William Golding: Lord Of The Flies

steffee said:

Has anyone seen the Japanese film, Battle Royale? It is very similar to Lord of the Flies, or the book Coral Island by Ballantane?

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I'd say the closest paralell to 'Lord of the Flies' in Japanese culture is probably "Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids" by Kenzaburo Oe; and a cracking read it is too.

regards,

K-S

Just started Lord of the Flies as a second read while i'm on my lunch at work. I've heard lots of hype about this book and because i wasted my time at school i never got chance to read it.

I'm about half way through and i'm enjoying it so far

Willam Golding-Lord of the Flies

I finished this book a while ago and was in this crazy hunt to find people who will discuss it with me. I enjoyed this book-so much that I search ed the internet for interpretations. This book is filled with symbolism and it was a pleasure discovering each allegory. I in fact enjoyed the fact that he used kids in order to show the dark side of human nature. By using a symbol of innocence and happiness he explained that a dark side exist within all humans. Also, this is probably one of the first time in literature that somebody considered the idea that kids can be monsters. And god, can they, even under the rules of the civilized society, and not on an island. What did you think about the book?

third_eye, we already had a thread about this book so I merged your post in it.

Also, this is going to be one of my next readings. I'll be sure to come by and discuss it once I've read it.

This is a book which I have resisted reading, ever since learning of its general nature. That humans have a dark side hardly needs proving, as far as I am concerned. The Bible was concerned about that a long long time ago.

But if you enjoyed it, more power to you. That dark side is there. :flowers:

Of course kids can be monsters. They learn empathy and kindness from adults. Ever see a kid pull the wings and limbs off of a bug just because they could? Or skin a frog alive? Kids are monsters until someone teaches them otherwise.

sparkchaser said:

Of course kids can be monsters. They learn empathy and kindness from adults. Ever see a kid pull the wings and limbs off of a bug just because they could? Or skin a frog alive? Kids are monsters until someone teaches them otherwise.

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Or until they know some suffering themselves as they grow up, and learn empathy.

Great book, BTW, and if it's a little disturbing, the reason is that it makes us aware of the facts you mentioned above.

Lokeo13 said:

Lord of the Flies

I have to read Lord of the Flies over the summer for my class. I may not be giving it a fair chance, but i cannot get through it. Is it really a good book? I heard it was a classic, but i don't know why.

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I love this book. Really haunting and yes, a classic. The disturbing "society" the kids create and its breakdown are chilling examples of what can and does happen in the real world.

I wrote paper on this book many years ago. I'm surprised to learn how much of it I have retained. So for what it's worth here are some of my observations.

Golding's book, The Lord Of The Flies (1954) was meant to serve as an expos'e of human nature in its primal state. It was also meant as a scathing attack and rebuttal to another novel about children, The Coral Island: A Tale of the Pacific Ocean (1858) by R.M. Ballantyne. In Ballantyne's book the children, who are also isolated on an island without adult supervision, have a wonderful time and revel in many adventures.

Golding's use of children to depict the primal state of human nature was a stroke of genius. He is making the statement that "evil" is INHERENT in human nature and is not the result of acquired conditioning resulting from exposure to evil behavior in others. We consider children to be untainted by evil and innocent, but in reality the children in the novel are exhibiting the same traits as the adults beyond our purview during the time frame of the novel - adults who are engaged in war.

The Beast is revealed to the character, Simon, who is represented as a sort of mystic in an epiphany resulting from his encounter with a pig head stuck on a spike which is covered with flies. In Simon's reverie he imagines that the pig head speaks to him and reveals that The Beast is not some monster lurking in the jungle, but rather the tendency to evil lurking within the children themselves. Simon, much like Jesus, attempts to take this revelation to the others, and like Jesus is killed for his efforts.

This book is drenched in symbolism and metaphor which makes it a good study for students:

The whole book is symbolic in nature except the rescue in the end where adult life appears, dignified and capable, but in reality enmeshed in the same evil as the symbolic life of the children on the island. The officer, having interrupted a man-hunt, prepares to take the children off the island in a cruiser which will presently be hunting its enemy in the same implacable way. And who will rescue the adult and his cruiser? - William Golding

EXAMPLES:
1) The creepers (jungle vines) are a symbol of the forces which retard progress.

