gain Piggy's glasses, even if it is not fatal, is intentional.
Chapter Eleven: Castle Rock • The conflict between Jack and Ralph is shown as an explicit struggle between savagery and civilization. • The two struggle over whether there should be any ordered society at all on the island. • The final confrontation in which Ralph and Piggy face Jack and the other boys clearly demonstrates the divide between civilization and animalistic savagery.
Piggy joins Simon as the second martyr among the boys. • The two outcasts both died when they shattered the illusions held by the other boys. • (Simon dies when he exposes the truth about the nonexistent beast, while the hunters kill Piggy when he forces them to see their behavior as barbaric and irresponsible.)
Chapter Twelve: Cry of the Hunters: • Ralph is now an object to be pursued by the other boys, who seem no longer able to make the distinction between hunting pigs and hunting each other. • The boys are now complete savages without either a moral or a rational sensibility.
The final chapter demonstrates the self-destructive quality of the boys’ actions. • The boys are not only destructive to their enemies but to themselves. • Images of decay permeate this chapter, such as the Lord of the Flies, which has decayed until it remains only a hollow skull. • The spear with two ends serves as prominent example of the dangers the boys create for themselves.
The appearance of the naval officer at the beach prevents Ralph from being killed and the others from starvation: the boys are saved from the consequences of the fire through pure chance.
