Lord of The Flies

Lord of The Flies is a disturbing story about the truth of society. Several boys are stranded on an island where they are forced to make up their own rules to live by until they are rescued. A boy named Ralph is appointed chief after he blows a conch. Ralph explains to the boys that they need to build a fire if they are to ever be rescued. Ralph appoints a boy name Jack leader of a group of hunters. Jack starts to become obsessed with hunting and killing. Jack, along with many other boys start to neglect the fire. Ralph gets very angry about this and so starts the ruin of his friendship with Jack. The younger boys start to talk about a beast. The rest of the boys are unsure that this so called beast is real until they are face to face with it. The boys then end up splitting up. Jack and his hunters along with some of the other boys start their own tribe. They don’t think that the beast will bother them if they just stay away from it. A boy named Simon is thought to be crazy by the rest of the boys. Simon is a social outcast in this story. Simon comes out of the trees where the tribe is and the tribe kills him. The so called beast turns out to be the madness of the boys. The boys have become savages. The tribe ends up killing the last social outcast, Piggy. The only boy left with some sense is Ralph, who is hunted by the tribe. When Ralph thinks that he is going to die he runs into an officer. The officer then proceeds to say that the boys are just playing a game. The story leaves you thinking about the truth of society.


In the form of survival of the fittest, William Golding shows us the truth about society. Society comes down to one last thing, survival of the fittest. The boys start out as friends, only to distance themselves from the weakest links. The boys then eliminate the weakest links. Right before they eliminate who they believe to be the last weakest link they come face to face with an officer. The officer was all it took to snap them all back to civil society. Golding takes us right down to the core of society, showing us what is underneath of the rules. We all know that this is the truth of society. If we were all forced to survive we would go insane, it would bring out our inner beast. In civil society we are able to keep our inner beasts in the dark, not letting them out. If we were forced into a survival situation we would let those beasts free simply because we are unsure of what else to do. Our inner beasts are like ticking time bombs. All they are waiting for is a situation where we need to survive, and that’s all it takes. They are released. We become the beast inside of us, letting only our animal instincts guide us. We all know that this is the truth of society, yet we refuse to speak of it. All Golding has done is shed light on what we demand be kept in the darkness.