2) At one point in the book some of the children reach the far side of the island and from a cliff they observe the waves crashing against the rocks below. As the waves retreated they gave the impression that the island was moving backwards - a symbol of the regressing social mores and civilized conditioning of the children.

3) The conch shell is the symbol of authority and civilized, collective behavior.

4) Piggy's glasses are a symbol of technology and the benefits to be derived through its use. They can be used to keep the signal fire going (progress), or, as they were used after being stolen by Jack, to aid the designs of the warrior caste. Technology can be used for either good or evil (think nuclear power).

5) Percival Wemys Madison is one of the younger children. At the beginning of the book can recite his name and address, but by the end of the book he cannot. He, as well as many of the other children, have broken with their past and have lost the knowledge of their personal identities.

I know this book is an important work but I can honestly say that it is one of the few works I hate with a passion.

My problem with the philosophy espoused in it, is that it assumes that man is inherently evil when this is patently not true and the 'evil' of this theory is that it gives people an out making them not responsible for their actions. The truth is we have free will. We are neither inherently good nor inherently evil but exist between the two states and at any given moment, for any given action, or reaction have a choice.

Does our choice result in good or harm, blessings or curses, joy or sorrow? It is always a choice how we choose to act and any one who says otherwise is simply avoiding the burden of responsibility.

Meadow337 said:

I know this book is an important work but I can honestly say that it is one of the few works I hate with a passion.

My problem with the philosophy espoused in it, is that it assumes that man is inherently evil when this is patently not true and the 'evil' of this theory is that it gives people an out making them not responsible for their actions. The truth is we have free will. We are neither inherently good nor inherently evil but exist between the two states and at any given moment, for any given action, or reaction have a choice.

Does our choice result in good or harm, blessings or curses, joy or sorrow? It is always a choice how we choose to act and any one who says otherwise is simply avoiding the burden of responsibility.

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I agree that it has more to say about choices. Not all of the children in the book are evil. But we have evolved over millions of years in which the tendency to what we refer to as "evil" was a requirement for survival. It's easy for us to pass judgement today on what is good and evil, but in a natural state our inherited primal instincts will win out. Man first domesticated animals, it is believed, about 80,000 years ago. It took another 78,000 years before he perfected the viaduct. And only about 2000 years later to put a man on the moon. Our technology has grown exponentially and we tend to reflect this technological progress parallel with moral progress .... but this is not true. We are, to all extent and purposes still Cro-magnon man and it would take little in the way of a natural, or man made disaster which limited resources for life necessities to see a barbaric struggle for survival which would negate all moral considerations.

I agree that this is a difficult book to come to grips with, and much like Steinbeck can be difficult to read; but I think Golding is correct in assuming that the majority of people, when given a choice, in extremis, to aid their fellow citizens or themselves will choose the latter. I have seen examples of this in my own life. Not nice to witness but true. Of course there are exceptions to this rule, but they are so rare that we have invented special terms for such people .... "heroes" and "saints".

DATo said:

I agree that it has more to say about choices. Not all of the children in the book are evil. But we have evolved over millions of years in which the tendency to what we refer to as "evil" was a requirement for survival. It's easy for us to pass judgement today on what is good and evil, but in a natural state our inherited primal instincts will win out. Man first domesticated animals, it is believed, about 80,000 years ago. It took another 78,000 years before he perfected the viaduct. And only about 2000 years later to put a man on the moon. Our technology has grown exponentially and we tend to reflect this technological progress parallel with moral progress .... but this is not true. We are, to all extent and purposes still Cro-magnon man and it would take little in the way of a natural, or man made disaster which limited resources for life necessities to see a barbaric struggle for survival which would negate all moral considerations.

I agree that this is a difficult book to come to grips with, and much like Steinbeck can be difficult to read; but I think Golding is correct in assuming that the majority of people, when given a choice, in extremis, to aid their fellow citizens or themselves will choose the latter. I have seen examples of this in my own life. Not nice to witness but true. Of course there are exceptions to this rule, but they are so rare that we have invented special terms for such people .... "heroes" and "saints".

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which is beyond a pity because if more people were taught personal responsibility (and I believe there is no point in human history in which this was not true) maybe 'hero' and 'saint' would be redundant because we would all be making better choices.

"which is beyond a pity because if more people were taught personal responsibility (and I believe there is no point in human history in which this was not true) maybe 'hero' and 'saint' would be redundant because we would all be making better choices."

