Examples Of Piggy In Lord Of The Flies

Aishna Kumar

Lord of the Flies Essay

Mr. Eyre

Piggy is clearly a clever boy, but he is a victim too. How does the writer use him in the novel?

What is one thing you would like to bring to a stranded island? Most people from the 21st century would say, their phone, a symbol of technology. The writer of the novel Lord of the Flies, William Golding symbolizes technology using Piggy’s glasses. Golding describes Piggy’s character in great detail using symbols, which reflect on to his personality as well as civilization. Piggy is a clever boy who shares his knowledge with the rest of the boys throughout the novel, however he is also a victim of asthma and myopia. Myopia is the quality of being shortsighted, which, can be fixed by wearing glasses. Piggy plays a major role throughout the novel and serves as symbols of logic, scientific knowledge as well as inferiority.

As Golding describes, with his “thick glasses”(1) Piggy is the only one who has the ability to think calmly and logically, even after being constantly bullied by everyone. His glasses fix his myopia and allow him to see a bigger picture of the world around him whilst gaining knowledge. Piggy, who is younger than Ralph, has much more knowledge than any other boys, for instance, he knows how to use a conch and also the importance of law and order. Piggy had observed a conch at someone’s place thus, if it weren’t for Piggy’s logical thinking, Ralph would not have been able to call an assembly and gather all the boys stranded on the island by blowing the conch. The idea of making a list of all the boys’ names so no one is lost is also thought by Piggy. However, neither Ralph nor any other boys give this idea any significance until some little ones do go missing later in the