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Plot Summary
1. Stranded and the First Assembly
A group of British schoolboys crash-lands on an uninhabited island after their plane is shot down during wartime. They gather on the beach, bewildered but eager to organize. Ralph finds a conch shell, and after blowing into it, calls the boys to a meeting. Their initial unity offers hope for rescue.
Ralph is elected chief over the more aggressive Jack, who leads the choirboys turned hunters. They agree to maintain a signal fire atop the mountain to attract passing ships. Enthusiasm runs high, yet fear surfaces when a littlun claims to have seen a beast. Anxiety creeps into their discussions.
The boys explore the island, mapping its shores and confirming fresh water. They stumble into a lush lagoon and pig roots. Their newfound freedom feels exhilarating. Still, faint worries about order and leadership lie beneath their excitement.
Jack’s hunters set their first snares but fail to trap anything. Piggy warns that without cooperation, they risk chaos. Ralph promises to maintain rules and shelter construction. Most boys pledge allegiance, unaware of how quickly discipline will erode.
2. Building Shelter and Growing Fears
Under Ralph’s guidance, small shelters rise near the beach. The littluns cluster inside, safe from the sun. Ralph pushes for maintaining the fire and looking out for rescue. Jack, obsessed with hunting, neglects these tasks, causing tension.
The boys debate the beast’s reality. Jack and his hunters claim it doesn’t exist, but the littluns remain terrified. Simon retreats into the forest, seeking solitude away from the collective dread. He senses the beast might emerge from within themselves.
Conflict surfaces when Jack’s choir mocks Ralph’s authority. Ralph reminds them of the fire’s importance. Piggy defends logic over fear. Their fragile order begins to crack under Jack’s disdain and Jack’s desire for power.
3. Jack’s Rebellion and the Painted Faces
Frustrated by Ralph’s leadership, Jack breaks away with his hunters to form a rival tribe. He paints his face, discovering its liberating effect. His painted mask symbolizes a shift from civility to savagery.
Jack’s tribe lures most older boys with promises of feasts and revelry. They sacrifice a sow to the beast, hoisting its head on a stick as an offering. This gruesome trophy marks a point of no return for their morals.
Ralph’s group dwindles and struggles to keep the fire alive. Piggy and Simon remain loyal, urging Ralph not to abandon hope. Their isolation underscores how far order has slipped away.
4. Simon’s Vision and Tragic Misunderstanding
Simon ventures alone to the “Lord of the Flies,” a pig’s head on a stick set near the forest clearing. He hallucinates a conversation with the head, realizing that the beast is not an external enemy but the boys’ own inner darkness.
Shaken but enlightened, Simon climbs to where Ralph and Piggy think the beast resides. He discovers that Jack’s hunters have killed a large sow. As he stumbles back to warn the others, storm clouds gather.
Near the beach, the tribe performs a frenzied dance. Mistaking Simon for the beast in the rain and chaos, they brutally kill him. His body washes out to sea, his truth unsaid. This murder marks the loss of innocence on the island.
5. Piggy’s Death and Collapse of Order
Piggy confronts Jack and his hunters over the stolen glasses, the tribe’s only fire-starting tool. He clutches the conch and demands that the assembly follow Ralph’s rules. His last stand represents the failures of reason amid rising violence.
Roger, silent and cruel, dislodges a boulder that strikes Piggy. Piggy falls to his death, the conch shattering beside him. The survivors witness the symbolic destruction of order and civil authority.
Ralph, stunned, realizes they now face pure savagery. Jack’s hunters, armed with sticks and painted faces, pursue Ralph. The island concedes no sanctuary as its governance vanishes completely.
6. Desperate Flight and Rescue
Ralph flees through the forest, hunted by Jack’s tribe who intend to kill him. They set the island on fire to smoke him out. Flames spread uncontrollably, reducing the jungle to blazing chaos.
Ralph plunges to the beach, exhausted and terrified. As the fire roars toward him, a naval officer arrives, alerted by the smoke. The officer’s arrival halts the chaos, and he gapes at the boys’ savage appearances.
Shame and relief wash over Ralph as he collapses. The officer’s pity contrasts with Jack’s defiance. The boys, rescued but irreversibly changed, weep for their lost innocence and the darkness within themselves.
Characters
1. Ralph (Protagonist/Chief)
“We ought to have a chief to decide things.”
Ralph embodies order and democratic leadership. He prioritizes rescue by keeping the signal fire lit and encourages building shelters. His election as chief makes him responsible for unity, yet he struggles as the boys drift toward savagery.
