Lord of the Flies

• Microcosm: the island is a miniature version of the events of the wider world (WW3- nuclear war)
• Dystopia: A state in which conditions of living are extremely bad due to deprivation, oppression or terror. The opposite of utopia. We could argue that the island goes from being a utopian paradise (the boys initially welcome the freedom) to a dystopian nightmare. 
• Simon is presented as a Christ-like figure. He provides fruit for the littl’uns when they cannot reach it (The Feeding of the 5000- or the miracle of the five loaves and two fish) and is tempted to renounce his beliefs by the Lord of the Flies, just as Jesus was tempted by the devil to renounce God (Jesus is tempted in the desert). He comes down from the mountain to spread the word that the boys have noting really to fear- this can be compared to Moses bringing down the 10 Commandments from Mount Sinai 
• References at the start of the novel allude to the Garden of Eden. Whilst aspects of the island appear to be ‘paradise’, we also have reference to snakes and darker descriptions of the environment (‘skull-like coconuts’ etc.). In the bible, Adam and Eve’s disobedience to God results in original sin (all humans by birth have the capacity to sin)
• Golding was a teacher at a private boy’s school.
• Golding joined the Royal Navy in 1940
• Lord of the Flies was published in 1954
• Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development:

  1. Up until about 9 years, children do not have a personal moral code- look to adults to guide them
  2. People begin to internalise rules, but don't necessarily question them- see things as right and wrong
  3. Few people question personal morals
• Rousseau: All people are born inherently good. Society is the agent of corruption.
• Thomas Hobbes: In the absence of political order, people's actions are only bound by their personal power and conscious.
• Freud's theory: The Id is the part of the mind with aggressive and primal instincts. The super-ego holds the moral conscience that a person develops over time and the ego is somewhere in the middle.
• Things that stuck with Golding post WW2:

  Hitler and Nazi Germany's rise to power, war crimes, The Holocaust, 80 million people killed, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
• Coral Island: Coral Island has British 'Imperialistic' views and proves that 'the British are the 'best'. Golding didn't agree with these views and wrote about how boys would actually behave.
• Golding's words:

  "The theme of the novel is grief... sheer grief"

  "We produce the wickedness and violence that sour our lives"

  "Man's basic instinct is to kill"
• Allegorical Figure for Ralph

  Democracy, USA
• Allegorical Figure for Jack

  Hitler, Stalin, Dictatorship
• Allegorical Figure for Piggy

  Working class, reason/logic
• Allegorical Figure for Roger

  Id, Himmler
• Allegorical Figure for Simon

  Christ, superego
• Allegorical Figure for the Conch

  Democracy, free speech
• Allegorical Figure for the Island

  Microcosm
• Allegorical Figure for the scar

  Human destruction of nature
• Allegorical Figure for the group splitting

  USA+USSR
• Allegorical Figure for the Littl'uns

  Front line soldiers, civilians
• Allegorical Figure for Sam n Eric

  Soldiers caught in war- no choice
• Allegorical Figure for the Lord of the Flies

  Devil
• Ralph Quotes:

  • "The boy with fair hair"
  • "We must make a fire"
• Crowd Mentality Quotes:

  • "The crowd surged after it"
  • "Boys armed with sticks"
• Jack Quotes:

  • "Bollocks to the rules"
  • "Shut up fatty"
  • "I ought to be chief"
• Beast Quotes:

  • "The head is for the beast. It's a gift"
  • "Maybe there is a beast. Maybe it's us."
• Savagery Quotes:

  • "Kill the pig! Slit her throat! Spill her blood!"
  • "The mask compelled them"
  • "Painted faces and long hair"
• Leadership Quotes:

  • "Lets have a vote"
• Nature Quotes:

  • "The island was scorched up like dead wood"
  • "Long scar smashed into the jungle"
• Law and Order Quotes:

  • "We've got to have rules and obey them. After all, we're not savages"
  • "The conch exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist"
• Piggy Quotes:

  • "The fat boy"
  • "Bag of fat"
  • "Sucks to your ass-mar!"
• Piggy's Glasses:

  • Power of science and intellect
• Simon Quotes:

  • 'Simon became inarticulate in his effort to express mankind's essential illness'
  • 'Simons dead body moved out towards the open sea
  • Simon was crying out about a dead man on a hill