The Savage Beast†Man’s Inherent Primitivism as Shown in Lord of the Flies

Ray Pen part Oct 3, 2010 The Savage Beast homophiles Inherent Primitivism as Shown in Lord of the Flies A running theme in Lord of the Flies is that military man is bestial at heart, always ultimately reverting back to an evil and ill- fashioned genius. The cycle of mans rise to power, or righteousness, and his inevitable autumn from g subspecies is an historic point that book settles again and again, often comparing man with characters from the password to give a more vivid picture of his descent.Lord of the Flies symbolizes this fall in different manners, ranging from the illustration of the mentality of actual primitive man to the reflections of a corrupt seaman in purgatory. The novel is the story of a group of boys of different backgrounds who atomic number 18 marooned on an unknown island when their prostrate crashes. As the boys try to organize and formulate a plan to nail rescued, they begin to separate and as a result of the dissension a band of savage tribal hunt ers is formed. Eventually the boys lose all smell of home and civilization. The founding, that understandable and lawful world, was slipping away. (Golding, Ch 5) When the confusion finally leads to a manhunt, the reader realizes that despite the strong sense of British character and niceness that has been instilled in the youth throughout their lives, the boys have backpedalled and shown the underlying savage stance existent in all humans The novel shows the reader how swooning it is to revert back to the evil nature inherent in man if a group of well-conditioned school boys can ultimately wind up committing various extreme travesties, one can imagine what adults, leaders of society, argon capable of doing under the pressures of trying to maintain world relations.Lord of the Flies misgiving of evil is such that it touches the nerve of contemporary horror as no English novel of its time has done it takes us, through symbolism, into a world of active, proliferating evil which i s seen, one feels, as the natural condition of man and which is backlash to remind the reader of the vilest manifestations of Nazi regression. In the novel, Simon is a peaceful cuss who tries to show the boys that there is no monster on the island except the tutelages that the boys have. Simon tries to realm the truth Maybe there is a beastWhat I sozzled is maybe its only us. (Golding, Ch 5) When he makes this revelation, he is ridiculed. This is an uncanny parallel to the be amiss that Christ had to deal with throughout his life. Later in the story, the savage hunters be chasing a pig. Once they polish the pig, they put its head on a stick and Simon experiences an epiphany. As Simon rushes to the campfire to tell the boys of his discovery, he is hit in the place with a spear, his prophecy rejected and the word he wished to spread ignored.Simon locomote to the ground dead and is described as beautiful and pure. The description of his death, the manner in which he died, an d the cause for which he died are remarkably exchangeable to the circumstances of Christs life and ultimate demise. The major difference is that Christ died on the cross, while Simon was speared. However, a reader familiar with the Bible recalls that Christ was stabbed in the side with a spear before his crucifixion. When Piggy, the largest advocate of the law, is killed near the hold back of the book, the conch is broken.Until that point, the conch had been a way to control and pacify the crowd only individual holding the conch may speak. When Jack and the boys have had enough of Ralphs laws, the boys kill Piggy and shatter the conch. The law ceases to exist, though when the boys are rescued, the game ends and they are once again righteous bedraggled boys smeared in mud and note on the shore. William Golding discusses mans capacity for fear and cowardice. In the novel, the boys on the island first beset a natural fear of being stranded on an unmapped island without the couns el of adults.Once the boys begin to organize and begin to feel more adult-like themselves, the fear of monsters takes over. It is understandable that boys ranging in ages from toddlers to young teenagers would have fears of monsters, especially when it is taken into amity that the children are stranded on the island. The condition wishes to show, however, that fear is an emotion that is giveing and active in humans from the very beginnings of their lives.This revelation uncovers other impuissance in man, supporting the idea or belief that man is misfortunate and savage at the very core of his existence. Throughout the novel, there is a struggle for power between two groups. This struggle illustrates mans fear of losing control, which is another example of his selfishness and weakness. The fear of monsters is natural the fear of losing power is inherited. The author uses these vices to prove the point that any type of uncontrolled fear contributes to mans instability and will u ltimately lead to his demise spiritually and perhaps even physically.The author chooses to use an island as the setting for the majority of the story. The island is an important symbol in Lord of the Flies. It suggests the isolation of man in a frightening and hidden cosmos. The island in the novel is an actual island, but its more than just that. It is a microcosm of life itself, the adult world, and the human struggle with his own loneliness. Man grows more savage at heart as he evolves because of his cowardice and his quest for power.The novel proves this by throwing together opposing forces into a location that dowses them with power struggles and frightening situations. By comparing mankind in world-wide to Biblical characters in similar scenarios, the novel provides images of the darker side of man. This darker side of mans nature inevitably wins and man is proven to be a pathetic race that refuses to accept responsibility for its shortcomings.Bibliography Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. 1952. 13. 3 (1952) 1-248. Print.