Lord of the Flies by William Golding : A Critical Perspective and Outline of the Narrative

 

LORD OF THE FLIES

BY WILLIAM GOLDING

Summary

CONTENTS:

Contributor’s Name:                                                                       Chapter 

Bikram Chowdhury:         -------------------------------------------------------- 1

Ahmed Hasan:                --------------------------------------------------------- 2

Seu Roy:                         ---------------------------------------------------------- 3   

Shubhankita Das:           ---------------------------------------------------------- 4

Sushmita Ghosh:            ---------------------------------------------------------- 5

Bappa Sarkar:                 ---------------------------------------------------------- 6

Hasi Biswas:                    -----------------------------------------------------------7

Sandipan Roy:                 ---------------------------------------------------------- 8

Debmalya Bhadury:         ---------------------------------------------------------- 9

Mou Sarkar:                     --------------------------------------------------------- 10

Meherun Nesha:              --------------------------------------------------------- 11

Bikram Chowdhury:          --------------------------------------------------------- 12

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter One: The Sound of the Shell

           The novel, Lord of the Flies begins abruptly on a distant location, with boys scattered on some deserted place having lagoon, rock and so on. The fair boy, whose yet-to-be-disclosed name is Ralph, seems to be taking off his school dress. He meets a fat boy who inquires about the man having a "megaphone". It reveals that they have had a plane crash, and all of the passengers, mostly young boys as we are to notice later on in the next chapters, have fallen on some distant place. The fat boy seems to be quite intelligent as the questions he asks are quite reasonable and he seems to have a good knowledge about the plane and its stuff. And he is quite startled finding that there are no "grown-ups" nearby. The fair boy informs that "we was attacked". If we closely observe the sentence, we may find that he is referring as "we" and it is quite a leader-like instinct to use "we" as a singular and a united army. It implies beforehand the politics of leadership and its effects on all the boys, sane or insane. 

 

             Then when asked by the fat boy, the fair boy reveals his name as Ralph, in return the fat boy expects that he would be asked to tell his name too. But it doesn't go that way. Then after some time, the fat boy himself, in his own clever way, brings up his name as Piggy. Next a good deal of happy ragging takes place upon that humorous name. Then after inspecting from above, Ralph concludes that this place is quite secluded. And he also discovers a swimming pool, and jumps in, and finds the water hot. Piggy also joins in the pool.  He also finds "a school of tiny, glittering fish flicked hither and thither". It seems quite ironic and obviously a punny play on the word "school". Although the school of  fish, despite being an aquatic creatures, seem to be wandering in order, the school of school kids, quite paradoxically, will prove themselves to be quite chaotic even though they are humans who regards themselves to be the superior beings than any creature. 

 

     Then Ralph and Piggy come across a stone-like thing, which turned out to be a "conch". Piggy knows how to use it in a productive way. He suggests Ralph to blow it up so that other boys, if present in the forest or around, can come following the wave of the loud sound of this conch. After some vain and sport-like efforts of Ralph, pricked by Piggy, a sound comes out of the conch aloud. It draws one by one many boys from nearby locations, Johnny and then a bold twin and so on. Then comes from the shadow of jungle a group of cloaked and caped boys like "a swarm of bees" headed by the Lord of the flies, Beelzebub himself, quite defiant and arrogant. 

 

            Then they starts about the main thing of being rescued from that place where there is no sign of any grown-ups. So a general urge of selecting a leader comes into the play. And Jack, the leader of the choir has an arrogant confidence that he is the leader and on the other hand, the boy with the shell who has actualized the togetherness by his trumpet is no less a leader and Piggy, with his sharp intelligence, is also worthy of being so. Then a voting system is proposed, everyone is called to raise his hand in support of his chosen leader. All the boys from the choir, as expected, have raised their hands in favour of Jack and the rest in favour of Ralph. Ralph, as being chosen by the majority, becomes the leader. 

 

Now Ralph proposes to verify the place if it is an island or not. Only three boys from the group, Ralph, Jack and Simon plan to go on exploring the place through thick and thin of the gloomy and sloppy forest by climbing many cliffs of mountain. Before sailing on that special search, Piggy also has a wish to accompany Ralph on tthe quest, but due to his asthma, in Ralph's word, "Ass-mar", Ralph tells him to be with the rest of the boys and to list their names as he's been doing before. From above the mountain, they throw a glance around, observing where they landed at first, if there is any smoke or not, or any trace of village or human habitation, they end up finding nothing. 

