Analyze three symbols in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies

Lord of the Files is a novel written by William Golding that describes the lives of

schoolchildren who were saved during World War II by a plane. Unfortunately, this plane

crashes, the pilot dies and all the boys land on a desert island. The story is based on their

attempts to stay alive and wait for the saviors to come. William Golding uses a multitude of

symbols to draw a parallel between life on the island and life outside. By using symbols such as

the shell, the fire, the island, Piggy Golding's glasses demonstrate that people, when freed from

the rules and taboos of society, allow their animal instincts to come to the surface.

The conch: The shell is the first symbol to appear in the novel. This conch is the symbol

of a civilized society that organizes itself through democratic elections. Initially, the boys use the

conch to set up a society similar to the society they come from: a civil society based on discourse

and consensus.

It appears at the beginning of the story, found by the main characters Ralph and Piggy.

Piggy comes up with the idea of calling the other boys, and the next thing is to set up a meeting.

Ralph had stopped smiling and was pointing into the lagoon.

Something creamy lay among the ferny weeds.

“A stone“

“No a shell“

“S`right. It`s a shell. I have seen one like that before. On someone`s back wall. A conch

he called it. He used to blow it and then his mum will come. It`s ever so valuable...
 This was the first thing they found on the beach. Ralph and Piggy were very curious and

then found a way to use it. Later, Ralph and Piggy`s idea ist o hold a meeting, by using the

sound of the conch they are calling for thing sounded.

The shell is also used firstly when they decide to vote for a chief.

“And another thing. We cannot have everybody talking at once. We`ll have to have hands

up like at school.“

He held his shell in front of his face and blew into it.

“Then I`ll give him the conch.“

“Conch?“

“That`s what this shell called. I`ll give to the next person to speak. He can hold it when

he was speaking“

From these lines, we learn the importance of the chonch for boys.

If in the first chapters the chonc was very important in the last chapters, we see that Jack

wants to free himself from the structure and develop his own power and authority. "The basin

exploded into a thousand white fragments and ceased to exist." (255)

When the chonc was shattered, all power and authority disappeared. Conca, in a sense,

was unable to resolve this crisis, which eventually led to its demise. When democracy encounters

a crisis, it can also "break" because it cannot exist.

Like democracy and conch it goes through all phases of existence. It can bring society to

a very prosperous and functional point of view, but when a problem arises, freedom and

democracy are threatened with survival.

Piggy’s Glasses: The glasses symbolized the ability to see and understand things clearly.

Piggy is the only boy, besides Jack, who really sees how things should be done. In this novel the
glasses can be used as the object to help people survive on the uninhabited island. This nove lis

also had kind of scientific part or technological things.

"We have to have rules and follow them. After all, we are not wild. We are English, and

the English are the best of them all. So we have to do things right. ”(Golding, pg 42) This quote

shows that Piggy is an intelligent man who tries to give confidence to the inhabitants of the

island and unite them.

As the glasses are transformed into an important symbol, they later become a vital object

for life on the island. Piggy is the boy with the glasses, and Jack is the one who pointed to

Piggy's glass to use as a tool to make fire. The symbol of the glasses becomes clearer when the

boys use the lenses of the Piggy glasses to focus the sunlight to start a fire.

Ralph shouted at him, Pggy! Have you got any matches?

My! You have made a big heap, havent`t you?

Jack pointed suddenly.

His specs! Use them as buring glasses!

Glasses are very important for Piggy, because with their help he can see things clearly

only if he wears them. When Ralph suggests they make a signal fire, the boys go to gather wood

to build a fire with which they hope to signal their presence on the island. The glasses are helpful

in their quest to create this fire. Without glasses, they could not light the fire and have no chance

of being saved.

These glasses also represent hope, allowing boys to have a sense of hope when the signal

fire is lit but also intelligence. Based on the condition of Piggy's glasses, we manage to find out

the condition of the island's inhabitants. Even though Piggy's glasses may seem fragile and
insignificant at the beginning of the story, they become an important symbol and a thematic

bearer that helps lead the plot.

When Jack broke Piggy's glasses after hitting her head, Piggy's glasses "flew and pinned

on the rocks. Piggy shouted in horror ...." This incident with the glasses symbolizes what will

happen to her soon.

Fire: The fire signal first appears on the mountain and later on the beach, to draw

attention to passing ships that could save the boys. To be saved by Marina, Ralph finds the

solution for everyone “There is something else. We can help them find us. If the ship approaches

the island, it may not notice us. So we have to smoke on top of the mountain. We have to make a

fire. "

As a result, signal fire becomes an indicator of the connection of boys with civilization.

In the first parts of the novel, the fact that the boys maintain the fire is a sign that they want to be

saved and return to society. When the fire burns or goes out, we realize that the boys have lost

sight of their desire to be saved and have accepted their wild lives on the island. The signal fire

functions as an indicator of the power, of the civilization left on the island.

“ Suddenly he blundered into the open, found himself again in that open space—and

there was the fathom-wide grin of the skull, no longer ridiculing a deep blue patch of sky but

jeering up into a blanket of smoke. Then Ralph was running beneath trees, with the grumble of

the forest explained. They had smoked him out and set the island on fire.“

Ralph had hidden from Jack's tribe, so some of Jack's boys lit a fire to force Ralph out

into the open so he could find and kill him. Now the signal fire that was lit for the purpose of

rescue was now used to kill. This shows how far the boys have deviated from civilized behavior.

Ironically, this fire saves them.

 .Bibliography

Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. London: Faber and Faber, 1987.

McCarron, Kevin. William Golding. Plymouth: Northcote House, 1994. 1-24. PH

Vlad, Florian Andrei. “The Kids Are Still Not Alright: Rediscovering Lord Of The

Flies.” Annals of Ovidius University Constanta Philology (Analele Ştiinţifice ale Universităţii

Ovidius Constanţa. Seria Filologie), issue XXVI/2015, pp.53-58.