Justine Jennings
Period 5
October 28, 2003
The Civil vs. the Barbaric
KABOOM! BANG! CRASH! As the boys crash land on the island and are exposed to a new life of order and commotion, of conformity and savagery, and of good and evil, they will gradually discover the defect of the absence of adults. The children will live without an adults realistic protection, in which they took for granted and thought they could live with out. In the novel, Lord of the Flies, a microcosm is continually shown through the conch and its deterioration and Jack’s desire for power.
From the beginning to the end of the Lord of the Flies, the conch represents civilization and the corrosion of society among the boys. For instance, in the opening of the novel, when Ralph and Piggy just met, they discover a conch described as a, “deep cream, touched here and there with fading pink…covered with a delicate embossed pattern” (Page16). The innocent shell is pristine and refined, just as Ralph hoped society would be. It is held with high regard and respect, which empowers order among the island. In addition, as the novel wears on, the “white blob” (Page 78) conch is highly valued by Piggy and is taken when confronting Jack about stealing his glasses. Roger kills Piggy and the conch, “exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist” (Page 181). From a balanced society to a crumbled barbaric tribe, Jack and his savages disintegrate the conch’s control. Ralph was simply stripped of his title of chief and left as a fugitive. The conch is a symbol of uniformity and order, the equivalent to an adult.