This is the crux of it. Man must be taught responsibility, and like Sparkchaser said, we are taught about right and wrong behavior by our parents (or someone else). We are born with the inclination to do bad things in pursuit of what we need (want).
In Judaism they call the evil inclination "yetzer ra". At it's most basic level we depend on it, because it causes us to eat, drink, procreate, etc. But, we are also born with the inclination to do evil to acquire these things. You don't get the good inclination (yestzer Tov) until you reach an age of maturity. If you do good as a child it is because you have been instructed to. How well you do at this depends on how well you were instructed. When you become of age you become responsible for choosing which inclination you will follow.
I tend to agree with this philosophy. I think that evil does inherently exist in mankind. Anyone who has grown up in the public school system is probably aware of what children are capable of. Lord of The Flies probably paints an accurate picture of what might happen in a situation where children were left alone to establish society. And like DATo said, not all of the children behave in an evil manner. Some behave in a noble manner.

I agree with Judge Judy when she was on the Jeff Probst show - we have spent the last 50 years making excuses for people's behaviour.

FYI the research indicates that babies are more altruistic than selfish and selfishness is the basis of all evil.

Babies show sense of fairness, altruism as early as 15 months -- ScienceDaily

You can only do 'evil' to some one or something when you consider them as less than you. Thinking yourself to be more is at its heart self-centered.

Meadow337 said:

FYI the research indicates that babies are more altruistic than selfish and selfishness is the basis of all evil.

Babies show sense of fairness, altruism as early as 15 months -- ScienceDaily

You can only do 'evil' to some one or something when you consider them as less than you. Thinking yourself to be more is at its heart self-centered.

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You're right Meadow. I saw an experiment involving "fairness" in which a deserving (very young) child did not receive a reward when the other children did. The others voiced a protest in defense of the child that was slighted.

But I'd like to offer another example, and I'm very sorry that I cannot cite the source. I wish I had taken note of the publication and its author but I did not. This is taken from a book dealing with human psychology:

The author presented a situation which I'm sure we all have witnessed at one time or another in our lives. Two very young children are placed on the floor in a room with many, many toys on the floor of different types, colors and shapes. One child begins to play with a specific toy. The other child sees that the first child is happy and rationalizes that the object that the first child is playing with is the source of the happiness. In this sense the second child intuits a value of the object causing the happiness and he wants it. His first attempt to possess it results in failure because the "owner" of the toy pulls it away from the second child's grasp. The second child attempts to take it again and this time is met with a more forceful reaction from the "owner". Now the second child begins to scream and cry in an attempt to get adults to support his cause. When this does not follow he physically tries to take the toy away with great force and when he fails strikes the first child in anger. The author said that if the second child had a gun and the knowledge to use it at that point he would kill the first child for possession of the toy.

We should hardly be surprised by this because adults in every country and age since the beginning of time have have engaged in the same behavior. Man has both altruistic tendencies and self-agrandizing tendencies. I think Golding's argument was that we do not learn to be bad for we are born with natural selfish tendencies which are the result of our evolution. Instead, we learn to be good though under specific types of stress we can forget our inculcated morality and revert to "bad".

It is a sobering thought to consider that our most distant ancestors were among the most thieving, murderous, selfish and rapacious hominids to ever walk the earth ... had they not been ... we wouldn't be here.

DATo said:

You're right Meadow. I saw an experiment involving "fairness" in which a deserving (very young) child did not receive a reward when the other children did. The others voiced a protest in defense of the child that was slighted.

But I'd like to offer another example, and I'm very sorry that I cannot cite the source. I wish I had taken note of the publication and its author but I did not. This is taken from a book dealing with human psychology:

The author presented a situation which I'm sure we all have witnessed at one time or another in our lives. Two very young children are placed on the floor in a room with many, many toys on the floor of different types, colors and shapes. One child begins to play with a specific toy. The other child sees that the first child is happy and rationalizes that the object that the first child is playing with is the source of the happiness. In this sense the second child intuits a value of the object causing the happiness and he wants it. His first attempt to possess it results in failure because the "owner" of the toy pulls it away from the second child's grasp. The second child attempts to take it again and this time is met with a more forceful reaction from the "owner". Now the second child begins to scream and cry in an attempt to get adults to support his cause. When this does not follow he physically tries to take the toy away with great force and when he fails strikes the first child in anger. The author said that if the second child had a gun and the knowledge to use it at that point he would kill the first child for possession of the toy.

