The Lord of the Flies - summary
In the midst of a war, a plane carrying a group of English boys is shot down over the ocean. It crashes in a thick jungle on a deserted island. Scattered by the wreck, the surviving boys lose each other. The pilot is nowhere to be found. Wandering down from the jungle to the water, one of the older boys, Ralph, meets Piggy, a chubby, intellectual boy, on the beach. Ralph and Piggy look around the beach, wondering what has happened to the other boys from the plane. They discover a large white conch shell; Piggy realizes that it could be used as a kind of makeshift trumpet. He convinces Ralph to blow it to find the other boys. Summoned by the blast of sound from the shell, boys begin sprawling onto the beach. The oldest among them are around twelve; the youngest are only five. Among the group is a boys' choir, dressed in black gowns and led by an older boy named Jack. They march to the beach in two parallel lines. The boys taunt Piggy, mocking his appearance and his nickname. Jack snaps at them to stand at attention.
The Lord of the Flies dramatizes the conflict between the civilizing character and barbarizing instinct that exists in all human beings. Every artistic choice that Golding makes in the novel is designed to emphasize the struggle between the ordering elements of society. His dramatic technique is to show the rise and swift fall of an isolated civilisation which is torn to pieces by the savage instincts of the people who comprise it.
In the first chapter, to begin with, it is populated solely with boys, the group of young English boys shot down over the wild jungle island on which the action is set. Golding's choice to make his characters boys is significant: the young boys are only half formed, perched between culture and savagery.
In Chapter 1, the boys, still unsure of how to behave with no adult presence to control their behaviour, largely stick to the learned behaviours of civilization and order, attempting to re-create the structures of society on their deserted island. They elect a leader
When the explorers return, Ralph blows the conch shell, summoning the boys to another meeting on the beach. Ralph tells the group that there are no adults on the island, but that if they remain calm and orderly, they will eventually be rescued. He says that there is a great deal of edible fruit on the island, and that if they work together, they will be able to survive. Jack reminds Ralph of the pig they found trapped in the jungle creepers, and Ralph agrees that they will need hunters to kill animals for meat. For now, Ralph says, it is important that they live by a set of rules, an idea with which Jack agrees enthusiastically.
Thinking about the possibility of rescue, Ralph proposes that the group should build a large signal fire on top of the island's central mountain, so that if a ship passes, it will see the fire and know that someone is trapped on the island. Excited by the thought, the boys rush off to the mountain, while Ralph and Piggy lag behind whilst Piggy still whining about the childishness and stupidity of the group.
Carrying a stick sharpened into a makeshift spear, Jack trails a pig through the thick jungle, but it evades him. Irritated, he walks back to the beach, where he finds Ralph and Simon at work building huts for the children to live in. Ralph is irritated because the huts always fall down before they are completed, and though they are vital to the boys' ability to live on the island, none of the other boys besides Simon will help him. As he and Simon work, most of the other boys splash about and play in the lagoon. Ralph gripes that few of the boys are doing any work. He says that all the boys act excited and energized by the ideas and plans that they make at meetings, but none of them is willing to work to make the plans successful. He also worries about the smaller children, many of whom have nightmares and are unable to sleep. He tells Jack about his concerns, but Jack, still trying to think of ways to kill a pig, is not interested in Ralph's problems.
In Ralph's opinion, the hunters ought to help with the hut building rather than stalking uselessly through the forest. Jack protests that the work of the hunters is central to the group's survival, because the boys need meat to eat. He claims that although they have so far failed to bring down a pig, they will soon have more success. As Jack and Ralph bicker, the bond between the two boys seems to crack.
The conflict between Ralph and Jack symbolizes the main conflict of the novel, with Ralph representing civilization and the desire for order and Jack representing savagery and the desire for power. The conflict between the two boys has been brewing since the election scene in Chapter 1, but until Chapter 3 it has been hidden beneath the surface. In this chapter, the conflict between the two boys erupts into verbal argument for the first time.
The boys even begin to develop their own language, calling the younger children "littluns" and the twins Sam and Eric "Samneric."
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The conflict between Ralph and Jack symbolizes the main conflict of the novel, with Ralph representing civilization and the desire for order and Jack representing savagery and the desire for power. The conflict between the two boys has been brewing since the election scene in Chapter 1, but until Chapter 3 it has been hidden beneath the surface. In this chapter, the conflict between the two boys erupts into verbal argument for the first time.
