In the absence of society, madness ensues. When a group of British school boys ages 6 to around 12 get stranded on a deserted island, they first try to work together to survive. Quickly tempers and egos flare, causing the group to split and turn on one another. Fear drives them further apart and eventually the line of morality is erased.

I was curious to think had the ages been different, had the school children been female or mixture of genders, had they not been British, would things have played out differently? Very interesting and more than slightly disturbing.

(I read THE LORD OF THE FLIES... en español!)

I watched the films when I was seven & had an existential drought thereafter, a hole in my soul--I thought that all the acts committed by the kids in a deserted island were so atrocious that there was NO God.

And the book. The book is a masterpiece undoubtedly, and probably one of the most horrifying allegories ever conceived. The greenness of the children, the naivete which is soon corrupted, almost as naturally as the green plants grow there, is the anchor that dares the reader to tread like the young explorers--cautiously & superaware of surroundings. "The Lord of the Flies" is the deus ex machina... the representation of something holy (or, in this case unholy), a dead parachuter, a cadaver brought back to earth to horrify the kids, but the monster is inside them.

My favorite detail is the horrific image of the little boy with the birthmark on his face (Hawthornian Goth here) who appears only at the beginning and disappears thereafter. Where did he go? Where does society arrive at when everything is dismantled and savages and anarchy rule?

I should've read this in high school.

Δεν μπόρεσε να με πείσει ότι αξίζει το θόρυβο που έχει προκαλέσει.
Ίσως αν το διάβαζα στα εφηβικά - φοιτητικά μου χρόνια. Ή ίσως αν το διάβαζα πιο κοντά στην εποχή στην οποία εκδόθηκε. Να έφταιγε και η μετάφραση?
Μην με παρεξηγήσετε, πρόκειται για ένα δυνατό βιβλίο, που θα το πρότεινα ως ένα γρήγορο αλλά σημαντικό ανάγνωσμα. Κυρίως γιατί καταρρίπτει τους μύθους του στυλ: "Αν τα παιδιά κυβερνούσαν τον κόσμο αυτός θα ήταν καλύτερος" και τα ηλίθια τραγουδάκια του τύπου: "Αν όλα τα παιδιά της γης πιάναν γερά τα χέρια...".
Τα παιδιά είναι σκληρά και το χάος υπάρχει μέσα τους.
Δεν μπορώ να πω κάτι περισσότερο, όμως, κυρίως γιατί όλος αυτός ο ντόρος γύρω από το βιβλίο, δημιουργεί τέτοιες προσδοκίες, που εκ των πραγμάτων είναι δύσκολο να επαληθευτούν.

Actual rating is 3.5 stars.

This book is considered a classic. It is about a group of children that are stranded on an island. Soon these children become savages as they are without law and order.

This is one more classic that I can scratch off my list. I basically knew what the book was about but there is nothing like reading the actual story. I can see why many consider this a favorite but I had issues with the first half. It just did not grab me at first. I believe I wasn't connecting with the author's writing style. I could not get a good sense of the picture of the island and the setting. But when the real drama kicks I really enjoyed this book. This book is an allegory about actual civilization as we had three characters act out as representatives. I enjoyed this aspect as we get to see civilization, the voice of reason, and what happens when we stop following the rules. I liked the descent of mankind. I loved the ending as it comes full circle and I appreciate what the author did there.

I am glad that I finally read this. It was a little slow for me at first but when the s**t hits the fan I could not read fast enough. I am also glad I read this for the reason I can see how this influenced so many works over the years. It had its flaws but definitely worth a read for enjoyment and its message.

A hard book to rate as although its well written and is very thought provoking, the content gets unpleasantly graphic and some aspects are awkwardly dated (eg the assumption the British boys should be jolly good chaps - “we’re not savages, we’re English”).

Plot

It starts off as a conventional adventure: a mixed group of boys (some know each other; many who don’t) survive a plane crash on a desert island and struggle to survive. It is somewhat confused and confusing at first – perhaps to make the reader empathise with the boys’ confusion.