Despite moments of self-doubt, Ralph remains determined. He values reason over fear and tries to uphold rules. His conflict with Jack over priorities reveals his commitment to civilization. In the end, he weeps for the fallen Piggy and Simon and mourns the darkness that consumed them all.
2. Jack Merridew (Antagonist/Hunter Leader)
“Bollocks to the rules! We’re strong—we hunt!”
Jack starts as head of the choirboys and becomes obsessed with power and hunting. He values strength over reason and quickly undermines Ralph’s leadership. His painted face frees him from shame, letting violence take hold.
He leads the split from Ralph’s group and forms a tribe based on fear and ritual. Jack’s cruelty escalates to murder, reflecting his descent into savagery. He wields power through intimidation and bloodlust rather than law.
3. Piggy (Intellectual Ally)
“Life…is scientific, that’s what it is.”
Piggy represents logic and scientific thought. He invents the idea of using the conch to call meetings and champions sensible planning. He relies on his glasses to start fires and cares about order.
Physically weak and bullied, Piggy nevertheless voices truth and warns of chaos. He clings to civilization’s rules until his final moments. His death symbolizes the death of reason among the boys.
4. Simon (Mystic/Truth-Seeker)
“Maybe there is a beast…maybe it’s only us.”
Simon is introspective, shy, and empathetic toward the littluns. He senses the beast’s true nature before anyone else. In solitude, he connects with the island and experiences a hallucinatory conversation with the Lord of the Flies.
His insight—that evil resides within each boy—proffers the novel’s moral centerpiece. Tragically, when he attempts to deliver this truth, the others kill him in a frenzy. Simon’s death underscores how fear can overwhelm truth.
5. Roger (Sadistic Hunter)
“Roger sharpened a stick at both ends.”
Roger lurks at the edge of violence before the island. He torments weaker boys and eventually kills Piggy by rolling a boulder. His evil acts without conscience.
Roger evolves into Jack’s chief instrument of brutality. He orders intimidation and physical harm without hesitation. In him, Golding suggests that cruelty lies dormant in human nature and can emerge when rules vanish.
Themes Analysis
1. Civilization vs. Savagery
Golding depicts civilization as fragile and easily eroded. Ralph’s structured meetings, fire-keeping, and shelters represent order. Jack’s tribe, in contrast, revels in hunting rituals, painted faces, and violence. The struggle between these forces drives the narrative.
The conch shell embodies lawful authority and collective discourse. When it shatters, so too does any remaining civility. The boys’ descent into savagery shows how thin the veneer of civilization remains when powered by fear and unchecked impulses.
2. Loss of Innocence
Cut off from the adult world, the boys start with excitement and hope. Gradually they confront violence, betrayal, and death. Simon’s murder and Piggy’s death mark irreversible endings to their childhood.
Their laughter at first murder reveals how innocence gives way to complicity. The island becomes a crucible where youthful play transforms into genuine horror. By rescue’s end, the boys recognize that childhood cannot be reclaimed once innocence is lost.
3. Innate Human Evil
The beast symbol evolves from imagined creature to the “Lord of the Flies.” This pig’s head on a stick speaks to Simon about humanity’s dark core. The novel argues that evil resides not in supernatural forces but in human hearts.
Roger’s unprovoked cruelty and Jack’s bloodlust suggest that societal rules only suppress innate brutality. Once authority collapses, violence surfaces. Golding implies that civilization’s purpose is to contain this human darkness.
Key Plot Devices
1. The Conch Shell
The conch shell summons meetings and grants the right to speak. It symbolizes democratic order and shared responsibility. Early on, it holds the boys together under a common law.
As respect for the conch wanes, meetings dissolve into chaos. Its destruction alongside Piggy’s death signifies the complete breakdown of structured society. Without the conch, no rules remain to protect the weaker boys.
2. The Signal Fire
The fire stands for hope of rescue and connection to civilization. At first, maintaining the blaze unites the boys in purpose. Ralph’s insistence on the fire shows his focus on return to safety.
When Jack’s hunters abandon the fire for hunting, their negligence allows a ship to pass unnoticed. This betrayal highlights their shift from rescue to savagery. The fire’s extinguishing parallels the extinguishing of rescue hopes.
3. The Lord of the Flies
A pig’s severed head mounted on a stick, rotting and swarming with flies, becomes the physical form of the beast. Simon’s vision reveals the head’s truth: the beast lurks within each boy.
The Lord of the Flies haunts the boys’ dreams and feeds their fears. It drives them toward savage rituals and bloodshed. In the end, it embodies the dark power that triumphs when human society collapses.