Book Review: Lord of the Flies by William Golding
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I went into this book thinking I would understand nothing, and I would finish it with a bunch of questions, but surprisingly I did understand all the figurative language and the big theme that the author was trying to get through to the audience.
Synopsis: At the dawn of the next world war, a plane crashes on an uncharted island, stranding a group of schoolboys. At first, with no adult supervision, their freedom is something to celebrate; this far from civilization the boys can do anything they want. Anything. They attempt to forge their own society, failing, however, in the face of terror, sin and evil. And as order collapses, as strange howls echo in the night, as terror begins its reign, the hope of adventure seems as far from reality as the hope of being rescued. Labeled a parable, an allegory, a myth, a morality tale, a parody, a political treatise, even a vision of the apocalypse, Lord of the Flies is perhaps our most memorable novel about “the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart.”
A plane crashes on an island as it’s mistaken for a war plane when, in reality, it was just a plane filled with kids from a British school. All the adults were dead and the group of kids from ages 6-12 had to learn to survive and work together to stay alive. They voted for a chief, they had rules and authority, they had order. This was until problems and conflicts started arising which drew a divide between the civil and the savage.
I expected to dislike this book, but, to my surprise, I understood it and what was the meaning behind it. The theme of this book was, honestly, quite deep and shows a stark difference between the people within our own society. We have the civilians, the ones who want rules and order, and the savages, who want to do things their own way and don’t think they need rules or anything like that. The plot of the book isn’t the most exciting thing ever though at the same time it’s not the most boring thing ever. They had a “beastie” that the boys had to look out for, they had hunting, they had adventures. At the same time, there were moments that they were just exploring, just wandering around which weren’t as exciting. I, personally, found it interesting to see what the kids would do next. The beginning I had to trudge to, but it just got more interesting as the book went on. And not just interesting, it got more disturbing as well. How far the savages went and how they ceased to care was crazy.
Let me introduce our main characters. We have Ralph also known as the Chief, the one who holds the most authority, the good-looking boy of the bunch. Ralph is the representation of civil. He tries to resemble actual society by implementing rules and creating things that they were used to back when they weren’t stranded in the middle of an island. Ralph mostly throughout the book held the hope that they could be rescued by a signal fire that they created. Ralph, ‘till the very end, was refusing to take on the savage ways even though we were shown there were parts of him that wanted to be involved in the savage's rituals and practices because they intrigued him. Jack was the leader of the savages. He was bossy and was shown to want power. He leads the savages because of the fear he instills in them. He becomes savage by doing practices, like hunting pigs, which gives him a taste of how it feels to not follow the norms of society. He eventually stops wanting to follow rules and order and he is the cause for the split in the group of kids into the civil people and the savages. Last but not least, we’ve got Piggy. Piggy, ever since the beginning of the book, has been smart and he took initiative by coming up with ideas with what to do now that they’re stranded on an island. He’s not as good looking as the rest and has asthma which causes the kids to not see him as a good leader. Though, Piggy shows how he would make an awesome leader because of him being realistic and kind. This choice of Ralph over Piggy represents how looks can play into how society thinks of a person and their capabilities without even understanding or knowing the person first.
The writing style of this book contained a lot of figurative language. This included symbolism, similes, metaphors, personification, imagery, and allusions. Imagery helped with world-building. The descriptions of the ocean around the island, the cliffs, and the forests were portrayed through imagery and described. I have to admit, the author did have way more emphasis on nature than the actual characters and what was going on with them. This was part of what made the plot slow at some points of the book. It also got quite repetitive as the same things were being described over and over again. Symbolism was shown in a large variety of ways with a conch shell representing democracy, fire representing hope and destruction, and more. I wasn’t overwhelmed with the amount of figurative language in the book like I was in other classic books I’ve read which was nice.
The factors that brought this book down to four stars was the amount of violence and killing in this book was ridiculous. This book was truly messed up at some parts and it left me shocked for a good while. It was quite descriptive as well which made those scenes even worse. I also would’ve liked this book better if there were a little bit more positive representation. The way Piggy was treated because he was the “ugly” one out of the boys as he was obese with thinning hair, and unathletic, was horrible. Especially when Jack would shove him around and no one would say anything. I know this is part of the story as it represents a part of our society, but I felt so bad for Piggy throughout the whole book. He was, from the beginning of the book, being pushed aside, neglected, and ignored.
This book is significant because of how it portrays the reality of people, in general, and within a society. I recognized multiple sides of our society shown and how people tend to act on a much smaller scale. This book got me thinking and seeing things about my world that I just never realized. I was required to analyze this book for school which helped me see how all these aspects of figurative language played a part in this book and why they were significant which I think helped me see the true message and importance of this book. People who are just simply reading this book may have a hard time understanding what’s going on and I would suggest try to take it slow and really think about what’s going on and why does it matter if you’re truly interested in understanding this book. If anything, I wrote above seemed like something you may be interested in or sounded intriguing, then maybe try this book out.
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