 

          Then Simon informs he is hungry and this awareness of being hungry spread like pandemic into the other two also. A sudden voice comes shrieking into their ears. They find a pig stuck in the creepers and Jack gets ready with his knife to stab it for the meat. But the pig flees before Jack hunts it. They all feel kinda ashamed and Jack reveals that "next time" he will slay it without any mercy. This discloses the "beast within" every being that comes out of every one at a certain point of time. Few can resist the beast within.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Two: Fire on the Mountain

Here in the beginning of the chapter two, “Fire on the Mountain”, Ralph is arranging a meeting by blowing the conch, after returned from the morning’s exploration. All the boys gathered at the meeting place. They look at Ralph with great attention and it makes Ralph nervous. He is unconfident about what to say or how to start the meeting. Then he gains some confidence and discloses the suspense regarding their morning’s exploration. Ralph says that there is no mark of human beings in this alien island. And in between the speech Jack urges to make a group to hunt pigs, which can solve their problem of food. Then Ralph, Jack and Simon explain their recent experience of hunting a pig and how Jack missed it. Being ashamed, Jack takes a vow to kill it next time and hits his knife to a tree trunk to show his sincerity.

 

When Ralph notices that a chaotic environment is prevailing in the meeting, he suggests to follow some rules to continue the meetings and everyday life in a disciplined way. It shows his leadership ability and democratic sense. He explains that every boy will have to raise their hands when they will want to say something, exactly like they did in school. The boy whose turn it is to speak will receive the conch. He will has to hold the conch in hand while talking and then pass it to others. Jack suddenly interrupts and discusses the punishments for breaking the rules. His urge for making an army to hunt and now the punishment issue bring him as a dictator like character. Now Piggy snatches the conch from Ralph and says that they have to know about where they are and how long have they been there.

 

Ralph again takes the conch from Piggy and tries to wipe out the worries of the boys. He says that the island is theirs and advices to enjoy the moments until they will be rescued. In this occasion, he allows the boys to follow some adventurous novels they have read. Some from the crowd mention few name of the novels, like, “Treasure Island”, “Swallows and

Amazons” and “The Coral Island”. Then a small six years old boy who has half-covered face by a red birthmark, comes in front to take the conch. When he gets it, he asks Ralph about the snake he saw in the forest. Boys are afraid to a certain extent in this case. After noticing this, Ralph assures them by telling that this kind of big animals can only be found in the large countries like, Africa or India. But it cannot wipe out the fear and doubts clearly. Then he tries to motivate them again. He mentions about his Naval father who told him that there are no unknown islands in the earth. It is a hint that they will be rescued. And for that, Ralph plans to make a big fire on the top of the mountain to give signals to the passing by ships. Without further delay, Jack leads the boys to the mountain top to make the fire leaving Ralph and Piggy alone.

 

After that Ralph begins to help the boys to carry the wood piles to the mountain top. Piggy feels disgusted in Ralph’s work. Some smaller boys cannot make it perfectly and loose their interest in it. They goes on to search some fruits to eat. After many difficulties the boys make

the heap of wood piles together. Then comes another problem in front of them. They don’t know how to kindle the fire. Piggy arrives and Jack takes the glasses of him. Putting the sunray through the glasses on the heap of woods, Jack gets success to bring the fire. But it soon burns out. Being disappointed Piggy rebukes Jack and they argue. 

Ralph snatches the conch from Piggy and says the boys to follow the rules properly. And Jack mentions that they are English people and they have to follow the rules to maintain discipline like English. Being practical Ralph mentions that they might not be rescued ever. Now Piggy takes the conch again and says that he has been trying to say it but nobody is listening. He suggests that they should build shelters first rather making the fire. Shelter is much more necessary. Piggy says anxiously that they don’t even know the exact number of the boys. Suddenly, Piggy marks a burning tree and cry of a little boy. Piggy thinks that one of the boys is missing. These things make Piggy more concern and realistic character than the two other major characters in the novel.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Three: Huts on the Beach

The chapter three, “Huts on the Beach” begins with the description of Jack’s pig-hunting alone in the deep silence of the jungle. It seems like that weeks have  passed because, we see here Jack’s looks and appearance have changed, length of his hair, the mass of freckles on his tanned back and peeling sunburn and he is naked. Jack is looking for a pig and finally, Jack spots a path cleared by pigs and hears the muttering of hooves. He has made a spear which is about five feet long, he hurls that spear at the pig but as usual he misses that.

