What I believe to be the most important symbol in the novel is the signal fire. It, at first, burns on the mountain, and later on the beach, to attract the notice of passing ships that might be able to rescue the boys. As a result, the signal fire becomes a barometer of the boys’ connection to civilization. In the early parts of the novel, the fact that the boys maintain the fire is a sign that they want to be rescued and return to society. "There’s another thing. We can help them to find us. If a ship comes near the island they may not notice us. So we must make smoke on top of the mountain. We must make a fire." When the fire burns low or goes out, we realize that the boys have lost sight of their desire to be rescued and have accepted their savage lives on the island. Ralph and Piggy cared more for the fire than the other boys, showing that they remained more civilized than the rest, ‘There was a ship. Out there. You said you’d keep the fire going and you let it out!’ Hence, the signal fire stands for the amount of civilization left on the island. It also comforts the boys at night; pushing away the darkness and making the boys feel safe. Ironically, at the end of the novel, a fire finally summons a ship to the island, but not the signal fire. Instead, it is the fire of savagery-the forest fire Jack’s gang starts as part of his quest to hunt and kill Ralph. This proves that the fire was important because without it, the boys would never have been rescued.
Piggy’s glasses are also a very important symbol in the novel. Piggy is the most intelligent, rational boy in the group, and his glasses represent the power of intellect in society. This symbolic importance is clear from the start of the novel, when the boys use the lenses from Piggy’s glasses to focus the sunlight and start a fire, ‘His specs-use them as burning glasses!’
The first sign of violence in the book is when Jack fights with Piggy and breaks one of the lenses on Piggy's glasses. The broken lens depicts the fact that the people on the island are gradually degrading in morals and allowing their malicious sides break through. The glasses symbolize the voice of reason and logic among the boys. Piggy defends his glasses even more than the conch. Piggy, who represents the superego of the boys’ (and society’s) collective personality, uses his glasses to find solutions to the boys’ problems. The most important solution the glasses find is the lighting of the fire, the boys’ best chance of being rescued.
The Lord of the Flies is represented by both the bloody, severed sow’s head that Jack impales on a stake in the forest as an offering to the beast, and the beast itself. The beast is seen as a real object on the island, which frightens the boys. Jack is able to use the beast as a way of stealing the boys’ reverence by offering them protection from it, ‘…if there was a snake we’d hunt it and kill it.’ In fact, the beast is something internal; the Lord of the Flies is in the soul and mind of the boys, leading them to the natural chaos of a society with no reasoning adults. Only Simon understands what the real beast is, but is killed when he tries to tell the boys about the Lord of the Flies.
The complicated symbol of the pig’s head becomes one of the most important images in the novel when Simon confronts the sow’s head in the glade and it seems to speak to him, telling him that evil lies within every human heart and promising to have some “fun” with him. "Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you? Close, close, close! I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are what they are?" In this way, the Lord of the Flies becomes both a physical expression of the beast, a symbol of the power of evil, and a kind of Satan figure who evokes the beast within each human being. Looking at the novel in the context of biblical parallels, the Lord of the Flies recalls the devil, just as Simon recalls Jesus. In fact, the name “Lord of the Flies” is a literal translation of the name of the biblical name Beelzebub, a powerful demon in hell sometimes thought to be the devil himself. As the pig’s head and the beast represent the Lord of the Flies, they illustrate great importance.
Nicola Maxwell
Form 4
Ms. Graham
