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STUDYWORLD STUDYNOTES

Lord of the Flies

 

 

Summary:

Jack has figured out that he needs to paint his face in different colors, so the pigs won’t see him when he is hunting them. Then he takes some of the boys hunting.

Ralph has been swimming in the pool when he suddenly sees smoke. He realizes that it is coming from a ship and begins shouting , "Smoke, smoke!" The others rush out of the pool. It takes a while before they see it as well. But eventually they do too. "They’ll see our smoke!" Ralph says. "We’re rescued!" They can’t believe it! "We’re rescued!"

Suddenly Piggy says, "I know I can’t see very well, but have we got any smoke?" It takes a while before anyone really realizes what he has asked. Of course they have smoke. The smoke on the mountain from their fire. They all look in the direction of their fire when they realize that there is no smoke coming from the mountain. Ralph is the first one to start running to check it out without even thinking to put on his clothes. As a result his body gets badly bruised and scratched in the forest. Simon, Maurice and Piggy follow him as fast as they can.

When Ralph reaches the top, he sees that the fire is dead, and the watchers are gone. Ralph screams at the ship: "Come back! Come back!" but to no avail. In anger he yells, "they let the bloody fire die out." Looking around to see where the boys who were supposed to be watching the fire had gone, he saw them. Instead of staying at their post, they had gone hunting. They were coming up the mountain carrying a stake on their shoulders. When they reached the top they couldn't stop talking about their hunt. Ralph confronts them and yells at them, "You let the fire out." Ignoring the significance of this act, Jack says they only let the fire out for a couple of hours because they needed the watchers as hunters. "There was a ship!" Ralph says.

Jack doesn’t know what to say or do. He knows it’s his fault but he tries to divert the attention from himself to Piggy because the fat boy starts to cry. Jack begins to yell at him and punches him in the stomach. He even breaks one of his lenses. After a while he apologizes and they start the fire again. The incident doesn't seem to affect the others as they enjoy eating the roasted meat.

Ralph decides to call a meeting, an assembly, to discuss the problems that are evident to him. He mentions that work isn’t getting done, and rules aren’t being followed. He tries to drive home the fact that ”we ought to die before we let the fire go out.”

All the young children, however, are preoccupied with the Beast, which they still believe exists on the island. Jack tries to reassure them and says that he’s been everywhere, and there is no beast, and Piggy says that a beast can’t exist n a world with science. However, a littl’un still steps up and says that he saw something horrid in the forest (which was actually Simon returning in the dark from his peaceful area.). Another littl’un says that there may be a beast, but that “it’s only us.” However, this is received with jeers as it seems to be a preposterous notion.

During the assembly, Jack tries bring up the fact that Ralph isn’t a good chief, because he can’t hunt or sing. Piggy and others object to the idea, but Jack is starting to become more and more savage and overpowering. The assembly soon falls apart and the hunters begin to chant and dance.

Unbeknown to the boys, during the night something strange happens. A dead body in a parachute descends on the island. This figure seems to have come from an explosion in the sky.

Next morning the twins are up on the mountain, doing their job and keeping the fire alive. Suddenly Eric notices the body which from a distance appears to be alive, and is flapping huge wings. The twins are terrified, and run back to the other boys..

They wake up Ralph, and a meeting is arranged. Sam and Eric explain what they have seen, and they all agree that they will have to find out where this beast lives. Ralph asks Jack if there is any area on the island that has not been explored. After some thought Jack says that the tailed part, where the rocks are all piled up has not been searched.

They decide to tackle this job and Jack leads the way. Everyone is carrying spears, and they are all very nervous. When they reach the destination-point, Ralph walks off to investigate the place, since he is the leader. Jack joins him, and together they find out that there is no beast. At least not on that side of the mountain.

They tell the others, and decide that they will have to search on the mountain top.

Review:

The most central theme of Lord of the Flies is probably the battle between good and evil. Several conflicts on several different levels underline and emphasize this theme. Examples of these conflicts are the conflicts between the conch group and the savages, between the boys and the terrifying «beast», and the conflict between Jack’s band on the one hand and Ralph and Simon on the other