Ralph’s mention of hiding is symbolic because in chapter 4, Jack painted his face as a symbol of hiding his social conscience. Jack’s idea of masks was the first time in which reality became distorted on the island and the boys were beginning to change their behaviour and appearance in order to fit in with the surroundings.
Ralph's priority is to evacuate the island rather than confronting or fighting the beast. He concludes that the only way of evacuating the island is by being rescued and his main concern is the maintenance of the fire in hope of a ship noticing them. This is illustrated when Ralph says 'As long as there's light we’re brave enough. But then? And now that thing squats by the fire as though it didn’t want us to be rescued… So we can't have a signal fire… We're beaten.' When Ralph implies that they will be ‘brave as long as there’s light, the reader comprehends the boys inability of coping with darkness. Furthermore, some of the boys, like Jack lose their consciences through the battle for power on the island. Ralph believes that they must make smoke as a signal but he is easily defeated by the beast and lacks the insight to move the fire. He begins to lose his mind and thoughts when Jack completes his take-over. This conveys Ralph’s mental breakdown.
Overall, this is significant to the novel because we learn that Ralph’s desires are not to stay on the island or integrate himself into the island because of his strong desire to be rescued. He says, ’now that thing squats by the fire as though it didn’t want to be rescued.’ Ralph puts this desire at the very top of his priorities and does not enjoy being the leader, however, recognizes the necessity for him to stay in power if the group has any chance of remaining democratic and ordered.
Throughout the novel and chapter 8, the ‘conch’ acted as a symbol of authority and order. At the beginning of the chapter, it is mentioned that ‘the conch glimmered among the trees.’ The ‘conch’ is the first important discovery Piggy and Ralph make on the island, and they use it to summon the boys together after they are separated by the crash. As a result, the ‘conch’ becomes a powerful symbol of civilization and order. It is used to govern the boys' meetings. The boy who holds the shell is given the right to speak, making the shell more than a symbol; it is an actual vessel of political legitimacy and democratic power. As the island civilization erodes and savagery begins to dominate the boys, the ‘conch’ loses its power and influence among them. When Roger kills Piggy with the boulder, the ‘conch’ is crushed, signifying the complete demise of the civilized instinct among almost all the boys on the island.
Jack, in chapter eight, capitalises on the appearance of the beast, although he himself is scared of its shadowy presence too. However, he realises that the group's faith in Ralph is ever decreasing because of the fear and instability of the beast on the island. Jack is ever challenging Ralph's leadership until one incident where Ralph insults his hunters and Jack splits completely from the group when he says, ‘What about my hunters?' 'Boys armed with sticks.’
Jack blows the conch and calls a meeting, in which he makes negative comments about Ralph like, ‘Ralph said my hunters are no good', 'He's like piggy…he isn't a proper chief…he's a coward himself…' 'He's not a hunter. He'd never have got us meat… He just gives orders and expects people to obey for nothing', 'not a prefect.’ He competes with Ralph for leadership, which is unmistakably a direct challenge. He questions the boys by saying, ‘Hands up…whoever wants Ralph not to be chief? ’ When nobody raises their hand, Jack is devastated and publicly humiliated. He runs down the beach and makes an offer to the boys: ‘I'm going off by myself. He can catch his own pigs. Anyone who wants to hunt when I do can come too.’ This life is obviously more attractive to most of the boys, killing and feasting instead of keeping a fire going. Therefore, inevitably some boys go on his side and begin to follow his footsteps. Jack persuades the littluns by saying, ‘We’ll hunt, I'm going to be chief', 'I say this, we aren't going to bother about the beast…we're going to forget the beast.'
Jack reacts very violently to the beast, but does not aim his anger at the beast, instead he aims it at Ralph's leadership and at hunting. He has bloodlust and loves to hunt and kill, the food is merely a by-product of the adrenaline that it gives him to hunt, chase and kill another animal. He has passed his passion onto his hunters. This is shown in the book when Golding mentions that, ‘The hunters followed, wedded to her in lust, excited by the long chase and the dropped blood...’ ’From his reaction to the beast, we learn that Jack is a much more natural leader than Ralph, and that he is a much more violent and ruthless character, he will go to extremes for power, and is a very manipulative and spiteful boy.
This is significant to the book as a whole, in the way Jack has reacted to ‘the beast.’ He uses the possibility of pacifying the beast as a way of seducing the boys to what he wants them to do. He uses the promise of exciting hunting, brilliant feasts and most of all, the promise that the beast will not bother them and the promise that the beast will cease to be a constant point of fear for the boys.
