english exam

Lord of the Flies tells the story of a group of British boys whose plane crashes on a deserted island in the Pacific Ocean. (It appears that the world is at war. This matters later.) With no adults, the boys are left to fend for and govern themselves. The boys range in age from six to twelve, and Ralph, one of the older boys, becomes "chief" with the assistance of a conch shell. (The boys decide that only he who holds the conch shell has public speaking privileges. It helps to establish order.) The first trouble begins when the boys become fearful of a "beast" somewhere on the island. Troubles aside, they decide it would be best to build a fire to signal any passing ships. To do so, they use the glasses of a boy named Piggy (who is a portly fellow, and also the most loyal friend to Ralph). Things heat up when another boy, Jack, jealous of Ralph's power, decides the boys should devote their energies to hunting food (namely pigs on this island) instead of maintaining the fire. Jack, among many others, seems to become more and more savage the longer they are on the island. Meanwhile our other key player, a wise and philosophical boy named Simon, works with Ralph to build shelters. It all goes swimmingly until these latent conflicts become not so latent and the boys who are supposed to be tending the fire skip out on their duties to kill a pig. The scene makes all the boys seem like primitive savages instead of well-behaved British gentlemen. The blood and gore of the hunt is all very exciting until they realize that, while they were out being bloodthirsty boys, the fire went out and a ship passed by without noticing them. Jack has also managed to punch Piggy in the face and break one lens of his glasses. Not good. Right about this time a dead man attached to a parachute blows in Mary-Poppins-style to the island. The war going on outside the island seems to be responsible for the fact that he is dead. Anyway, the mysterious parachuting creature is mistaken for the beast, and the boys begin a massive hunt to kill it. Only Simon is doubtful that there is such a creature, believing instead that the beast is part of them, that their fears are only about themselves. He goes off into the woods to contemplate the situation while Jack and Ralph ascend the mountain and find the beast - but don't stick around long enough to see that it is in fact only a dead man. Back in the group, Jack decides Ralph shouldn't be chief anymore. He secedes from the union, if you will, and invites whoever wants to come with him and kill things (like more pigs, and maybe some people if they feel like it). Ralph and Piggy set about building the fire, but realize by the end of it that most of the older children have gone, presumably to join Jack. During all of this, Simon is hidden in his nifty meditation spot (a "cave of vines" in the woods), watching Jack and Co. hunt a pig. This time, they slaughter a fat mother pig (in a scene described somewhat as a rape), cut off her head, and jam it onto a stick in the ground. Simon stares at the head, which he calls "the Lord of the Flies" as it tells him (he's hallucinating, by the way) that it is the beast and that it is part of him (Simon). Simon passes out, gets a bloody nose, and wakes up covered in sweat, blood, and other generally disgusting things. Despite all this, he decides to continue up the mountain to face the beast. Simon discovers that the beast is in fact just a man. Then he vomits and staggers down the mountain. By now, Ralph and Piggy (both rather ravenous) are attending (with all the other boys) a big feast/party that Jack (decorated like an idol) is throwing. It's all a frenzied reenactment of the pig hunt until Simon, still bloody, sweaty, and covered in puke, stumbles down into the center of the crazed boys. He tries to tell them about the beast, but he is unrecognizable and the boys jab at him with their spears until he is dead. Again, the boys are portrayed as savage animals. Simon's body is washed out to sea that night, as is the body of the dead parachuting man (which was conveniently picked up by the wind and taken away, once again Mary-Poppins-style). Ralph and Piggy later convince themselves they didn't take part in murdering Simon. It's all downhill from here; Jack's crew attacks Ralph and Piggy and steals Piggy's eyeglasses to make fire on their own. When Ralph and Piggy decide to calmly talk it out with the "savages," Roger pushes a huge boulder off a cliff which kills Piggy. Ralph ends up running for his life, finds out that there's a head-on-stick future planned for him, and at last makes it to the shore of the island where he runs into...an officer of the British Navy. The boys are rescued from their mock war, but we're left with the image of the Navy's "trim cruiser" from the real war of the adults.

