character essay

• “i’ll give the conch to the next person to speak, they won’t be interrupted“

  • sense of democracy-any child who wants to speak will be given the chance
  • ‘interrupted‘ shows ralph expects the boys to listen to each other-give respect if disagreement
  • ralph is leader as he gets to chose where conch goes
  • authority figure
• “i’m calling an assembly“

  • younger boys start to slack off from work
  • older boys don’t pay attention to fire
  • ralph shouts quote and boys immediately gather-Ralph clearly leader
  • boys still have a sense of civility as they follow Ralph’s instructions
• “are we savages or what?”

  • boys starting to move away from civility-Ralph tries to remind them
  • older boy let’s fire go out-ralph gets furious and asks quote
  • tone is angry-trying to tell boys they need to behave better
  • loss of fire loss of hope for rescue-suggests some of the older boys aren’t fussed about getting rescued
  • ralph gets exhausted from being authority
• “That was a dirty trick”

  • Ralph starts to lose his authority when Jack begins to openly challenge him
  • jack punches Piggy and steals his glasses in order to restart the signal fire
  • ralph calls him out saying quote
  • told that  “Ralph felt his lip twitch”-His lip twitching is an involuntary action which indicates Ralph’s dislike for Jack
  • Ralph is openly identifying Jack’s deviant actions whereas in the past he would have let Jack away with it.
• “that was simon, that was murder“

  •  Ralph loses control of the boys completely but refuses to join them as he still clings to civility over savagery
  • simon-mistaken for beast ralph only one that will admit—quote-
  • end-naval officer asks ’jockingly‘ if they’ve killed anyone
  • ralph responds “only two”
  • golding reveals “The officer knew when people were telling the truth. He whistled softly.” 
  • clear acknowledgement of boys savagery
  • ralph response indicates boys would have killed more if not rescued