Simon has a diverse reaction to ‘the beast’ compared to the other boys in the novel. This is especially conveyed in chapter 8 because it is when Simon instinctively knows that the beast is something that has manifested itself in the heads, hearts and minds of all the boys giving them a focus for their fear. He endeavours to disprove the beast’s existence by climbing the mountain and discovering what it was that Ralph and Jack saw; ‘I thought there might be something to do, something we-' again the pressure of the assembly took his voice away… 'I think we ought to climb the mountain… What else is there to do?' Simon climbs the mountain and his theory is proven, when he locates a dead parachutist and encounters the pig’s head. This attests that Simon’s predictions about the existence of a physical beast were right. This is significant to the text because Simon’s character and Christ-like figure is revealed.
When Simon confronts the ‘Lord of the Flies’, it is just a pig’s head on a stick, which Jack had stuck into the ground in Simon’s special retreat. However, when Simon is speaking to it he doesn’t see it as a pig’s head; he interprets it as evil. When the ‘Lord of the Flies’ is talking to Simon, the dialogue is like a schoolmaster is telling him off. ‘You are a silly little boy… just a silly ignorant little boy. ‘The Lord Of The Flies’ intentionally talks in this manner to try overpowering Simon’s thoughts and mind and acts as if he knows better.
The pig’s head then progresses by instructing Simon to go and socialise with the other boys, or they will think he is crazy. ‘You’d better run off and play with the others’. ‘You don’t want Ralph to think you’re batty, do you?’ Overall, the ‘Lord of the Flies’ starts trying to scare Simon into thinking that no one on the island likes him and the ‘Lord of the Flies’ is also trying to affect Simon’s thoughts by making him socialise with the evil boys. The beast attempts taking control of Simon by saying, ‘There isn’t anyone to help you. Only me. And I’m the Beast’. Simon’s reaction to this is to shout insults at the pig’s head. ‘Pig’s head on a stick!’ This confirms that Simon understands that this is all it is. The Lord Of The Flies attempts gaining Simon’s obedience. This is ironic because it is similar to what happens to Jesus.
Subsequently, the ‘Lord of the Flies’ starts informing Simon that ‘he can’t kill it.’ The beast sarcastically says, ‘Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill!’ The ‘Lord Of The Flies’ is trying to embed its presence inside Simon’s head by stating that it is immortal.
The island itself, particularly Simon's glade, functions as a kind of Garden of Eden that is gradually corrupted by the introduction of evil. The Lord of the Flies may be seen as a symbol for the devil, since it works to promote evil among mankind. An example of this is when the ‘Lord of the Flies’ tells Simon to, ‘Get back to the others.’ This promotes evil because the other boys’ evil will affect Simon.
Because Simon is the character who arrives at the moral truth of the novel, and because he is killed sacrificially as a consequence of having discovered this truth, his life has certain strong parallels with that of Jesus. His conversation with the Lord of the Flies also parallels the confrontation between Christ and the devil in Christian theology. However, it is important to remember that the parallels between Simon and Christ are not complete, and to read the novel, as a pure Christian allegory would overstate the case and thereby reduce the range of possible readings. For one thing, Simon lacks the supernatural connection to the divine that is the main characteristic of Jesus. Simon is wise in many ways, but he is not the Son of God, and his death does not bring salvation to the island. Rather, his death plunges the island deeper into savagery and moral guilt. The beast says to Simon, ‘Aren’t you afraid of me?’ and ‘You don’t want Ralph to think you’re batty do you?’ This confirms Simon’s wisdom which is portrayed through the concept that he does not believe and act by the beast’s words.
Simon dies before he is able to tell the boys what he has discovered, while Christ was killed only after spreading his moral philosophy. In this way, Simon echoes Christian ideas and themes without developing precise parallels with them. Because the ‘Lord of the Flies’ uses its religious motifs to enhance its moral theme, Christian iconography is an artistic technique in the book, but it is not necessarily the primary key to interpreting the story.
To conclude, Simon is an important character to the novel because he is what every person should wish to be. The others bully him because he is different from them. The character Simon is perhaps, a role model for the rest of the world. It could really change a lot in the world and if people could at least try and be like Simon, just as Christ wished that people could all live by his beliefs. However, in real life no matter how good people are, they have a certain amount of evil in them, but it is how they control this evil that is important. In the novel, without Simon there is nothing to stop evil reigning supreme and anarchy taking control. This is the message that Golding is conveying through the characterization of Simon.
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