#1: Animalistic Diction
Civilization has been established as a way to cage our inner beasts. If taken out of civilization, that beast is allowed to roam and thrive. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the use of animalistic diction illuminates that if a group of people is let into the wild without any form of civilization or concrete rules, they will slowly lose touch with the society they left. Unless we are kept under control with a sense of ethics, we will do bad things knowing they are wrong, and turn into something we did not know lived in us and will not change back.
Once someone realizes they have been let free, they will allow that side of them show. During a plane ride, something goes terribly wrong and crash lands into an island with no adult survivors. After a few months of being on an inescapable island in the middle of nowhere, the little boys trapped there start getting bored. Except not long after arriving on the island, once Jack, one of the boys, decides to see what he is capable of by going out hunting by himself. “Jack himself shrank at this cry with a hiss of indrawn breath, and for a minute became less a hunter than a furtive thing, ape-like among the tangle of trees.” (Golding, page 49). When Jack first starts his hunt, he leaves as a human, but once he gets into it, he starts to show parts of his inner beast. Soon, Ralph, too starts to turn into a savage beast and become less human. “Ralph carried away by a sudden thick excitement, grabbed Eric’s spear and jabbed at Robert with it. ‘Kill him! Kill him!’... 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.” If a so-called leader can easily be turned into a something unknown, there is definitely a beast inside us all. We need to keep a working society in order to keep our inner beast caged and not let the craving for power stand in our way.
#2: This is What Happens
Little spurts of power excite us, but too much power is never a good thing. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the thirst for power controls the boys and overrides them, illustrated through change in characterization. A working society hides the savage part of people, and if for some reason that fails, everyone will all turn into something we did not know lived inside us and will not change back, our innocent lives forever ruined.
Once someone realizes they have been let free, they will allow that side of them show. While on a plane, something goes wrong and a group of boys crash land onto a remote island. After a few months of being on an inescapable island in the middle of nowhere, the little boys trapped there start getting bored. Except not long after arriving on the island, Jack, one of the boys, decides to see what he is capable of by going out hunting by himself. “Jack himself shrank at this cry with a hiss of indrawn breath, and for a minute became less a hunter than a furtive thing, ape-like among the tangle of trees.” (Golding, page 49). When Jack first starts his hunt, he leaves as a human, but once he gets into it, he starts to show parts of his inner animal. After realizing he has a thirst for power, Jack has to become less and less human to quench it. “Jack was on top of the heap, stabbing downward with his knife… Then Jack found the throat and the hot blood spouted over his hands. The sow collapsed under them and they were heavy and fulfilled upon her.” (Golding, page 135). Instead of hunting for food, Jack killed the pig over and over again so he could see more blood and stab the flesh of the pig. He felt the need to slaughter this innocent mother pig just to fulfill his need for power. This is what happens when we are separated from society. This is what happens when we don’t have rules. This is what happens when we are let free. #3: Light vs. Dark
Darkness is thought to hold evil. For this reason, most little kids are scared of the dark, and when they hear an unknown bump, they are not confident it is not a monster until the lights are turned on. In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, he uses the repetition of light to illuminate how the boys on the otherwise deserted island realize that light triumphs over darkness, but there is not enough light to cover the darkness of the night; there is not enough light to cover the evilness that seems to lurk there. Even when things seem to be going down the wrong path, there is still hope, until we stop believing. If nothing seems to be going right, we must not be without faith, or we will be plunged into darkness.
Without civilization, we will fade into the darkness. While on a plane, something goes wrong and a group of boys crash land onto a remote island. Even though the way they were raised showed a promising future, once they are released into the wild, their inner beast is allowed to roam free. Before they know it, the boys are plunged into savagery, or darkness. “A sliver of moon rose over the horizon, hardly large enough to make a path of light even when it sat right down on the water… there were other lights in the sky, that moved fast, winked, or went out, though not even a faint popping came down from the battle fought at ten miles’ height.” (Golding, page 95). Once the boys have become savages, there is no turning back into the light they used to be. There is not enough light left in them to cover up the darkness they have encountered. When the lights go out for good, they will never come back on. #4: Ineffective Ending
In William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, the ending was too abrupt and simple to be effective enough to leave an impact on the audience. The last chapter was sudden, yet thrilling for the reader. “The red rock that he could see at the top of the cliff vanished like a curtain, and he could see figures and blue sky. A moment later the earth jolted, there was a rushing around in the air, and the top of the thicket was cuffed as with a gigantic hand.” (Golding, page 193). Although the beginning of the conclusion was fantastic, keeping readers at the edge of their seats, the ending just sort of happens, and lingers in the air like fog until the reader realizes it was the end. This makes it very easy for the reader to forget about the moral of the book and the impact the heavy topics were supposed to have. The incomplete ending not only forgets to remind the reader of the moral of the story, but also leaves them hanging, craving for closure and filled with questions, wondering what happened to the characters.
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