Lord of the Flies: is law that important?

Secondly, the evil prevails on the island because of individuality. This also is a major factor of the boys becoming savage. When the boys get on the island, they make a fire for themselves and others, but this is never again an action that the children would do to try to rescue themselves. The boys begin to focus on themselves and only make actions to have “fun.” This individualism leads to great pains and suffering of other people. Piggy and Simon are good examples. The boys start killing pigs for justified reasons such as meat, but soon this action is no longer a necessity to feed the hungry crowd, but a desire that is fuelling their savagery. Their cruelty gives every individual a sense of power over the objects or people that they kill. They are also filled with happiness when they sing “’Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in.’” (79), and this is how they fulfill their “fun”.  Ralph is the person who refrains from this savagery for a long time, but he is pressured into the group of the savages and becomes one of them because he wants to have his share of “fun” as well. “’I hit him with the spear, I wounded him.’” (125)  This Ralph’s wildness progresses, and he wants to hurt Robert when he acts as the pig. “Ralph too was fighting to get near, to get a handful of that brown, vulnerable flesh. The desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering.”(125) But Ralph’s savagery doesn’t end there. Later, he shows his ultimate savagery by taking a part in killing Simon. After a while, the boys no longer care or think of the aftermath of their actions and start killing each other, and in the end, they would have killed themselves if they were not saved by the naval officer.  

Finally, evil is the victor on the island because of the boys’ immorality. Without rules and restrictions the boys’ evil comes out and becomes apparent to the reader. An example of this is Roger. In the beginning he wants to throw stones at the little ones, but he has no power to throw the rocks directly at the kids. “Here, invincible yet strong, was the taboo of the old life. Round the squatting child was the protection of parents and school and policemen and the law.” (65) The author shows that Roger still remembers the laws of where he came from, but slowly he forgets his past conditioning because of the absence of law on the island. However, soon the teachings of his past society are forgotten, and he begins to realise that he can escape with doing things that are much worse. No one is there to stop him, and he gives in to his inherent evil. The contrast to the Roger in the opening of the book is when Roger is overpowered by evil to the extent where he kills Piggy. “High overhead, Roger, with a sense of delirious abandonment, leaned all his weight on the lever” (200) Roger is one of many kids who are experiencing this trend. At the end of the book, Ralph, one of the most resistant boys on the island to savagery, is the person who cries because he knows that evil was successful, and even he, a boy who wanted to have a fair and a civilized society, joined the barbarians. This proves that evil was successful on the island without laws, and it would prevail if the laws aren’t set in a society to restrain savagery from conquering people.

In conclusion, without rules to restrain the boys’ inner wickedness the children will succumb to sin. These reasons explain why the boys fail to have a civilized society: rivalry, independence from each other, and their natural evil. As Aristotle once said “At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.”

Works Cited

“Aristotle Quotes.” 20 May 2008. < http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/    

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Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. London: Faber and Faber, 1954

“Major Themes” 21 May 2008. < http://www.gradesaver.com classicnotes /titles/  

lordflies /themes.html >

“Themes, Motifs & Symbols” 15 May 2008. < http://www.sparknotes.com/ lit/ flies/    

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