Lord of the Flies

By: William Goulding  

Report By: Nick Yeske

The story takes place during the middle of a harsh war. Some planes crashed and left two twins on a beach parachuting down to an island they thought may be inhabited by a beast of some sort. The boys ended up falling asleep waking up the next day to find that they were not the only people on the beach the most significant ones in this story are Ralph, Piggy, Jack. Jack and Ralph are the two leaders (keeping in mind that these are just young kids). Early on they try to carry out a hunting expedition to find what the younger kids on the island call the beast. They end up finding a parachute in the shape of a deformed ape and Jack and Ralph are trying to decide whether or not to tell the other kids or not. Jack went to the other kids to try and proclaim that Ralph was a coward and that he shouldn’t be chosen to lead the group so in essence they both go their separate ways on how they want to do things on the island. When Jack declares himself the leader of the group, he organizes a group of hunters to go on a brutal hunt. After the fact they came back with a sow or a pig and had its head on a stake which you can imagine would be very frightening to small children, they did this to try and make an offering to the beast so that they would not “hurt” them in anyway. One of the boys Simon has a terrible vision one night that the head is speaking to him and that the boys and nobody could escape the “lord of the flies” or some might say they devil or evil within us. The next morning Simon goes to the top of one of the mountains to find the so called beast. Yet all he finds is the dead parachuter. Finding this Simon realizes there is no beast and that it was all in the kids imagination. When Simon goes to tell the other boys they se his shadowy figure emerging in the trees, they kill him with their bare hands and teeth. (Still keeping in mind these boys are extremely young.  The next morning Jack and Piggy discuss what has happened and the other boys attacked them and took piggy’s glasses. All the boys end up getting in a fight and one of the boys which I believe is Sam rolled a boulder down a hill and ended up crushing and killing piggy, this story truly shows the brutality of human nature. Ralph ended up escaping. Ralph ends up hiding for the night and in the morning finds the Sows head and destroys it. He soon realizes he has to go back on the beach and when he does he collapse from exhaustion, the other boys eventually see him and before they get there they see a British naval ship and the officer walks on the beach and he sees what has happened. The End.