Jacks returns frustrated and angrily to that area where Ralph and Simon are building huts for them with tree trunks and palm leaves.  Jack asks for water but Ralph doesn’t notice him. Jack again asks “Oh, hullo. Water? I’m thirsty.” Ralph addresses him to the tree where, coconut shell is brimmed with fresh water. Then Ralph expresses his frustration because many of them have agreed to help build the huts but only Simon helps him. Ralph complains Jack that littluns (little ones) all are hopeless, all day I am working here to build shelter but they are preoccupied with playing or swimming or eating.

Jack advises Ralph that he is the chief, he should order them to build shelter. Ralph replies that meeting everyday or twice a day will not work. They would agree to work five minutes and then “wander off or go hunting”. Jack blushes, and says, “We want meat, though we have not got any.” Ralph emphasizes that they also want shelter as well and points out that all the hunters except Jack have come back hours ago and yet to bring any meat back from the forest, the hunters would rather swim than hunt. Jack defends himself and replies that he has little control over his hunters, he hopes he could sneak up on a pig by himself and kill it. The madness comes into Jack’s eyes again. Ralph reminds Jack that he has not gotten any hunt yet and tries to explain that hunting is as important as building shelters.

Ralph and Jack both are red in their faces as they are arguing with each other.  Ralph explains that they need shelter not only for rain but also for littluns who are frightened and having nightmares. Simon says Ralph and Jack about the littluns’ fear of the “beastie” or the snakething. But Jack and Ralph are not interested in this and says that it is a good island.

Ralph reminds Jack of the fire and they go to the mountain to inspect the fire. Ralph frowns and asks Jack, “We don’t make enough smoke.” Jack shouts, “Got it”, Ralph jumps and asks, “What? Where? Is it a ship?”, but Jack is pointing to the slopes of the mountain where the wild pigs might rest in the shadow during the hot day. Ralph cannot believe that Jack is still thinking about pigs when they should be thinking about rescue.

Simon goes into the forest for helping littluns to get fruits. After that he goes off on his own into the jungle on and sits down middle in the forest and enjoys the surroundings. He hears birds, bees, and, the distant sound of the waves.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Four: Painted Faces and Long Hair

This chapter opens with a general description of the island's changes throughout the day and the boys' responses to each day's cyclical progression. The focus narrows to the littluns' subculture and three of the littluns interacting as they play with one of their sandcastles.

 

 Then Roger and Maurice emerge from the jungle and deliberately destroy some of the sandcastles on their way to the beach. Henry, Percival, and Johnny, three of the littluns, are making sandcastles on the beach when Roger and Maurice approach from the forest. Roger immediately kicks the castles into dust, casting sand into the eyes of Percival, one of the smallest and most sensitive of the littluns, who begins to cry. Roger feels a pang of guilt, a holdover from his former civilized life. Then Roger wanders off and watches Henry, who is now playing with arthropods at the waterline. Roger hurls stones at Henry, making them fall a few feet away, never too close. His desire to hit the boy is again restrained by his impulses toward social order. When Henry turns and looks his way, Roger quickly hides behind a palm tree.

 

         As the boys settle into life on the island, factions develop. The smaller boys are now known by the generic title of "littluns," including Percival, the smallest boy on the island, who had previously stayed in a small shelter for two days and had only recently emerged, red-eyed and miserable. The littluns spend most of the day searching for fruit to eat, and since they choose it indiscriminately they suffer from chronic diarrhoea. They cry for their mothers less often than expected, and they spend time with the older boys only during Ralph's assemblies. The littluns occupy themselves by building castles in the sand, complex structures whose fine details are only noticeable from close range. The littluns remain collectively troubled by nightmares and visions of the "beastie" described at the first meeting.

