Devin's+Blog

December 6th - I'm reading Lord of the Flies by William Golding. I just got my book so I have yet to read any of it but i chose it because Mrs. Olsen recommended it.

This is about the first-half of the book; In the middle of a war, a plane evacuating a group of young Britain schoolboys gets shot down over a deserted island. The boy named Ralph walks around for a bit and then finds a fat boy wearing spectacles that he ends up calling Piggy. They come across the rest of the survivors. Piggy finds a conch shell on which he thinks can be used as a horn to assemble everyone. The group then appoints Ralph as their leader and Ralph appoints Jack as the group's lead hunter. Jack takes a group of kids he names as his hunters and leaves to hunt. Ralph stays at the beach and has the rest of the group assemble a signal fire on the beach. They managed to get it lit using Piggy's spectacles and the sun. While most of the group slept, a select few were to stay up and keep the fire lit. Those kids ended up playing rather than watching the fire and the fire spreads and burns part of the forest. One of the youngest boys end up missing and they assume he was killed in the fire. All the children become consumed with the act of play rather than concerning themselves with other tasks. Ralph tells them that they need to focus more on being rescued. They generally ignore him. Later, a ship passes by and Ralph and Piggy notice. Ralph gets angry because the signal fire has gone out due to the assigned boys negligence. Ralph accosts Jack, Jack punches Piggy, Jack has returned with his first kill, and Piggy calls everyone using the conch shell. He then became what i personally would consider crazy re-enacting his kill of the swine. The little ones in which they called "littluns" end up believing that there's a monster on the island. Ralph then tells them that the monster would be noticeable and a child says that the monster could live in the water. This just scares everyone even more.

This is the other half; While the boys are asleep, there's a dogfight over the island and a parachutist ends up floating onto the island, dead. There's a hunting party made to search for the monster. The party sees the chute and thinks it's a deformed ape. They hold a meeting and Jack says Ralph is a coward and tries to get Ralph voted out of office. The kids refuse and Jack runs off. Ralph gets all the other kids to move the signal fire from the mountain to the beach. During this procedure, most of the kids slip away to join Jack. Jack declares himself the leader of the new tribe. Jack's tribe kills a hog and puts it on a post to signify his new tribe. Simon has a vision that the head talks to him. In his vision, the head tells him that the beast that the y're all afraid of is inside all of them and he can't outrun it. Simon heads back to Jack's tribe and everyone sees his shadowy figure and kills Simon with their teeth and bare hands. The following morning, Ralph and Piggy talk about what they have done. Jack’s hunters attack them and their few followers and steal Piggy’s glasses in the process. Ralph’s group travels to Jack’s tribe and try to make Jack see reason, but Jack has Sam and Eric tied up and fights with Ralph. In the engaging battle, one boy, Roger, rolls a boulder down the mountain, killing Piggy and shattering the conch shell. Ralph barely manages to escape a torrent of spears. < I thought the conch shell being broke showed symbolism. The instrument used to assemble the children was broken as they all finally fell apart and turned into savages. > Ralph runs from them and hides. Jack has his followers search for him, but fail, so Jack has them burn down the forest to force him out of hiding. Ralph takes refuge on the beach and passes out due to exhaustion knowing that Jack's tribe will soon be there to kill him. When he awakes, he sees an officer standing over him on the beach. (The ship had seen the island on fire.) Jack's tribe sees the man standing there and everyone freezes. Then they all begin to cry and the officer turns his back so they can regain their composure.