Darkness is a part of the human nature, it is festers in us, in forms like greed and jealousy, and in the book Lord of the Flies human nature is what William Golding is writing about. She writes about the darkness within us, she writes about how all of us, even children, even the ones which society perceive as innocent, can kill. She writes about how easy it is for one individual to let loose and join the stream of darkness, started by others; at first, it’s a trickle, then a stream, then a roaring river so wide and powerful, it becomes unstoppable. The theme of this books is darkness is a part of human nature. Elise Golding weaves together a wonderful tale, surprisingly bloody, and haunting truthful.
The book is set in the middle of a war, when a group of young English school boys, about age 7-11, takes a plane to evacuate, but they are shot down onto a deserted island, now they are waiting for help. This group of boys are by themselves, no adults, no supervision. Ralph and his friend Piggy find a conch shell, they use this shell to summon all the boys together. They elect Ralph as leader and Jack as lead Hunter. Ralph proposes that the only way they will rejoin the civilized world is by building a huge fire and that the smoke will signify passing ships. Jack was determined to start hunting. Life was good at first, then the little ones started to see a monster on the island, that caused panic among them. Eventually, the two sides split up and Jack became an independent tribe. Jack’s independent tribe spent all day hunting, and having a good time, eventually people from Ralphs side got attracted into Jacks tribe of so called “Warriors”, Ralph and Piggy were thinking of ways to keep the fire going without starving, the only way the kids could start a fire was with Piggy’s glasses, but the fire needed to be maintained, and that could not be done with 2 people. That night, Jacks tribe came in and stole Piggy’s glasses. Now Ralph was furious, he marched to Jack’s camp fire and demanded his glasses back, a fight broke out and Piggy was murdered. Ralph was on the run, Jack and his hunters scoured the island hunting for Ralph, eventually they came up with an idea to burn Ralph out. The fire caused smoke, and a passing ship noticed and came to the rescue right before Ralph was murdered too. This book is signifying the darkness of the human mind.
In this book, the children forgot the concept of law and order, they become wild with their freedom and lets basic instinct rule. The reader eventually realizes the monster that terrorizes the children on the island is just a representation of the darkness in man’s heart. The book also describes a sort of hunting ritual that Jack devised, once they start the ritual, they become so frenzied that they mistake human for pig, and murder the human. People can get caught up in a frenzy or a trend so easily, and they just don’t worry about the consequences, from big things like murder, to just a fashion trend, people just get caught up. At the end of this book, all-out war a waged between Ralph and Jack, this war caused the death of Piggy and was a second away to causing the death of Ralph. Darkness is a part of human nature, we have turned everything we have created into weapons, from the first wooden clubs to gunpowder to atomic bombs.
Darkness is a part of human nature, but do not let it rule you, accept that it is there and control it. Lord of the flies perfectly demonstrates how that, once you let yourself get caught in that frenzy you will never escape it.
