Lord of the Flies
Last term, I read William Golding's Lord of the Flies for my outside reading. I enjoyed the book thoroughly. It is a very symbolic piece, and it can be applied to anybody's life.
The book begins with a large group of young English boys being stranded on an island. They form a tribe, elect a chief, and organize a society. In the beginning, this system works very well. This can be related to the real world. Mankind usually think that everything is ok in the world in times of piece. They are oblivious to the looming terrors that may be lurking around the bend.
After a time, there begins to be a division among the boys. One faction wants to do nothing but hunt, while another group believes that keeping a signal fire going is most important. Over time, the hunters split from the original tribe, taking most of the boys with them. Only 4 older boys are left in the original group.
This represents the silliness of war. One of the main themes of the Lord of the Flies is that men's squabbles are trivial. When the boys are rescued by soldiers from Britain, who are fighting in World War II, the soldiers laugh at the boys and say, "are you having a war?" What these men do not realize, is that the boys are behaving in the exact same manner as the various nations who are at war. However, no one is going to save these "men" off of their "island". How will all the chaos in the world stop then? This is the question which William Golding poses in the conclusion of his masterful work.
The book begins with a large group of young English boys being stranded on an island. They form a tribe, elect a chief, and organize a society. In the beginning, this system works very well. This can be related to the real world. Mankind usually think that everything is ok in the world in times of piece. They are oblivious to the looming terrors that may be lurking around the bend.
After a time, there begins to be a division among the boys. One faction wants to do nothing but hunt, while another group believes that keeping a signal fire going is most important. Over time, the hunters split from the original tribe, taking most of the boys with them. Only 4 older boys are left in the original group.
This represents the silliness of war. One of the main themes of the Lord of the Flies is that men's squabbles are trivial. When the boys are rescued by soldiers from Britain, who are fighting in World War II, the soldiers laugh at the boys and say, "are you having a war?" What these men do not realize, is that the boys are behaving in the exact same manner as the various nations who are at war. However, no one is going to save these "men" off of their "island". How will all the chaos in the world stop then? This is the question which William Golding poses in the conclusion of his masterful work.
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