The Conflict Of Civilization In William Golding's Lord Of The Flies

715 Words3 Pages

The Man Booker Prize for Fiction which is a prize awarded for the best original novel is awarded to an author whose novels central theme is the conflict between two competing impulses that exist within all human beings. These include the instinct to live by rules, act peacefully, follow moral commands and value the good of the group against the instinct to gratify one’s immediate desires verses the impulse to act violently in order to obtain supremacy over others and enforce one’s will. This conflict is expressed in a number of ways within the novel such as: civilization vs. savagery, order vs. chaos, reason vs. impulse, law vs. anarchy, or the broader heading of good vs. evil. Throughout the novel, this author associates the instinct of civilization …show more content…

Lord of the Flies is an emblematic novel, which means that Golding conveys many of his main ideas and themes through symbolic characters and objects. He represents the conflict between civilization and savagery in the conflict between the novel’s two main characters: Ralph, the protagonist, who represents order and leadership; and Jack, the antagonist, who represents savagery and the desire for …show more content…

During the 1950s and 1960s, many readings of the novel claimed that Lord of the Flies dramatizes the history of civilization. Some believed that the novel explores fundamental religious issues, such as original sin and the nature of good and evil. Others approached Lord of the Flies through the theories of the psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, who taught that the human mind was the site of a constant battle among different impulses—the instinctual needs and desires, the ego, and the sense of conscience and morality. Still others maintained that Golding wrote the novel as a criticism of the political and social institutions of the West. Ultimately, there is some validity to each of these different readings and interpretations of Lord of the Flies. Although Golding’s story is confined to the microcosm of a group of boys, it echoes with implications far beyond the bounds of the small island and explores problems and questions universal to the human

Open Document