They fear that the creature hunts the boys after nightfall.

 

       The extent to which the strong boys bully the weak mirrors the extent to which the island civilization disintegrates. Since the beginning, the boys have bullied the whiny, intellectual Piggy whenever they needed to feel powerful and important. Now, however, their harassment of Piggy intensifies, and Jack begins to hit him openly. Indeed, despite his position of power and responsibility in the group, Jack shows no qualms about abusing the other boys after nightfall.

     Gender differences underlie the boys' decline into savagery, which becomes apparent in this first successful hunt. English public schools for boys were notorious for the aggressive, sometimes brutal, behaviour of schoolmates toward each other. The bullying of Piggy, Jack's control over the choir, and the older boys' dominance over the littluns all reflect these patterns, which are decidedly male. The hunters' chant about killing the pig includes the phrases "Cut her throat. Spill her blood," extending male aggressiveness to an act of destruction of the female. 

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Five: Beast from Water

In Golding’s “Lord of the Flies” ,there are twelve chapters. Here chapter V is going to be discussed. In chapter V, Ralph decided to call a meeting. He thought that the boys were not maintaining the group rules. So in the evening he blew the conch shell and all the boys gathered on the beach .At the meeting Ralph told that the boys neglected their duties .They didn’t mention their required work and they didn’t follow the rules .They didn’t even maintain the signal fire .They were only securing fear of beast and monsters in their heart . But Ralph stated that there were no beast and monsters at all so they did not need to fear. Piggy supports Ralph’s statement but the sense of fear still runs through the group’s nonetheless.

 

One of the littluns told that he had seen the beast. All the boys started asking him about the beast. He also claimed that it might come up from the ocean at night. This terrified all the boys and in a moment the meeting turned into a Chaos . At the time Jack claimed that if there is a beast in the forest he and his group of hunters will kill it. Then Ralph, Simon and Piggy are left but the group of hunters danced and chanted.

 

Piggy requested Ralph to blow the conch shell as it was Ralph’s duty to guide them but Ralph denies in the fear that they might not listen to him and they might ignore him . Ralph told Piggy and Simon that he might give up the leadership of the group but they awared him that the group needs his guidance. As the group drifts off to sleep, the sound of a boy crying echoes along the beach.

 

The part of beast played an important aspect in Golding’s “Lord of the Flies “. Day by day the fear of beast increases in the heart of boys , especially at night. It becomes stronger when a boy claims that he has seen a beast. It is uncertain whether the beast exists or not but it serves as an important symbol in the novel. “Beast” becomes the cause of fear in one hand whereas on the other hand it symbolises the devilish desire and savagery within each and every human being.

 

The concept of beast can be interpreted in a several number of shades . The beast recalls the devilish power in religious concept . It can be represented like the Freudian instinctual urges,id, the desire of humans unconscious mind. The existence of beast terrifies the boys and they thought that the beast comes from the ocean at night. It represents beast’s emergence from their own unconscious mind . Simon realises it later that the very existence of beast is actually rooted inside each boys’ mind and Soul that represents the capacity of savagery and evil power that slowly grabs them.

 

The fear of beast is already in the mind of the littluns and Jack also tries to manipulate the boys fear of beast to their own advantage. In this way we can say that the concept of beast indirectly expresses Jack’s primary sources of evil power. At the same time Jack also instigates the boys to act or behave as a beast. The instinct of savagery or barbarism always exists in every human being and it is natural. Golding as a skilled writer asserts the concept that we all have the capacity within us of becoming a beast. Water emblems purity and hear the beast comes from the water as the boys thought. So the beast or the evil power comes from purity.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Six: Beast from Air

In chapter six of William Golding’s novel “The Lord of the Flies” we can see that After the assembly, all the boys go to sleep. Above them an aerial battle is taking place. A casualty of the battle floats down to the island on his opened parachute. The wind drags the body to rest at the top of the mountain. The breeze inflates the parachute occasionally, making the body appear to sit up and then sink forward again. Samneric, tending the fire on the mountain, catch a glimpse of the body’s movement and hear the parachute inflating. They flee to Ralph in a panic with a story exaggerated by their fear.