The boys even begin to develop their own language, calling the younger children "littluns" and the twins Sam and Eric "Samneric."
Life on the island soon develops a daily rhythm. Morning is pleasant, with cool air and sweet smells, and the boys are able to play happily. By afternoon, though, the sun becomes hot, and the boys nap
Jack obsessed with the idea of killing a pig, camouflages his face with clay and charcoal then enters the jungle to hunt, accompanied by several other boys. On the beach, Ralph and Piggy see that a ship has appeared on the horizon; they also see that the signal fire has gone out. They hurry to the top of the hill, but it is too late to rekindle the flame, and the ship does not come for them. Ralph is furious with Jack, because it was the hunters' responsibility to see that the fire was maintained.
Like much of Chapter 3, Chapter 4 is devoted to describing the civilization that emerges as time passes on the island and to developing the dramatic conflict between Ralph and Jack that will define the shape of the rest of the novel. Now that the group has been living on the island for some time, their society is clearer.
Since the beginning, the boys have bullied the whiny, intellectual Piggy whenever they needed to feel powerful and important. Jack begins to hit him openly. Despite his position of power and responsibility in the group, Jack shows no doubts about abusing the other boys physically.
At the meeting place, Ralph grips the conch shell and tells the boys their failure to uphold the group's rules. They have not done anything required of them: they refuse to work at building shelters, they do not gather drinking water, they neglect the signal fire. When Piggy seconds Ralph's rational claim that there are no monsters on the island, Jack interrupts him and talks about the beasts that might lurk on the island. A ripple of fear runs through the group. One of the littluns claims to have actually seen a beast, and when he is pressed by the others about where it could hide during the daytime, he suggests that it might come up from the ocean at night. This explanation terrifies all the boys, and the meeting plunges into chaos. Jack torments Piggy and runs away, and many of the other boys run after him. Eventually only Ralph, Piggy, and Simon are left. In the distance the hunters who have followed Jack dance and chant.
Piggy urges Ralph to blow the conch shell and summon the boys back to the group, but Ralph is afraid that the summons will be ignored and that any vestige of order will then disintegrate. He tells Piggy and Simon that he might relinquish leadership of the group, but his friends reassure him that the boys need his guidance. As the group drifts off to sleep, the sound of a littlun crying echoes along the beach.
Analysis
"What I mean is ... Maybe it's only us ..."
The boys' fear of the beast has been an increasingly important aspect of their lives, especially at night, ever since the first littlun claimed to have seen a snake-monster in Chapter 2. In Chapter 5, the fear of the beast finally explodes, ruining Ralph's attempt to restore order to the island and precipitating the final split between Ralph and Jack. The beast does not really exist, but it nevertheless serves as one of the most important symbols in the novel. The beast represents both the terror and the allure of the ancient, primordial instincts toward violence, power, and savagery that lurk within every human soul.
Because the symbolism of this novel is so resonant, it can be interpreted allegorically in many different ways. In a religious reading, for instance, the beast can represent the devil; in a Freudian reading, it can represent the id, or the amoral desires of the mind. But however one interprets the notion, it is quite clear that the littlun's idea of the monster rising from the sea terrifies the boys, for it represents the beast's emergence from their own unconscious minds. As Simon eventually realizes, the beast is not something that exists outside in the jungle. Rather, it exists inside each boy's mind and soul, and it is the capacity for savagery and evil that slowly overwhelms them.
Lurking in the darkness of their psyches, the idea of the beast increasingly fills the boys, especially the hunters, with bloodlust, cruelty, and savagery, as represented in the hunters' wild and violent dance. Jack manipulates the boys' fear of the beast, hinting that it exists when he knows that it probably does not. This is one source of his power, but another explanation for his charisma is that he enables the boys to act as the beast-to express the instinct for savagery that civilization has previously held in check. Because that instinct is natural and present within each human being, Golding asserts that we are all capable of becoming the beast. This notion will take on symbolic clarity later in the book, when the other boys, mistaking Simon for the beast, fall upon him and kill him like animals, with their bare hands and teeth.
