Themes in Lord of the Flies

Loss of innocence
1. "Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man's heart."
2. "the boys were falling still and silent, feeling the beginnings of awe at the power set free below them"
3. "Simon was murdered"
4. Ralph: "Things are breaking up and I don't understand why"
5. "Simon thought of the beast.. a human at once heroic and sick"
6. "A blackness within, a blackness that spread"
7. "To Ralph, this seemed the breaking up of sanity."
Power
1. Conch, Piggy's glasses
  1. conch has power to call boys to a meeting
  2. Piggy's glasses have power to light fire
2. Jack: "I'm going to be chief"
3. Ralph: "I'm chief. I'll go. Don't argue.", "Sit down"
4. J: "I ought to be chief"
5. J: "we don't want you. Three's enough"
  1. Ralph&Jack assert authority over Piggy
6. "I was chief, and you were going to to what I said"
7. J: "Now you eat." - asserts dominance over Piggy
8. J: "Give me a drink" - completely dominant of his 'tribe'
9. "The most obvious leader was Jack."
10. "I've got the conch!" - Piggy has no authority even when holding the conch
Tribe Mentality
1. boys chant together: "kill the pig, cut its throat, spill its blood"
  1. changes to "do him in" when boys play act with Robert + kill Simon
2. "the chant rose ritually"
3. "the chant rose a tone in agony"
4. "we want meat!"
Primitivity
1. JACK
  1. "swung back his right arm and hurled the spear with all his strength"
  2. "tried to convey the compulsion to track down and kill"
  3. "I went on. I thought by myself - I thought I might kill."
  4. "began to laugh and his laughter became a bloodthirsty snarling"
  5. "liberated from shame and self-conciousness"
  6. "he giggled" after brutally killing the sow
2. "the hunters.. had outwitted a living thing, had imposed their will upon it, taken away its life like a long, satisfying drink"
3. "all the boys were talking at once, relieved and excited"
4. "Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in."
5. "The desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering" (Ralph)
6. "the crowd leapt onto the beast, screamed, struck, bit, tore."
7. "headless body of the sow lay where they had dropped it"
8. Samneric: torn between savagery (Jack) and civilization (Raplh)
Civilization
1. "We'll have a hands up, like at school"
2. conch, glasses, clothes are all ties to civilization
3. "Rules are the only thing we've got!"
4. "Demented but partly secure society"
5. "The taboo of the old life"
6. "he was back from where he came from, feeding ponies with sugar over the garden wall"
7. "Which is better - to have laws and agree or to hunt and kill?"
8. "let's have a vote"
9. "I'm calling a meeting"
Breakdown of Society
1. Group splits into two
  1. "I'm not going to play any longer, not with you"
  2. "Bollocks to the rules!"

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Themes in Lord of the Flies

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	Created by lowri_luxton over 10 years ago