 

At dawn, Ralph calls an assembly, where they decide to investigate the only spot on the island left unexplored: the castle-like rock formation at one end. With Piggy and the littluns remaining behind on the beach, Ralph and the others go to the castle. Ralph goes first by himself, followed a few minutes later by Jack. After they establish that the beast is not there, the other boys join them in the castle and want to play there a while. They resist when Ralph announces that they need to all go check on the fire, but he forces the issue and Jack leads the way back up to the fire site.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Seven: Shadows and Tall Trees

   This Novel is an allegorical novel , here Golding conveys many ideas and themes through symbolic characters  and ideas. As the novel progress, Golding shows how different people feel the influences of instincts of civilization (Ralph)and savagery (Jack) to different degrees. This chapter provides deeper insights into several of the boy's personalities and further illustrates the growing contrast between Ralph and Jack.

 

In the beginning this chapter, the boys continue along their journey towards the mountain. Ralph stops to gaze at the ocean. The ocean symbolizes the subconscious, where the beast lurks, it does separate Ralph from civilization. Simon predicts only Ralph's safe return, not his own.

  

Ralph's excitement at killing the shows that even he has a Savage side to him, though it's more repressed. The ritual dance gains in power, almost killing Robert and foreshadowing future trouble.

 

 All the boys suggestions from drums to human sacrifice, would make the dance more 'savage' and foreshadow more violence. Only Simon understands that the beast is within. He doesn't fear the jungle because the beast isn't there.

 Ralph wished, they could have been the dead parachutist for what it was because they go at night, however, they see the parachutist distorted by Shadows and believe it to be the beast. People are uncomfortable facing questions that hint at the beast within.

 

The conflict between Jack(Savagery) and Ralph( civilization)for control and power serves only the beast's benefit. Here Jack and his savagery prevail luring the boys deeper into believing in the beasts' physical existence.This connection emphasizes the idea that the beast is a symbolic manifestation of the boy's primitive inner instincts.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Eight: Gift for the Darkness

A great poetry can inextricably and intermittently tremble the eternal darkness of slumber but what is there in this spine-chilling title of the novel “Lord of the Flies “which not only trembles the darkness but also creates a mystery, a kind of enigma ? The name of the chapter eight is Gift of the darkness which may create a sense of curiosity and excitement amazingly in a long-drawn situation of conflict between illusion and reality by leaving the readers in an atmosphere ,mixed up with lights and darkness which is elusive, in other words.

         From the chapter eight, what we came to learn is the fact that piggy has no faith about the existence of beast. He totally disbelieves about the beast. It is Ralph who said that the beast is sitting up by the signal fire.    Jack made disastrous attempt to take the control of the situation and called an assembly by blowing the conch. Here jack said that “we have seen the beast, we crawled up, we were only few feet away. The beast sat up and looked at us . The beast comes out of the sea, out  of the dark trees . The beast is the hunter “. It is worthwhile to mention here that there was a conflict and cold war between Ralph and jack which was taking place and we find the glimpse through studying the psychology and idiosyncrasy of Jack who wants to lead the group and get deep delight in punishing the boys like piggy. Even he practically did this by breaking the lense of piggy’s glass. At the same time, we find totalitarian attitude and behaviour in Jack umpteen times as he is willing to focus on only power and control. So in his desire to become leader and lead the groups and in his zeal to remove Ralph from the position of “chief “of the group, we vividly find this attitude. Jack accused Ralph of humiliating his hunting groups. He said that Ralph is responsible for belittling his group. He also added that Ralph is not proper chief. Then Jack wanted to reject Ralph by making the arrangement of vote. But unluckily nobody voted for Jack. Then feeling insulted, jack made determination to constitute a new group and said that anyone can join the group.

          When all the boys were trapped in an isolated island, then Ralph gave higher importance on how to be rescued from such labyrinth conditions. He decided to create smoke signal of fire in the top of the mountain that may alert the passing ships and that could come to rescue them. But it is Simon who says that they should go up the mountain and confront the beast but rest of the boys get frightened to do that . Suddenly an idea came to the mind of piggy. He said they should build a new signal fire on the beach rather than mountain. And this idea of piggy absolutely restored the planning of Ralph. Piggy then said that “we could experiment, we could find out how to make a small hot fire and then put green branches on to make smoke. Some of them leaves must be better for that than others “. Ralph and piggy most probably understood that most of the biguns have vanished. “Where is Bill,Roger and Maurice ?” Only Simon and Samneric did not leave the company and association of Ralph and Piggy. When beyond the screen of leaves ,the sunlight pelted down and butterflies dance , Simon shifted restlessly and felt thirst.