6
Summary
In the darkness late that night, Ralph and Simon carry the littluns back to the shelter before going to sleep. As the boys sleep, military airplanes battle fiercely above the island. Yet none of the boys see the explosions and flashes in the clouds, because Sam and Eric, who were supposed to watch the signal fire, have fallen asleep. A dead parachutist drifts down from the sky onto the island; his chute becomes tangled in some rocks and flaps in the wind, while his shape casts fearful shadows on the ground. His body is covered up by the parachute, but his head seems to rise and fall in the wind.
When Sam and Eric awake, they tend to the fire to make the flames brighter. In the flickering firelight, they see the twisted form of the dead parachutist. They mistake the shadowy image for the figure of the dreaded beast and rush back to the camp, claiming breathlessly that they have been attacked by the beast. They wake Ralph and tell him what they have seen. Ralph immediately calls for a meeting, at which the twins reiterate their claim of having been assaulted by a monster. The boys, electrified and horrified by their claims, organize an expedition to search the island for monsters. Most of the boys are afraid to go, but they are even more afraid to be left behind. Armed with wooden spears, they set out to find the beast. Only Piggy and the littluns remain behind.
As they set out on the search, Jack insists to Ralph that he is now in charge, because he is the head of the hunters and the search for the beast is a kind of hunt. Ralph is irritated, but in the exertion of the search the conflict quickly recedes. The boys soon reach a part of the island that none of them has ever explored before, a hill dotted with dark caves and grottoes. The boys are afraid to go into the dark grottoes, so Ralph goes in to investigate them alone. He finds that while he is frightened to go into the darkness when he is among the other boys, he quickly regains his confidence once he is alone in the dark. Soon, Jack joins him in the cave.
The group climbs the hill, and Ralph and Jack feel the old bond between them rekindling. But the other boys begin playing games, pushing rocks into the sea, and many of them lose sight of the purpose of their expedition. Ralph angrily reminds them that they are looking for the beast, and says that they must return to the other mountain so that they can rebuild the signal fire. The other boys, lost in whimsical plans to build a fort on the new hill, are displeased by his commands, but they grudgingly obey.
Analysis
At the beginning of the novel, Ralph's hold on the other boys was quite secure; they all understood the need for order and purposive action, even if they did not always want to be bothered with rules. By this point in the book, however, as the learned conventions of civilization begin to erode among the boys, Ralph's hold on them is slipping, and Jack is becoming a more powerful and menacing figure in the camp. In Chapter 5, Ralph's attempt to reason with the boys was ineffective; by Chapter 6, Jack is able to manipulate Ralph's behavior by calling him a coward, forcing him to act irrationally simply for the sake of preserving his status among the other boys. This breakdown in the group's desire for morality, order, and civilization is increasingly enabled (or excused) by the presence of the monster, the beast that has frightened the littluns since the beginning of the novel and that is quickly assuming an almost religious significance in the camp.
Chapter 6 also serves to remind us of the larger setting of Lord of the Flies: though the boys lead an isolated life on the island, we know that a bloody war is being waged elsewhere in the world, a war in which England is involved. The war is apparently a terrible holocaust; all we know is that England has been threatened by atom bombs in a war against "the reds" and that the boys were evacuated just before the impending destruction of their civilization. The war is also responsible for the boys' crash landing on the island in the first place, because their transport plane was gunned down by enemy aircraft. Now the war is responsible for another important development in their lives. The air battle above the island results in Sam and Eric's encounter with the dead parachutist and fosters their subsequent belief that they have seen the beast.
Although the war remains in the background of the novel, it is nevertheless an important extension of the main themes of the book. Just as the boys struggle with the conflict between civilization and savagery on the island, the outside world is gripped in a similar conflict. War represents the savage outbursts of civilization, when the desire for violence and power overwhelms the desire for order and peace. The outside world has imposed a moral sense and an instinct for civilization upon the boys, but even within the civilization that has nurtured them, the danger of savagery remains real.
7
Summary
As they travel toward the mountain, the boys stop to eat. Ralph gazes disconsolately at the choppy ocean, thinking that the boys have become slovenly and undisciplined. As he looks out at the vast expanse of water, he feels that the ocean is like an impenetrable wall blocking any hope the boys have of escaping the island. But Simon lifts his spirits by reassuring him that they will be rescued soon.
