Lord of the Flies. 'What's your name?' 'Ralph'. How does this opening prepare the reader for the rest of the novel?

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Read up to: 'What's your name?' 'Ralph'. How does this opening prepare the reader for the rest of the novel?

From its beginning 'Lord of the Flies' establishes itself as a story packed with allegorical meaning; it dramatises the conflict between the civilizing instinct and the barbarising, savage instinct that exist in all human beings, using characters and objects to symbolise the two separate ideals. The novel is a meditation on the nature of human political society, dealing with such concerns as the development of political systems and the clash in human nature between instinctual and learned behaviour. In this manner, Golding establishes the deserted island as a clash between two different conceptions of pre-civilized humanity. The artistic choices Golding makes in the novel are designed to emphasize the struggle between the ordering elements of society, which include morality, law, and culture, and the chaotic elements of humanity's savage animal instincts, which include anarchy, bloodlust, the desire for power, amorality, selfishness, and violence. Over the course of the novel, Golding portrays the rise and swift fall of an isolated, makeshift civilization, which is torn to pieces by the savage instincts of those who comprise it.

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