chapter 1

Ralph blows the conch and calls another meeting. By now, thank goodness, the choir boys have removed their cloaks. Using his authority as the newly elected chief, Ralph addresses the boys and tells them that they need to get organized. Apparently that means rules. Now all boys have to raise their hand to talk. Oh, and no one can speak unless they're holding the conch shell. The boys are excited about having rules, but mostly so that they can punish those who break them. This notion elicits cries of "Whee-oh!" "Wacco!" "Bong!" and "Doink!" Piggy takes the conch to raise a few points: 1) they might never get off this island and 2) assuming they don't, they should figure out how to go about the process of not dying. Ralph agrees with the whole "we might be here until eternity" thing, but he declares quite clearly that "this is a good island." Go ahead and sticky-note this page. (But in case you forget to sticky-note it, you have another chance several paragraphs later when he again says "It's a good island.") One small boy with a mulberry-colored birthmark, the reason for which will be shortly explained, requests the conch and everyone laughs until Piggy demands he be allowed to speak. The young child is too scared to talk in front of everyone, so Piggy listens and then tells the rest: The child is fearful of a mysterious snake-thing in the jungle. He describes it as a "beastie" and says it comes only in the dark. (We have concluded that the boys must have been on the island for at least one night before they found each other and began to organize.) The other boys laugh and they decide that the beastie is just the ropey-looking creepers that hang in the trees. Jack says of course there isn't a beast, but just in case they're all going to go hunt for it anyway. Ralph is forced to concede, and notes that he is "facing something ungraspable." Ralph insists that a signal fire must be made so that when his father comes to rescue them on a ship, the men on board will see the smoke and know where to find them. Also, burning things is fun. Everyone tears off, and Piggy remarks that they're all acting "like a bunch of kids." Everyone excitedly piles up the wood before realizing...they have no way of starting the fire. Jack very helpfully mumbles something about rubbing two sticks together (Eagle Scout Lesson #2, if you've been counting.) They use Piggy's glasses to start the fire after many hurrahs and much gathering of wood. Piggy is not happy about the use of his glasses for this purpose. What we mean is: "[Piggy's] voice rose to a shriek of terror as Jack snatched the glasses off his face." Ralph says that they need to choose certain, responsible people to keep the fire going at all times - in case a ship passes by. Jack declares: "We're English, and the English are best at everything." Piggy, rather blind without his glasses, grabs the conch from Ralph and complains about how no one pays attention to his ideas. While the boys argue, the fire spreads...like wildfire. As the smoke drifts through the air, Piggy rants about all these things they should have done, like build shelters and show him some respect. Then, most likely because of the smoke, his asthma flairs up and he can't breathe. Yet, it seems he has enough breath to point out that the small children, a.k.a. "the littluns," seem to be missing, especially that one who complained about "the beastie" and had a mulberry-colored birthmark, the better to distinguish him by when he's gone. He seems to be the most missing of all.

chapter 2

Time has passed, and as Chapter Three opens, we see Jack, his bare back a "mass of dark freckles and peeling sunburn." He is naked (what do you know) except for a pair of tattered shorts. Jack has become obsessed with killing a pig. Obsessed to the point of tracking down pig's droppings. Based on his sniffing the air all the time, it seems that Jack is now a lot like an animal himself, or at the least a primitive form of man. Jack fails to catch a pig, yet again. He tries to take it out on someone else, meaning Ralph and Simon, who are trying to build shelters out of leaves. It's not going so well, as you might have expected. So Ralph and Jack do what they always do together: argue. Jack thinks it's more important to kill things, while Ralph thinks it's more important to not die of exposure. Ralph makes the argument that everyone is still scared of the beastie. He says that the children are scared "As if it wasn't a good island." This is an interesting line to sticky-note along with that earlier one. Jack, too, admits he gets a little scared when he's in the jungle alone. Despite all this, Ralph is still mostly concerned with the fire. Jack suggests they could paint their faces. We suggest you flip back to that part about the brightly-colored bird. And the point of painting faces is that they could sneak up on the pigs while they're sleeping. Piggy lies on his stomach and stares at the water. But he does point out that Simon is the one helpful guy, whenever he's not missing, which he tends to be quite frequently. OK, camera swivel; now we're looking at Simon as he walks into the forest "with an air of purpose." We are told that his "bright eyes" made Ralph think he was "delightfully gay and wicked," when in fact he is not. He is also tan, barefoot, and has "a coarse mop of black hair." The littluns follow after him, and he helps them pick fruit too tall for them to reach before heading deeper into the jungle by himself. Simon comes to a place where "the creepers had woven a great mat that hung at the side of an open space in the jungle." He crawls inside this space (we cannot imagine why) and chills out there while evening approaches, musing non-specifically.

