At the start of the chapter, Jack is alone in the jungle, hunting for meat like an animal. “Dog-like…on all fours”, Jack is no longer a civilised human being but has turned into a savage animal, stalking his prey. He has become so obsessed with ‘meat’ that it he has become crazy, his eyes “bolting…nearly mad” as he desperately tracks down the pig. Golding directly mentions Jack’s atavistic characteristics, upon hearing a bird cry Jack becomes “less a hunter than a furtive thing, ape-like”. This further intensifies Jack’s savage nature and how he is moving further and further away from civilisation. Jack’s motives for hunting also support this and are rather disturbing. Jack hunts not for the rational purpose of acquiring food, but more for his personal enjoyment and to prove to the group that he is strong and a hero. However when Jack tries to explain to Ralph the “compulsion to track down and kill that was swallowing him up”, “the madness came into his eyes again” and he insists that he might “kill”. It is significant that Golding to use the word “kill” as opposed to just “hunt” as it suggests Jack is only doing it for the “kill” and the triumph he would get rather than for the practical outcome of having something to eat, showing Jack is now completely savage, only interested in murder.
After Jack returns to the beach, we see Ralph attempting to build shelters, aided by Simon. Ralph knows that shelters are required in the long term and that no one else will build them, “we need shelters”. While Ralph doesn’t really enjoy building the shelters Golding greatly contrasts this with Jack who very much does enjoy hunting for pigs. Near the end of this section, the gap between Ralph and Jack opens up and their completely different agendas become apparent. “two continents of experience and feeling, unable to communicate”, Golding describes Jack and Ralph as “continents”, showing just how dissimilar the pair of them are and how they will never share the same way of thinking. Golding’s use of language is also notable as the book was written during the Cold War between America and Russia, two continent-sized countries at war, a brilliant metaphor for Jack and Ralph’s relationship.
The focus of the book then switches to Simon who after helping Ralph with the shelters, decides to go to a clearing in the forest on his own. Simon goes into an almost meditative state, sitting alone, enclosed in a wall of bushes, cut off from everyone else on the island. Golding has Simon enter this ‘ashram’ just as the sun is setting, which is usually when bad things happen, however this is compensated by having the candle buds open at the same time. Golding also mentions that the stars in the sky give light and cause the flowers to “glimmer”. The white flowers of the candle bushes not only provide light onto Simon but also fill the clearing with the scent which the characters first experienced when Jack “slashed” them open, making this a magical end to the chapter.
