Lord of the Flies, written by English author William Golding, remains a seminal work exploring humanity’s potential for good and evil. Written not long after the end of World War II, Golding’s novel takes an allegorical approach to its central themes of the loss of innocence, humanity’s basic nature, and the struggle between civilization and savagery.
The story follows a group of English school boys who have been stranded alone on a deserted island. Without the benefit of adults, the boys work to create their own society by electing a leader and organizing survival tasks. One of the key tasks is working to achieve their rescue off the island by keeping a signal fire lit. The other critical task is finding food for the group. Through a series of mishaps, the tension among the boys begins to rise. The tension comes from their fears of what is out in the jungle (some believe there is a monster living there) and decaying relationships among the boys. As the boys doing the hunting sink deeper into their primal task of hunting and killing, they become more aggressive. Eventually, the group of boys divides into two tribes: the hunters, which constitutes most of the group, and those who remain behind the original leader. The schoolboys divide into one group that descends into violence and another trying to return to civilization.
As an allegorical work, Golding used specific characters to represent specific options along the civilization to barbarism continuum. Ralph is the boy first elected leader when the group is working together to order their new world. As such, Ralph represents the order and morality imposed by an external civilization made up of laws. Simon is a quieter character who represents a morality based in nature. That is, a more internal framework of ethics that perhaps is the most ambitious and idealized form of morality as it is more organic rather than a response to external pressures like Ralph’s civilized society. At the opposite end of the spectrum is Jack who deposes Ralph and becomes leader of the savage hunters tribe. Jack represents the descent into a power based morality unrestricted by any other value.
The other key figure in the book is Piggy, an intellectual, chubby boy who seems most unsuited to the harsh, physical realities of living on a deserted island. However, in fact, many of the little group’s greatest achievements, such as lighting fire, come through Piggy’s innovation and resourcefulness. As such, he represents the rational, scientific side of civilization.
The representatives of perhaps the highest forms of civilizing influences – rationality (Piggy) and harmony (Simon) – are literally murdered by crazed hunters, the representatives of savagery. This is clear symbolism of Golding’s assessment of human nature. Ralph and the other boys fleeing the hunters are found by a British officer, the ultimate symbol of extrinsic order. The officer turns to Ralph, as his symbolic counterpart on the island, for an explanation. That the higher forms of morality were crushed by chaos with only the representative of legal civilization remaining long enough to regain itself indicates Golding’s dark view that civilization is perhaps only a fragile bulwark against man’s barbaric nature.