chapter 3

More unspecified time has passed. The boys have developed a sort of rhythm in their lives that involves the littluns playing together, the biguns (Jack and the choir boys) still hunting pigs, and the other boys (Ralph, Simon, and Piggy) trying to build shelters and keep the signal fire going. We are reminded that there are sharks in the water beyond the reef. One littlun named Percival cries all the time and everyone thinks he's a little crazy. The biguns and littluns have become rather separate groups, although Simon, Maurice, and Robert are walking a fine line because of their size (in general, though, it seems they are considered biguns). Being a littlun is terrible, as there's no one to really take care of them. They have built and decorated sandcastles near the little river, which has become their play and general dwelling area. We see Henry, the biggest of the littluns, hanging out with the smallest (Percival and Johnny). The children are "at peace" until Roger and Maurice come along and step on their sandcastles, with Roger in the lead and Maurice feeling a little guilty. Once again, can you guess which one will end up being evil incarnate? Roger follows Henry as he wanders off to an overlook; below, Ralph, Simon, Piggy, and Maurice are splashing in the pool (the small and naturally-occurring kind, not the cabana kind). Roger starts throwing stones at Henry, but missing on purpose because he still has some semblance of decency left, at least for the time being. Jack calls to Roger; he's with Sam, Eric, and Bill and still on this pig-hunting kick. Jack refers to the twins as "Samneric." After going through with the face painting plan, using white and red clay and a stick of charcoal, Jack looks at his reflection in a coconut shell full water and is astonished to see an "awesome stranger" looking back at him. He begins to dance, and it seems that the mask is a "thing on its own, behind which Jack hid." When he orders the boys to come with him, it is "the mask" that "compel[s] them," not Jack. Creepy stuff. Meanwhile, back at the lagoon, Ralph, Simon and Piggy are still swimming with Maurice. Piggy suggests that they should make a sundial, but, as has become general habit, no one takes his suggestions seriously. Suddenly, Ralph spots a ship. Much excitement follows. Piggy is immediately frantic as to whether or not the signal fire is still lit. Ralph dashes up the mountain to see, "doing desperate violence to his naked body among the rasping creepers so that blood was sliding over him." (Yes - still naked.) But before he goes, Simon seems to know what's up. He "crie[s] out as though he [has] hurt himself" and tries to touch Ralph's face. Interesting! As you might have guessed, the signal fire has indeed gone out. By the time they stop panicking, the ship has disappeared. Now WHERE, everyone wants to know, are the (former) choirboys who were supposed to be tending the fire? Everyone looks down from the mountain and sees a procession of choice boys who have finally ditched the black robes and joined in the public nudity. But, they're still ominously wearing their black caps. They are also, equally ominously, led by Jack, carrying a dead pig on a stake, and chanting: "Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood." Jack and his posse tell the tale of how they killed the pig. Ralph stares at them, expressionless, and finally says, "You let the fire go out." Jack and Co. experience that "oops" feeling, accompanied by a side of intense guilt. Piggy rails on them for being irresponsible; in a moment of twelve-year-old-boy-ness, Jack punches Piggy in the face. Simon finds the glasses and reveals that a lens is broken, which leaves Piggy with vision in just one eye. Finally, Jack breaks down and apologizes. Standing still and stoic, Ralph very simply commands them to rebuild the fire. In this, we are told, he reasserts his chieftainship; the choir boys are forced to rebuild the fire away from where Ralph stands, unmoving, which is a hell of a lot of work for them. He finally has to move to help them light the fire, using Piggy's glasses. Piggy is obviously not comfortable with his only means to sight being used this way; he snatches the "specs" back immediately, as the boys begin to roast the pig they killed, ripping off hunks of meat and devouring it like wolves. In his attempt to be indignant and above everyone, Ralph tries to not eat any of the meat Jack is roasting. That lasts about two seconds once the smell reaches his nose; remember, they've been eating fruit and plants since they got to the island. No one hands Piggy any meat, and when Jack gives him a hard time about his not helping with the hunt, Simon gives his own food to Piggy. Jack is furious, and yells at Simon to "Eat! Damn you!" He basically realizes he has no power over the boys unless they eat the meat he got for them all. The hunters describe their kill again in gory detail, and continue their chant of "Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Bash her in." This is pretty bad, as you can tell. The boys are becoming violent barbarians and fast. Ralph decides to call another meeting and walks down the mountain