From the outset there are issues of priorities (Jack’s instant gratification of hunting or Ralph’s long term need for shelter and maintaining a fire signal) and leadership. It’s inevitable that standards of “civilization” will slip.

There is also an infectious fear of “the beast”, although whether one interprets it as animal, airman, hallucination, or symbolic may vary at different points in the story. Certainly the tone of the book changes after Simon’s first encounter with Lord of the Flies.


Image: Teaching Lord of the Flies, by The Jenkins Comic (Source)


Group Dynamics

Eventually the boys split into two groups: hunters who become ever more “savage” in appearance and behaviour, and the remainder who want to retain order, safety, common sense – and their lives. Why do the obedient and angelic choir turn to savagery - does the fact they have an identified leader, who isn't the overall leader once they're on the island, contribute? One also wonders how the story might be different if it was a mixed sex group, or even an all girl group. Very different, certainly, and I suppose it would provide a distraction to what Golding was trying to say about human (or just male?) nature.

It illustrates how petty bullying can be condoned and encouraged within groups (exacerbated by rituals, chanting, body markings etc) and how it can escalate to much worse. Nevertheless, one of the main victims, Piggy, is proud of his differences, demonstrates knowledge and intelligence and actually grows in confidence as his leader loses his.

Milgran, Zimbardo, Christianity...

It questions whether it is power or the environment that makes some of the boys so bad (echoes of Zimbardo’s prison experiments and Milgram’s obedience experiments - if a book can echo things which came after it was written).

In fact, Golding "experimented, while a teacher at a public school, with setting boys against one another in the manner of Lord of the Flies"! See HERE (thanks Matt).

The more Christian concept of original sin runs through it, which was probably Golding's intention (his editor made him make Simon less Jesus-like), along with other Christian analogies relating to snakes, devils (aka Lord of the Flies), self sacrifice, and redemption/rescue.

And then there are the conch and fire as symbols of order and god, respectively, in total contrast to the warpaint etc of the warriors.

Lots to think about, but more the stuff of nightmares than dreams.

Compared with The Hunger Games

It's interesting to compare this with The Hunger Games, which modern teens probably find much easier to relate to (see my review HERE). I think one problem Lord of the Flies has is that the period is tricky: too far from the present to seem "relevant" (though I think it is), but not long enough ago to be properly historical.

Compared with I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream

For another dysfunctional group trying to survive a very different ordeal, see Harlan Ellison's horrific short story about an evil supercomputer, which I reviewed HERE.

4.5 rounded up

This is my first time reading 'Lord of the Flies'. Which seems amazing to me when it's a book that's so popular, so famous and so celebrated

I knew quite a lot about the book (it's difficult not to when it's so popular) so I went in believing that I'd be disappointed or maybe the book would be 'of it's time'.

I read the book in the space of 3 hours and loved every page. It's definitely a book I will re-read often. Stunning

★★★½ /5
This was a really interesting book, sadly I wasn‘t really attached to the characters. But the plot and the ideas just carried the story really well.

Without what the author intended to do or probably has done, it would be a 3 star, but so 1 star is the only option.

Of course, it´s completely natural to become primitive again within the shortest amounts of time, and not an unintended dark comedy, self satirizing, biased, sexual predator of an author, who finally deus ex machinas out of this mess.

„In a private journal and in a memoir for his wife, Golding said he tried to rape a 15-year-old girl when he was 18 and on his first holiday from Oxford“
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William...

„He had met her when both were taking music lessons in Marlborough, Wiltshire, when he was about 16 and she was 13, but he tried to rape her two years later when he was home during his first year at Oxford.
Golding writes that they went for a walk to the common and he 'felt sure she wanted heavy sex, as this was visibly written on her pert, ripe and desirable mouth'.
Soon they were 'wrestling like enemies' as he 'tried unhandily to rape her'.
She resisted and Golding, years later, wrote that 'he had made such a bad hand at rape' before shaking her and shouting 'I’m not going to hurt you'.“
„A later girlfriend, Mollie, was also treated badly by Golding.
She was another local from Marlborough whom he later let down by breaking off their engagement because he had found her frigid.“
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...