          Jack was extremely happy as he is going to be chief of separate group. He is going to get more biguns away from the conch. Jack said that “we will kill a pig and give a feast. He paused and went on more slowly. And about the beast. When we kill ,we will leave some of the kill for it. Then it won’t bother us may be.” Actually they decided that they will leave part of the pig for the beast and as a result, the beast would not bother them. They find a drove of pigs. They set their sights on the biggest pig who is nursing a row of piglets. Then a bloody and terrible scene happened. They killed the pig and they would make party and cook the pig. Jack told Roger to sharpen a stick at both ends. Then he bends over the pig with knife and cutts off her head. Then jack held up the head and on the pointed end of the stick, he kept that which pierced through into the mouth. Then Jack including his members of hunting group heard the loud noise which was no doubt the buzzing of flies. The swarm of flies surrounded the head of the pig. Jack spoke loudly “ This head is for the beast. It is a gift”.

            Simon discovered something which was inexplicable and indescribable. What was that ? It was cutting head of a pig which was surrounded by swarm of flies. It was the gift for the beast. In other words, the gift of the darkness. It was strange moment when the clouds were sitting on the land, butterflies deserted the open space, when obscene thing grinned and dripped, when there were no shadows under the trees but everywhere a pearly stillness, so that what was real seemed illusive, then a sound came to the ear of Simon . Simon heard a silent sound from the head- “ run away ,go back child “. Simon called this creature ‘the lord of the flies’. Meanwhile on the other side, Jack invited everyone to come as he arranged a feast. There Jack declared himself as chief . The lord of the flies tells Simon with dialogue quotes that he is an ignorant silly shakes . The lord of the flies asked whether Simon is afraid of him and also told that “I’m the beast.  Beast is something you could hunt and kill. “Then in the tone of a school master, the lord of the flies addressed him as poor misguided child. At last he lost his consciousness on seeing the blackness inside the mouth of Lord of the flies.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Nine: A View to a Death

This chapter focuses on Simon and his role as a visionary mystic.  Waking up from the faint he asks the same question that he did in front of everyone before.  He has to see what is happening on the hill, this confrontation has made him age-old. Because of “the infinite cynicism of life”  he is crouching like an old man.

When Simon sees the dead pilot and realizes that there is no such thing as a beast, he rushes to tell the rest of the boys.  Meanwhile, the power struggle between Ralph and Jack begins, and despite Ralph’s best efforts, Jack is chosen as their leader.  At that moment a storm arose in which Simon came and appeared, but the boys attacked him thinking it was a beast and in the end, Simon died.

 

Golding describes the murder scene: “ There were no words, and no movements but the tearing of teeth and claws”

 

As soon as Simon died, the last civilized order of the island disappeared.  The surroundings are filled with brutality and chaos and the boys of Jack’s team become inhuman savages to the fullest. Golding symbolizes this weather as a universal assessment of all the events that take place in the novel and as an extreme reaction of the boys.  Significantly, the storm also washed away the bodies of Simon and the parachutist so that the idea that there was no beast did not arise in anyone.

 

Jack, on the other hand, makes this beast as important as a Godlike figure so that his dominance over the team is easily established.  He immortalizes this beast, making him known as the holder of so much power that others are feared and forced to worship as an idol.

 

Simon’s murder is an almost inevitable outcome of his encounter with the Lord of the Flies in Chapter 8. During the confrontation in the previous chapter, the Lord of the Flies foreshadows Simon’s death by promising to have some “fun” with him. Simon died only because of the delusion of the other boys.  He doesn’t even get a chance to tell his story before he dies.  His death makes us stand again in the face of the evil forces in human beings.

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Ten: The Shell and the Glasses

The name of the chapter is the Shell and the glasses. The shell (conch) and the glasses ( Piggy’s glasses) bears an important role in the novel. At the beginning of the chapter, we can see the shell’s part and the chapter ends with the glasses.

