As the story develops, Jack turns from being a quite ordinary school boy to a savage. In the second chapter of the novel, Jack’s character develops quite quickly. Before this, Jack, Ralph and Simon go to explore the island, and while doing so, they encounter a pig. They are about to knife it, but they pause. The pig then escapes. In chapter two, we sense that Jack regrets not having killed the pig, and he feels that he has failed in proving his masculinity and strength to the other boys. He interrupts Ralph at a “meeting” to announce that “an army” is needed, “for hunting. Hunting pigs.” Here, there seems to be a development in Jack’s character, and from being the rather ordinary schoolboy, he becomes quite obsessed with hunting for meat, and spilling blood. At one point, “Jack slammed his knife into a trunk and looked round challengingly.” This is a very violent action. Here, Jack is seen to form a leadership of his own, which comes out through threat. In a way, he appeals to the smaller boys because he intimidates them with violence.
Furthermore, when Ralph mentions that a fire is needed for smoke, so that people can locate the boys at the island and rescue them, Jack and the boys (except for Piggy and Ralph at first) are excited about the idea of a fire, because it represents danger, which is adventurous for them. Having a fire is not something that the boys can usually do, and this is why it is appealing to them. Jack, in particular, leads the boys and encourages the fire to start. In this chapter, we see the unpredictable, dangerous side of Jack, when order breaks down, and the fire gets out of control. The fire unleashes something very primitive in the boys, and seems to be a catalyst to savagery.
As the story develops in the third chapter, we sense that Jack’s ego is being questioned. At first, he hesistated and did not kill the pig in front of Ralph. Now, he is desperate to prove himself as the “hunter”. I can infer that Jack’s failure to prove his daring masculinity in his first encounter with the pig leads to a psychologically disturbed obsession with killing. He almost has a blood lust.
The third chapter is the main turning point in the development of Jack’s character. In this chapter, we are introduced to Jack, who is “bent double… his nose only a few inches from the humid earth.” This description makes him seem like an animal who is sniffing out the scent of it’s prey. The fact that he is no longer standing upright like a human hints savagery. “Except for a pair of tattered shorts held up by his knife-belt he was naked.” This points out that Jack may have been abandonned, and again hints savagery, because similarly to Jack who is barely dressed, animals do not wear any clothes. As he “breathed in gently with flared nostrils, assessing the current of warm air for information,” Jack “passed his tongue across dry lips and scanned the uncommunicative forest.” The descriptions here remind us of a predator, who uses tactics that a skilled animal would. He is possibly hungry as well, as he licks his dry lips, waiting for his prey. The words used by Golding in this chapter to describe Jack are very savage and animal-like. Jack’s eyes are described as “bright blue eyes, that in this frustration seemed bolting and nearly mad.” This point hints the loss of the human faculty to think and the overtaking of the animal instinct, as Jack is so frustrated and seems to be driven by a “seductive, maddening” instinct – “the promise of meat”. The fact that “the forest and he were very still” is very important, because Jack seems to becomes part of the jungle environemt, and it’s as though they almost become one. This also points out the development of Jack’s character into a much more savage and bestial one.