| «Lord of the Flies» |
| 1 | It is most astonishing and lamentable that a book as widely read and frequently used in the classroom as William Gelding's Lord of the Flies has received so little analytical attention from the critics. True, it has not been neglected; this volume attests to that. But despite the profusion of essays by a number of well-known and worthy critics, few close analyses of Golding's technique can be found among them, few explications of the workings of the novel will be discovered. |
| 2 | Indeed, despite a running controversy over the meaning of the novel, critical articles fall largely into a pattern of plot summary and applause for the arrangement of the novel's materials followed by observations on Golding's view of human nature, often embellished with the critic's response to that view. There are exceptions—they will be found among the essays in this book—like Claire Rosenfield's psychological study of meaning, Carl Niemeyer's comparative study of the novel and its antipathetic predecessor The Coral Island, Donald R. |
| 3 | Spangler's penetrating study of the function of Simon, and William Mueller's discussion of the use of the various hunts. Further explorations are needed in many areas, however, among them a careful scrutiny of the opening descriptions of Ralph and Jack in Chapter One. It is useful, but perhaps not very subtle, to point out that the former is immediately declared the "fair boy," that he, like the angel Gabriel, sounds a horn that announces good news—that of survival—that Jack with his angular frame, black cloak and cap, and red hair is Lucifer-like. |
| 4 | More Biblical parallels must be developed—the paradisiacal setting, the symbolic nakedness or near nakedness of all the boys except Jack and his followers—but most especially needed is a study that explains items that do not comply with the original Biblical pattern but that perhaps serve as tip-offs to the theme and the ironies that Golding employs without fully delineating until the last page, for instance the "response" of the paradise to the boys—first from the heat, then a bird with an echoed "witch-like cry," then the entangling creepers (more like the Eden of Milton than Genesis)—together with the important information that Ralph, not Jack, has a snake-clasp belt, that Jack wears a golden badge. |
| 5 | We have implications very early that Golding's view is not simple, traditionally Christian, or predictable in spite of the title, that it is a complex rebuttal to the ever-present faith in man's potential for regeneration and redemption. Here is a fruitful area of research: do all these elements of the novel, some seemingly inconsistent, even extraneous, operate in unified support of theme? Symbolism is one of the most puzzling aspects of this book. |
| 6 | The names of the four major characters are a perplexing illustration. Simon, the mystic of the group, has a name clearly linked with an Apostle of Christ, the one, strange to say, who denied Him three times. (Simon does deny the objective existence of the beast, but is this a parallel?) Jack also has such a name, since his first name is a nickname for John, the announcer of Christ, also a follower of Christ, arid his last name is Merridew, an echo at least of Mary. |
| 7 | Ralph's name, oddly enough, is unrelated to the New Testament and in fact is said to be akin to the Anglo-Saxon Raedwulf, "wolf-council." Piggy's nickname appears even more incongruous because it is Simon rather than Piggy who is slain as a substitute pig. The only instance in which a name seems incontestably appropriate is that of Roger, where etymology directs us to the Anglo-Saxon Hrothgar, "spear-fame." In The Coral Island the three protagonists are named Jack, Ralph, and Peterkin Gay. |
| 8 | Golding claims that he changed the latter name to Simon to emphasize his priestly qualities—implying some intention on his part to make at least one name symbolic—while another critic insists that Peterkin is altered not to Simon but to Piggy. But that is beside the point. The central question is, "To what extent do the names function symbolically?" Do we just select Simon and Roger and, because inconvenient, forget the others? |
| 9 | Or is there another more subtle solution? We are also mystified by the relationship between Lord of the Flies and The Coral Island. Before undertaking a study of Golding's book, must one study Ballantyne's? To what degree do details in the former depend upon the latter, and, more confusing, to what degree do both books contain the same details because of similarity of setting? No one has produced a full-scale synthesis of the symbols of the novel either, nor has anyone prepared a fully adequate study of characterization. |
| 10 | Ralph himself is an enigma. Does he represent the idealist and Piggy the pragmatist? Or the reverse? Why are Piggy and Jack foes from the start, but Ralph and Jack friends for a considerable length of time? Is it important that Ralph disdains Piggy for so long? Why does Ralph the leader have such difficulties controlling the littluns even though they instantly recognize him as chief rather than Jack? |
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