 

   In chapter 10, we can see that Ralph and Piggy are talking about the last night when Simon was killed. Ralph clutches the conch to him for consolation. He tells Piggy that he was a part of Simon’s murder. He feels the guilt of Simon’s death. Piggy tells him that they don’t have any role to kill Simon. He is comforting Ralph by saying that they were outside of the circle. He also tells him that it was just an accident, the circumstances was really weird like – that bloody dance, lightning, thunder and rain. Piggy tries to comfort Ralph and also tells him not to tell Samneric ( Sam+Eric) that they were there last night. Then the twins ( Samneric) come with a great log out of the forest. They tell Ralph that they lost last night. Piggy tells that they had come earlier from the feast because of tiredness. They are talking about themselves about that.

         On the other hand, we can see that Jack is ruling his tribe in Castle Rock. They don’t have any guilt to kill Simon last night. Jack tells his tribe that they have killed an imposter of the beast. The beast can come in any disguise. So they have to be alert in every way. Everyone believes Jack. He tells them that they will hunt tomorrow and have a feast. He tells them he and the two others ( Maurice and Roger) will go hunting. As the sun is setting, so they need fire then Jack tells them they will take fire from the others.

      On the other side, Ralph and his boys are lighting the fire by using Piggy’s glasses. Then after taking fruits from the trees they come back and see that there is no smoke. They are very tired so they leave it like that. They start talking between themselves. After that, they sleep peacefully. Suddenly they( Ralph and Piggy) are wakened by Samneric’s play-fighting. But they hear the sound of rustling outside and someone is whispering Piggy’s name. Jack and his hunters attack Ralph’s boys. Ralph’s boys also fight with them bravely and make them suffer pain. So that they won’t come again. Ralph thinks that they have come for the conch but the conch is still at the same place. Then Piggy says that they don’t come for the conch but the broken glasses.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Eleven: Castle Rock

 In chapter eleven of William Golding’s novel “Lord of the Files” we can see that in the next morning Ralph and his few companions including Piggy, Sam and Eric gather together and try to light fire in cold air  as the signal fire. But once their attempt is failed because of the  absence of Piggy’s  eye glasses. Then Piggy comes up with a plan and instructs Ralph to blow the conch shell in order to arrange an assembly in which they can demand and ask Jack to give back Piggy’s glasses. And finally they’ll able to light the fire.

 

Ralph agrees and blows the conch shell and also in order to remind his formal authority he decides to take the conch shell to the Castle Rock. When they reach at  Jack’s camp, they encounter with the armed guards who tell them to leave and also throw the stones aiming them. At the same time, Jack and his group of hunters emerge from the forest behind Ralph’s group, hanging a dead pig on his shoulder. Then Ralph demands that Jack has to return Piggy’s glasses because he has to obey the rules based on “What’s right’s right” while Jack says that Ralph has to leave their camp. Once they attack to  each other and fight.

 

 Actually Ralph makes struggles to understand Jack about the importance of signal fire which give them a hope of rescue from this island. But Jack instead of understanding it, he orders his fellow hunters to tie up Sam and Eric who are included in Ralph’s group.

 

 This incident makes Ralph fury and again he lunges at Jack and fight for a while. At this time Piggy cries out and tries to speak in order to understand them  the importance of rules and rescue. While Roger pushes a boulder off cliff, Ralph dives out from way. But the boulder explodes the conch shell into the pieces by hitting Piggy as he can’t see without eye glasses. Lastly Piggy is lost in the wave of wide sea and he dies.

 

Piggy’s death makes a silence which descends the tribe and Ralph’s lips formed a words but no sound came out. Then Jack screams and throws spear at Ralph to kill him. Ralph runs into the jungle as more boys throw their spear aiming him.  At the end of this chapter, the tribes bring Sam and Eric and Jack begins to torture forcing them to join in his tribe. Thus this chapter ends with the mournful incident of Piggy’s death.