„The attempted rape involved a Marlborough girl, named Dora, who had taken piano lessons with Golding. It happened when he was 18 and on holiday during his first year at Oxford. Carey quotes the memoir as partially excusing the attempted rape on the grounds that Dora was "depraved by nature" and, at 14, was "already sexy as an ape". It reveals that Golding told his wife he had been sure the girl "wanted heavy sex". She fought him off and ran away as he stood there shouting: "I'm not going to hurt you," the memoir said.“
https://www.writerswrite.com/sir-will...

„Golding, who won the Nobel Prize in 1983, three years after bagging the Booker for Rites Of Passage, admitted trying to rape a 15-year-old schoolgirl when he was an 18-year-old student at Oxford, according to a forthcoming biography by John Carey.
The schoolgirl put up a fierce resistance. But they had sex two years later, according to Golding, who nevertheless called her “depraved by nature” and “sexy as an ape” in his unpublished memoir, Men, Women & Now. He wrote it for Ann, his wife of 50 years, to explain his “monstrous” character.“
https://readiscovery.com/2009/08/18/w...

https://www.theguardian.com/books/boo...

Fringe philosophy
Downgrading and unintended satirizing of kids´ language from an adult´s perspective to seem capable of writing empathic and emotional, tragic-comic dialogues and characters is a cheap trick that fails epically, if not performed right. But it´s the logical consequence of making kids act as if they were stupid animals to integrate a biased, boring, and one sided plot. If you want real philosophy on an island, read:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

More bad philosophy on an island, read:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
This one has everything, racism, glorifying religious extremism, a true, clear picture of our past.

Back to the show, as it´s often the problem with monopolies, the ones in art lead to overrated, hyped, and simply not good wanna be philosophical constructions. I mean, symbolic, metaphysical, allegory metaphor overload for young people who want to be entertained? Honestly? „Don´t try to murder each other kids.“ What a lesson! Of course, kids are so stupid that they immediately establish cultic dictatorships if they are not supervised, what else should logically happen.

If this wouldn´t be a typical forced read to torture school kids and a kind of pre pop psychology Nobel Prize higher literature with meaning drivel, I would say it´s barely average, but because of its excessive misuse, it´s just unacceptable. Possibly the ever so clever bureaucrats of the boards of education all over the world ought think a second about removing all the trash of all the lauded, boring, outdated, obsolete,… literature each country tends to accumulate in a strange mixture of patriotism, cultural imperialism (our writers, literature, tradition) and think about including the great, amazing, wonderful worlds of literature kids and young adults want to read.

The worst classic I´ve ever read
One extra star up to 2 could have been given for incompetently trying to be deep, philosophical, and critical and failing to transport the important message about the evil lurking in naked apes. Nice try, William, but just an epic fail, and total bigotry regarding your alcohol and abuse problems you loved to drivel about in your strange diaries of a molester.
I was really searching for deeper meaning, any of all the arguments seen in positive reviews, but it´s just unrealistic, the ending is a bad joke, putting as much symbolism and innuendos in it to camouflage the immense flaws doesn´t really help, and it just fuels my opinion that, just as in real life, much of what is idealized and glorified is just bad and rotten. Look at the ratings of Golding´s other books, rated by people who like to read classics! Another achievement in inability.

I know, there are many getting real pleasure out of classic literature, that´s a question of taste and I don´t force them to read my trivial literature. That´s where the tolerance ends, because the problem is that the previously mentioned kids, teens, and young adults don´t deserve to be bored with what elder generations may really enjoy, but has absolutely no worth for them. I did once make the mistake of reading a few dozen classics and most were just average, some really bad, but definitively close to none great. It´s sad, avoidable, and just plain anachronistic to violently keep extremely outdated versions of descriptions of long away pasts in the curriculum and the main reason kids and teens hate to read.

