Showing posts with label Rescue. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rescue. Show all posts

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Quote from Lord of the Flies Page 68


"The fire was dead...smokeless and dead; the watchers were gone. A pile of unused fuel lay ready."
-Lord of the Flies Page 68
This quote is from a very important scene in the novel. Ralph becomes infuriated when the boys he assigned to keep the fire going choose to go out and hunt. A possible rescuer floats by offshore and the signal fire is out. This event is what starts the schism between Ralph and Jack. Jack defies Ralph, saying that hunting is more important than the fire, while Ralph believes the fire to be much more important than eating meat. This division in the parties eventually leads to death and fear.
Picture:http://www.crwr.utexas.edu/gis/gishydro06/Introduction/TermProjects/FinalReport_Drake_files/image006.jpg

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Lord of the Flies Pages 180-200

The scene with Ralph running into the naval officer illustrates a very powerful oversight in the book. As the novel progresses, Golding's descriptions of the characters and the events of the novel make the reader forget that the characters described are only ten, eleven, and twelve years old. The last scene with Ralph and the naval officer gives a different perspective on the characters. The descriptions change. Golding uses words such as "little boys" to describe the boys the naval officer meets on the beach. No where else in the novel does he describe the boys in such a manner. Golding is narrating the scene through the eyes of the naval officer. The officer is met by a group of boys who appear tribal in their ways, but British school boys by their appearence. Golding also makes the boys appear more adolescent when he writes that they begin to sob after they have realized what they have become.

Lord of the Flies Pages 160-180


The conch that Piggy holds so dear is destroyed in this section of the novel. The conch was a symbol of order and social structure on the island. It was what Ralph called assemblies with and what gave one the right to speak at said assemblies. When the boys in the tribe capture the twins and destroy this symbol, along with Piggy, the island is pushed into anarchy and chaos. Ralph's mindset is completely changed with this development of the story. He initially believed that the boys would come to their senses, but now he comes to realize that these boys have lost all traces of civilized life. Their time on the island has erased the civilizing marks of society and has instilled primitive thoughts and ways in the boys. I believe this is the point in the novel in which Ralph loses all hope in being rescued. He believes that because of the boys choice to be savage, he will die on the island.
Picture:http://www.museumeducation.bedford.gov.uk/Bedfordbytes/nature/images_nature/gallery_natural_objects/images/Common%20Spider%20Conch%20Shell_jpg.jpg