 

If we see in a literary sense, we can find that Piggy and the Conch Shell hold on to civilization. Piggy’s logical argument based on “What’s right’s right” ignores the savage rule of dominance by Jack. Here Piggy is represented as the thinker, the intellect and on the other hand conch shell is a symbol of social order, democracy and reason, also exploded. Actually the Chaos of this chapter represents the conflict of two contradicting philosophies i.e. the civilization of Ralph and the savagery of Jack. Ralph stands for genuineness, true leadership on the other hand Jack stands for greed, evil power exists in every human being.

 

 

 

 

Chapter Twelve: Cry of the Hunters

 

This is the last chapter of Golding's Lord of the Flies. Now the situation on the island is worse than before. Only Ralph is alive. Piggy and Simon are dead, rather killed by the human savages, led by Jack. Ralph is the one they are targeting now. Samneric, the duo have joined the tribe of the savages. They kind of worship the beast, the skull of a dead pig hung upon a stake. Ralph break the skull into two pieces and takes the spear with him as his protecting weapon towards the Castle Rock where Samneric are on guard of the main gate, and the feast of human beasts is going on. They plan to dedicate more sacrifices of heads to the beast. Next has to be of Ralph, last symbol of civilization left on the island.

 

Now Ralph is on the run, hiding away from the hunters who are crying for more blood, particularly of Ralph now, and have become blood-thirsty. Ralph now visits the island of Jack's side, where they have built their shelter Castle Rock which can be related to Satan's Pandemonium. There he meets with Sam and Eric. All of them are frightened. They are warning Ralph of The danger that is to come him soon. They warn him to vanish soon into the far as soon as possible. But Ralph decides to stay close, in the near thicket. The savages are having feast upon the flesh of pig in the Castle Rock. Samneric warns Ralph that Roger is sharpening both ends of a stake which reminds us of the stake used to make the statue of the Beast, by placing the dead skull of the pig upon the spear-like stake, on the same height as of humans. Ralph could not make meaning of this warning which is negatively profound and obviously fatal. Eating the food thrown at Ralph by Samneric, he falls asleep.

 

In the morning, Ralph wakes before his eyes at a near noise. He awakes up discovering the sounds of nature. After a while, he starts listening to voices, speaking of his presence in this thicket. He augurs of the danger that has finally come. Of course, he has some time before they can hurt him anyway. And there is a rock, that has killed Piggy, protecting him like a shield, as if the rock has become Piggy himself. With the spear, in order to secure his life, Ralph strokes one of the savages and they shout that he is dangerous. Jack orders some huge rocks to be rolled down unto the thicket, so that Ralph gets killed like Piggy. Then marking himself safe from the rolling rocks, Ralph senses that there is a smoke coming out from near and they have set the thicket on fire and the fire then spreads across other trees and the whole jungle is on fire, with all the fruits burnt. He plans to escape from there. He runs from there. Now he reaches on the beach, running and pressurizing himself to think wise about how to tackle the situation, also thinking that there is no Piggy now to direct him on the right and secure path. He thinks of hiding behind a tree and the tribe to pass by him.

 

Then finally, he finds a place, a mat where he can hide well from the sight of the tribe of savages who are searching to slay him down like a pig with a stake sharpened at both ends. After, some time of his hiding in that hidden mat, he sees someone with a stake sharpened at both ends. It is Roger, the most dangerous boy of them. And then rest of the tribe follow up here soon in front of the mat. Utterly tensed and utmost frightened, Ralph, with his all might, runs away from there on to the open beach.

 

 There on the running beach, he falls down to the feet of a capped man. A British Navy officer this is. He says, "Hullo", Ralph replies with, "Hullo." All the boys have stopped moving. They are all covered with dirt, some of the faces are marked in special designs. The Naval Officer thinks they have been playing game or having fun. But the situation of this place has been of life and death. This island is quite changed now, from the then beautiful greenery to the now's conflagrated state of the same. The officer asks funnily about the number of casualties. Ralph answers seriously, "two". Boys have lost count of their numbers. They are sobbing and crying. Then the officer shifts his gaze from the emotions of these human boys to the warships.

 

 

 

THE END

Contributors here are the students of 3rd Semester, Department of English, University of Gour Banga, Malda, West Bengal, India. They were encouraged to share their critical views, interpretation and summary while reading this magnum opus by William Golding. Contributors were categorically warned regarding the protocols of plagiarism, and if still there is any, he/she is solely responsible for that.