Simon Lord Of The Flies Beast Analysis

Simon had an event in the book where he too feared the beast: “Simon, walking in front of Ralph, felt a flicker of incredulity—a beast with claws that scratched, that sat on a mountain-top, that left no tracks and yet was not fast enough to catch Samneric. However Simon thought of the beast, there rose before his inward sight the picture of a human, at once heroic and sick.” (Golding, 103). The beasties becomes like an idol to them and they leave heads out for it so it doesn’t attack them like an effigy to praise something they fear: “ ‘This head is for the beast. It’s a gift.’ “(Golding,

Jack had tried to lead the inhabitants of the island by terror and savagery instead of by order and civilization when he had declared himself chief of his hunter-driven tribe. Both his lust for blood and lust for power had aided him in becoming the savage tyrant and an antagonist of the book. Jack’s widespread fear would not have been substantial enough to build his stature in the hierarchy if the “beast” was not included in the story. The beast has been portrayed to the readers as a dead parachuter from the world war happening beside them. The characters, however, had no clue about the outside world or the parachuter who fell on the island. Therefore, the beast became a part of their fear on the island. The beast was the main antagonist in the middle of the story. It caused the most discord in the already terror-ridden state of the boys. The internal fears of the characters, the feeling of terror towards the other characters, and the nightmarish imagination of the youth, had all shown the dominating abilities of fear taking over the vulnerable sense of

At one point, a dead pilot lands on the island, which the boys (specifically SamnEric) mistake for the beast they already feared (document D). At this point in the story, the beast begins to represent war. This new “beast” came after Ralph wished for a sign from the grownup world in chapter 6. It symbolizes that even the adults can’t help them, quite possibly because they are no better. As stated earlier, everything the boys do is influenced by their perception of the existence of a beast. When Golding writes the beast to represent war, the boys actions are related to war (document C). This first shift in the meaning of the beast occurs as the boys are beginning to divide, as Jack begins to undermine Ralph. The beast symbolizes war; the boys are consumed by the beast, and the boys are eventually consumed by

Initially, the beast can represent fear. The beast is simply a pigment of the young boys imaginations, “The younger children first, then gradually the older ones… begin to people the darkness of night and forest with spirits and demons which had previously appeared only in their dreams or fairy tales.” The boys externalized their inner fears with objects from the outside the world, resulting in the creation of the “beast”. In Document B, the young boy with the mulberry-colored birthmark, claimes to have spotted

Further blinded by the illusion that their supposedly superior English heritage precludes savagery, the boys ignore the perverse qualities of their actions. Nevertheless, they become terrified as they increasingly feel the blight of their own evil upon the island. Attempting to attribute the decay of sanity and civilization to external sources, they fail to look inwards. When Simon correctly proposes that the beast is "maybe. . . only [themselves]" (89), the others scornfully dismiss him as "batty" (52) and his suggestion as invalid; they refuse to acknowledge Simon because they are neither capable nor willing to believe the frightening truth that the evil arises from within themselves. As a result, the boys manifest their fear in a dead parachutist whose appearance they grotesquely distort. Ironically, this source of fear comes from the majestic adult world to which they have so long

“Things are breaking up. I don’t understand why. We began well. We were happy.” (Golding 87). In this statement, Ralph realizes that his life, and those of the others’ on the island, is going to hit rock-bottom. All goes terribly wrong when the beast is introduced by the littlun with the mulberry patch on his face in Chapter 2. The beast is the reason for all the chaos in Lord of the Flies. The beast is an imaginary creature that frightens all the boys, and yet, it stands symbolically for the savagery that exists within all human beings. As the boys develop their fear and grow more and more certain of the presence of a beast, they also become more and more savage. William Golding uses the beast as a way to show the demise of the boys while they are on the island. The beast represents the irrational fear that exists within man, the savage monster within us all, and the ability for man to use intimidation to gain ultimate power.