That afternoon, the hunters find pig droppings, and Jack suggests that they should hunt the pig while they continue to search for the beast. The boys agree and quickly track a large boar, which leads them on a wild chase. Ralph has never been on a hunt before, and he quickly becomes caught up in the exhilaration of the chase. He excitedly flings his spear at the boar. It glances off the animal's snout, but Ralph is thrilled with his marksmanship, nonetheless. Jack holds up a bloodied arm, which was grazed by the boar's tusks. The boar escapes, but the boys are in a frenzy in the aftermath of the hunt. Excited, they reenact the chase among themselves with a boy named Robert playing the boar. They dance and chant and jab Robert with their spears, eventually losing sight of the fact that they are only playing a game. Beaten and in danger, Robert tries to drag himself away. The group nearly kills Robert before they remember themselves. When Robert suggests that they use a real boar in the game next time, Jack replies that they should use a littlun instead. The boys laugh, delighted and stirred up by Jack's audacity. Ralph tries to remind everyone that they were only playing a game.
Darkness falls, and Ralph proposes that they wait until morning to climb the mountain, since it will do no good to hunt the monster at night. Jack calls him a coward, and Ralph finally agrees to go on the hunt simply to regain his position in the eyes of the group. Simon volunteers to return to the beach to tell Piggy and the littluns that they will not return until late that night. Ralph, Roger, and Jack start to climb the mountain; then Ralph and Roger wait at the halfway point while Jack climbs alone to the top. He returns, breathlessly claiming to have seen the monster. Ralph and Roger climb up to have a look and see a terrifying specter: a large, shadowy form, with the shape of a giant ape, making a strange flapping sound in the wind. Horrified, the boys hurry down the mountain to warn the group.
Analysis
Chapter 7 continues to explore the subtheme of power and its connection to the primitive instincts represented by the beast and the bloodlust of the hunt. Ralph's power has already eroded among the boys, but until Chapter 7 he was largely baffled about why the group was increasingly more concerned with hunting, dancing, bullying, and feasting than with building huts, maintaining the signal fire, and trying to be rescued. Now even Ralph cannot avoid the instinctive excitement of the hunt, as he is caught up with the other boys in bloodlust and egomania. The scene following the failed hunt is the most suggestive symbol we have yet seen of the inextricable connection between the thrill of the hunt and the desire for power. Robert is nearly killed, as the boys, caught up again in their excitement, lose sight of the limits of the game in their mad desire to kill a pig. Afterward, when Jack suggests killing a littlun in place of a pig, the group laughs. Probably none of them (except possibly Jack and Roger) would go so far as to actually initiate such a plan, but instead of being horrified at the possibility, they find it titillating.
Golding also continues to develop the conflict between Ralph and Jack, now escalated to a real struggle for power, as Jack's brand of violence and savagery almost completely replaces Ralph's disciplined community in the boys' conception of their lives on the island. Ralph's exhilaration in the hunt and his participation in the ritual that nearly kills Robert is, in a sense, a major victory for Jack, since the experience shakes Ralph's confidence in the primacy of his civilized, moral ideals. As befits a power struggle in a savage group, the conflict between the boys manifests itself not as a competition to prove who would be the better leader but as a competition of sheer strength and courage. Just as Ralph went boldly into the dark caves alone to prove his bravery in the previous chapter, Jack goes up the mountain alone now. (It is also significant that Ralph discovers nothing, while Jack discovers what he thinks is the beast: Ralph does not believe in the beast, while it forms a major part of Jack's attitude toward life on the island.)
Additionally, Jack gains leverage within the group by using the competition in bravery to force Ralph to commit unwise acts of leadership, such as his decision to go up the mountainside at night. Ralph realizes that it is foolish to hunt the beast at night, but, in a society based on strength, he cannot risk appearing to be a coward. In this way, Jack manages to weaken Ralph's position in the group. Tellingly, Ralph's decision to explore the mountain at night means that he loses the opportunity to prove to everyone that Sam and Eric did not see the beast. Had the boys climbed the mountain in the daylight, they would have seen the dead parachutist for what it was; because they go at night, they see it distorted by shadows and believe that they are seeing the beast. In this way, each boy is prone to see the beast to the exact extent that he gives in to the demands of savagery, strengthening the idea that the beast is a symbolic manifestation of the boys' primitive inner instincts.