Irony time, there would be old, classic, clever books that could really tell something about human nature, not using placative over the top violence, especially in the classic and new sci-fi and social-sci-fi genre that explore many questions regarding human nature, state, politics, sexuality, economics, faith, but, they would be too extreme, progressive, and subtle. Cause bigoted conservatives don´t want their kids to read really dangerous, meta context, social criticism, stuff, they want some characters far away from any real, imminent problems playing hide and seek with a freaking pigs´ head.

It truly left me speechless, just asking why, what´s wrong with you, humanities, literary critique, Nobel prize, quality literature, higher art, snobs, modern art, don´t you realize that you are satirizing yourself by praising so many works that many avid, lifelong readers, with k reading scores deem bad, arrogant, boring, and worthless? Reminiscences of a past when bigoted, unenlightened people celebrated any trash that could distract from their incredible cognitive biases. It at least also lets me imagine a purgatory library filled with this stuff and dark angels forcing me to read it until I become insane, repair my brain, and restart the process. Forever. Mwahahaha!

Trying to find an explanation, a combination of personal drivel with the biography of a disturbed mind
The author had issues, binge drinking and alcoholism were demons haunting him, and he did exactly write this one thing that made him famous and nothing else of importance. What makes one more disgusted is the fact that he, as mentioned, tried to rape a 15 year old girl when he was 18 (how often has he been successful and didn´t write about it, because he was so completely wasted and drunk that he wouldn´t even remember it?), a reason he should at least be retrospectively condemned, as retroactive, time travel castration isn´t really an option. That´s one of the crime areas where I distance myself from restorative justice and go full metal eye for an eye, archaic retributive justice, because I am of the opinion that sex offenders should be incarcerated under terrible conditions, life imprisonment without any chance to ever see the light of the day again (and this rehabilitation thing is complete, psychologic, psychiatric (2 other partly fringe science the humanities unleashed on humanity like a plague) nonsense. Nobody would try to „cure“ someone who is heterosexual, homosexual, or has a different gender identity than physical body, because that´s completely crazy. But hey, someone who is born (seen in babies) or made a pedophile, rapist, necrophile, etc. can of course be healed. And, another very important factor, it´s cheaper for the state to release serial sex killers to save some money and wait if it takes them weeks or months until the next victim is tortured, raped, and eaten. How is it possible that psychiatrists say that they are no danger anymore before and don´t get any problems for their little oopsies?). However, such a tortured, poor soul, someone who raped as bad as he wrote, could become a celebrated highlight of highbrow s*** literature, which makes him worthy of even more fringe Nobel prizes, maybe for voodoo economics.

Tropes show how literature is conceptualized and created and which mixture of elements makes works and genres unique:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph...

أول رواية للكاتب البريطاني ويليام جولدنج نُشرت عام 1954
يكتب جولدنج عن الطبيعة الانسانية بين الخير والشر
كيف يتحول البشر إلى العنف والهمجية والفوضى
وخاصة إذا توفرت الظروف والبيئة المناسبة
فكرة الرواية مزعجة لكنها ترمز إلى الواقع

Is humanity inherently prone to savagery or civilisation? I guess the jury's still out on that one.

Golding, however, is convinced that we are all bloodthirsty savages at heart - and he has written this novel to prove it.

I don't know whether he's right or wrong; but who cares? This book's terrific.

4.5 stars!
I was considering giving this book 2 stars at about halfway through. I was bored. And more bored, and I just couldn’t understand why people liked this book so much. Then I read the second half and woah it took me by surprise. I had so many feelings reading this book; sadness, anger but also happiness and at many points yes, I was confused but it only made me want to read on to know more.

I’m glad I read this as it’s on the ‘fifty books to read before you die’ challenge and also as I really enjoyed the book overall even though the beginning was a bit difficult to trudge through. I highly recommend trying the classic out if you haven’t yet!

Golding has said that the genesis of his novel lay in the brutalities he witnessed during his service at sea in world war 2 and in his experiences teaching small boys for 13 years. His use of an obvious but effective symbolism throughout the story allows it to work as an allegory of humanity's fallen nature as well as a graphically realistic scenario.