It is important to note what the children’s thoughts of the beast are and why they think of it this way. Some of the littluns on the island believe they saw a beastie, a sort of monster that prowls through the woods. One of the littluns, named Phil, says, “‘I saw something moving among the trees, something big and horrid’” (85), during the boy’s assembly about the beast and what it might be and where it comes from. Other boys think the vine creepers are snake-like monsters. The littluns talk of the beastie starts to worry the older boys as they begin feeling frightened. Jack says, “‘But you can feel as if you’re not hunting, but being hunted as if something’s behind you

Simon is symbolized as things such as depression and loneliness which is very important, in the book because there is one point where someone says to the boys on the beach, which means that he thought about it while the others did not think about it. He thought about the problem and the things that the boys did, he becomes the beast himself. The story states, ”maybe we are the beast” (Golding).

Imagine sitting on an airplane, then all of a sudden you wake up and find yourself stranded on an uncharted island. Your palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms heavy. When all the adults have died and you are the only person alive with a group of boys on the break of adolescence… Without an adult how will one survive? In William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies there are many characters that are perceived as savages. When an airplane crashes on an undiscovered island, the only survivors are young boys. Throughout the novel, the boys fight for their survival, but many fear that there is a beast who may be lurking on the island. As the boys were once moral, their innocence slowly disintegrates away and they turn into their true form, a bloodthirsty savage. Perhaps the beast is within themselves.

One of the main problems that the boys had on the island was the beast. In their minds the beast was a terrible creature that was out to kill them. Their fear of the beast ruined

During the middle of the novel, the fear of the unknown beast is exemplified from the boys who start to question their own safety due to the beast that is still unknown to them. As they tried to find

He talks of a slithering object at night that tries to get him while he is asleep. There are many other accounts of a beast, even a pig’s head and a parachutist who did not make it. The Beast represents the fear that the boys have and everyone. The Beast is altered or changed depending on the boy who speaks of it because they are all scared and afraid of what might be out there or what might come to be. However, after Simon is killed and the parachutist is gone, they believe the beast is gone.

One the major symbols that appears throughout the book is the beast. The beast is a monster that the boys believe to be on the island after a littlun mentions it in a meeting.  As the story progresses the boys begin to act more savagely and uncivilized in fear of the beast which later on leads to them to leave Ralph

the head. For a moment or two the forest and all the other dimly appreciated places echoed with the parody of laughter. “You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you? Close, close, close! I’m the reason why it’s no go? Why things are what they are?”

The boys project their irrational fears as a derivative of their immaturity, in an attempt to identify a realized external enemy. Literary critic Lawrence S. Friedman explains, “Too immature to account for the enemy within, the boys project their irrational fears onto the outside world. The first of these projections takes the shape of a snakelike “beastie,” the product of a small boy’s nightmare.” (233) The boys’ irrational fear of the unknown, one of a small boy’s nightmare, only serves to exemplify their immaturity in handling situations like this. It is a stepping stone to events to come, prophesied by Simon. In addition, the character of Simon alludes to the fact that there evil ‘beast’ can really be traced to their internalized innate evilness. Simon argues, “maybe there is a beast… What I mean is… maybe it’s only us.” (Golding 89) While all of the boys attempt to explain the phenomena of the ‘beast,’ Simon is the one who realizes that the boys themselves are the evil ‘beast’ they perceive. There is no external force, the ‘beast’ only serves to be a placeholder for the boys’ true primal nature. However, it is Simon’s death, at the hand of the boys themselves, that only serves to prove that evil truly exists in all of these boys. Friedman suggests, “The ritual murder of Simon is as ironic as it is inevitable. Ironically, he is killed as the beast before he can explain that the beast does not exist. His horrid death refutes is aborted revelation: the beast exists, all right, not where we thought to find it, but within ourselves.” (236) His death is truly the tipping point, a point of no return for the boys. After his killing, Simon’s philosophy of inner evil is realized. It is clear that his own philosophy is what ultimately leads to Simon’s death, as unfortunate as it may be. It is reflected of the group’s fear of the unknown, and their