Examples Of Innocence In Lord Of The Flies

ecilia Peña
English II Pre-AP / 4B
Ms. Sifuentes
December 1, 2015
The Death of Innocence
Lord of The Flies written by William Golding (1954) is a haunting tale that depicts man’s return to the primal state of savagery, of which it took thousands of years to emerge from, through a group of innocuous schoolboys, whose innocence disintegrates as certain boys commit acts of evil that would make today’s society cringe. The boys face a challenging decision: to welcome the darkness in their hearts and embrace the exhilaration of the wild, or fight for hope and a chance of rescue. This essay will explore and analyze the various deaths within Golding’s allegory, each presenting a message dealing with morality, or the destructive nature that lies within

Prior to this gruesome event, Jack announces his break from the group of boys, demonstrating his desire to become chief and foreshadowing the event. Having been wounded by the powerful Ralph, Jack attacks a defenseless sow, “sunk deep in maternal bliss” (134), and taking advantage of its vulnerability while she nurses her piglets, an act of absolute cruelty. The killing of the sow is brutal, loud, inhumane, and aggressive. The whole scene alludes to many forms of assault, including rape: “and the hunters followed...the sow fell and the hunters hurled themselves on her...Jack was on top of the sow, stabbing downward with his knife.” (135). Golding reminds us that the boys are no longer boys, but predators. When Jack rubs the sow’s blood on Roger’s face in a baptismal way, it is evident his sense of propriety is nearly nonexistent. Thus, the transformation from a loving mother figure to the embodiment of essentially the devil and the innate evil that all humans possess mark Jack as the serpent that invades the boys “Eden”. The fact that such evil pervades from the innocent sow asserts that good is no match for evil. Golding even describes Jack as “wedded to her in lust” (134), one of the seven deadly sins. The death of the sow and its disfigurement mark the triumph of evil and the climax of the

Unable to keep up with the rest of the boys physically and intellectual beyond his age, he is shunned from the beginning. While Ralph’s calmness seemed to augment his image of leadership and strength, Piggy’s rationality and common sense becomes a hamartia, marking him as a tragic figure. Piggy is so intent on preserving some remnant of civilization on the island that after Jack’s tribe attacks Ralph’s group, he assumes they “wanted the conch” (00), when in fact they have come for his glasses in order to make fire. Even up to the moment of his death, Piggy’s perspective does not shift in response to the reality of their situation. Because his intellectual approach to life is modeled on the attitudes of the authoritative world where Golding utilizes Piggy to make a statement on the treatment and disregard of the weak, whose punishment for giving power through his glasses to the corrupted Jack Merridew is death by murder. The feuds and fights between Piggy and Jack can represent the ongoing battle of civilization versus savagery and the hopelessness of the process towards