We should hardly be surprised by this because adults in every country and age since the beginning of time have have engaged in the same behavior. Man has both altruistic tendencies and self-agrandizing tendencies. I think Golding's argument was that we do not learn to be bad for we are born with natural selfish tendencies which are the result of our evolution. Instead, we learn to be good though under specific types of stress we can forget our inculcated morality and revert to "bad".

It is a sobering thought to consider that our most distant ancestors were among the most thieving, murderous, selfish and rapacious hominids to ever walk the earth ... had they not been ... we wouldn't be here.

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I don't disagree with you that the capacity is there but both experiments together prove my point. Even babies can choose between 'good' altruism and 'evil' selfishness. The proof BTW is that not all babies exhibit altruism and not all children try to take the toy away which implies a choice in behaviour is being made and neither good nor evil is inherent. Golding's (and the inherent evil) theory says that man will inevitably revert to some murderously atavistic 'evil' being if the good-making behaviours of civilised man were stripped away. This is would imply that more primitive (less civilised) societies which are still present on earth should be more 'evil' than us. Seeing as they are generally just about the same with some good people and some bad people and some law-abiding and some not - there is kind of a hole in that theory.

Another book which espouses the same theory is Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" where a journey upriver represents a journey from civilised to increasingly less civilised until the passengers reached the primitive 'heart of darkness'. (And yes you guessed right I don't much like it or the film based on it).

I see both these books as a product of the same mindset that saw colonialism as a good thing, and although Lord of the Flies was written some 50 years after Heart of Darkness that same mindset was still very much present in the English psyche. In order to dominate 'less-civilised' people you have to believe they are less than you, and it is even better if you think of 'less-civilised' as 'evil' so you are not only bringing them the benefits of civilisation but saving them from 'evil' at the same time. A nice feel-good justification for colonialism.

Meadow,

I don't think Golding was trying to say that primitive cultures are more evil in terms of morality. Even primitive cultures have complex rules and laws of behavior that are accepted by the population. In the example of the primitive people you've mentioned we must remember that they are living under what for them constitutes "normal circumstances". In other words, the stresses that the community live under are well understood by them and they are well-adapted to them. Even the most primitive cultures can be found to be friendly to strangers once they determine that the strangers offer no threat. This totally amazing bit of footage illustrates my point. (NOTE: The presentation continues after the credits are displayed). At one point the commentary in this video validates your comment about the evil influences of contamination of primitive societies by modern interlopers.

It is only when the "normal" circumstances are greatly disrupted and survival requires providing for oneself and family that the atavistic throwback to instinctive behavior occurs. Such were the circumstances in The Lord Of The Flies. The majority of the boys followed Jack because he could provide meat and security for them. In Conrad's book Kurtz symbolizes the instinctive lust for power which lurks beneath our civilized outer skin. It took millions of years of evolutionary molding to create our psyches and I think both Golding and Conrad are saying that the brief period (historically speaking) of man's "civilized" adaptations to life cannot obviate the much longer period during which man was molded, by necessity, to behave in a manner which at times we would today consider morally reprehensible.

I think we are forever going to disagree on this. Not only do I not support evolution, but using it as a justification for bad behaviour is the one of the least appealing applications of it. It's a catch-all ultimate excuse 'I couldn't help it because we are all just atavistic beings at heart' what rubbish! If we didn't have any choice in our behaviour why don't we just all take what we want when we want it? Why do we even bother holding people accountable in a court of law for their behaviour because shame after all they are just following their instincts.

It is our ability to control ie choose how we behave that makes us human, to suggest anything else is wrong.

Meadow337 said:

I think we are forever going to disagree on this. Not only do I not support evolution, but using it as a justification for bad behaviour is the one of the least appealing applications of it. It's a catch-all ultimate excuse 'I couldn't help it because we are all just atavistic beings at heart' what rubbish! If we didn't have any choice in our behaviour why don't we just all take what we want when we want it? Why do we even bother holding people accountable in a court of law for their behaviour because shame after all they are just following their instincts.

It is our ability to control ie choose how we behave that makes us human, to suggest anything else is wrong.

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Well, we totally DO agree on this, regardless of our position on evolution...

"We have spent the last 50 years making excuses for people's behaviour." - Judge Judy