chapter 4

Ralph sounds the conch shell and the boys gather for a meeting. A serious meeting. We get a description of the meeting place: we know it's on a sort of platform, and now we're told it's shaped like a triangle. Ralph, as the chief, sits on a huge log, which lays parallel to the beach below. To his right is another not-so-chiefly log, and on the left four smaller logs, all which make for seats for the boys. Ralph gets rather philosophical here before the big meeting, pondering such relevant matters as, "If faces [are] different when lit from above or below - what [is] a face? What [is] anything?" It seems the wilderness has made Ralph question the very foundations of his knowledge. If this seems weird to you, we suggest you live on an uninhabited island for a month or two. After all this pondering, Ralph gets around to blowing the conch. Ralph is bothered by his long shaggy hair which keeps falling into his eyes but he goes on with the speech he has prepared. He reminds the boys of some rules: 1) (as you might have guessed) KEEP THE SIGNAL FIRE GOING, 2) don't build any other fires, and 3) do their toilet business by the rocks near the bathing pool instead of all over the island, as they have been doing (the boys snigger and laugh at this last item). Ralph adds that "This place is getting dirty." He also decides to address their fear - fear about dying and fear about the beastie. When he sets down the conch, Jack grabs it up and tells all the little children to stop acting like children. He says there is no beast, and if they're afraid they should suck it up. He's been all over the island, after all, and he hasn't seen anything. There's this great moment where someone asks what a beast would eat, someone else says "pig," and yet another someone said "We eat pig." Piggy, in a moment of astounding and unprecedented perception, states that there is no beast, and no fear, either - unless they get frightened of people. So there's nothing to fear but the fear of people. One of the littluns (Phil) tries to declare that the beast comes out at night. When they tell him it was a dream, he says quite adamantly that no, he was dreaming that the creepers were snakes, and then after he woke up he saw something big moving in the dark. Ralph insists it was a dream, until Simon admits he was the one mucking about in the dark. Simon grabs the conch and explains that sometimes he likes to go hang out in this "place" in the jungle. They keep talking about "getting taken short," which is refined British for "needing to poo." Supposedly, this is why Simon was out, but we all know that's not true. Another littlun comes forward, and again Piggy has to hold the conch for him and coax some words out of him. This little guy is none other than Percival. Percival gets a little nutty; he yammers off his street address, he cries, then he yawns, then he staggers, and finally he just lies down in the grass and goes to sleep, but not before telling Jack that the beast "comes out of the sea." Simon makes a comment on "mankind's essential illness" and states that the beast is "only us." Simon tries to further his point by asking, "what's the dirtiest thing there is?" Jack's answer, "one crude expressive syllable" (yes, you know what it is) causes the other boys to scream with delight (remember, essentially, these are proper, well-educated British boys - swearing was a big thrill for them). As the boys laugh, Simon gives up on his effort to make them think about themselves and sits down in defeat. The idea that the beast might be a ghost is discussed, which visibly upsets Piggy. Someone yells at him to "shut up, you fat slug!" (ouch!) and the whole meeting begins to disintegrate. Ralph shouts that the rules are the only thing they've got holding them together, but Jack is louder and leads a pack of boys off to search for the beast and hunt him down. Piggy and Ralph and Simon are left in despair. Piggy says to blow the conch to get everyone back. Ralph makes the third amazing comment of the chapter, stating that, if he blows it now and no one comes back, the conch will have lost its power completely. And then, they will all "be like animals." He wants to give up being chief, but Piggy asks desperately what would happen then. Simon tries to convince Ralph to go on with his duties. There's some talk of how, if only the grown-ups were there, they'd know what to do. They would have rules and they would meet and discuss. They wish for a "sign" from the adults. As the boys stand there in the darkness, a thin wail arises. It's one of the littluns, Percival, crying out from his spot on the grass.

chapter 5

As if that were not scary enough chapter six opens with a "sign" from the adults: it's a parachuting dead body drifting down to the ground from a battle being fought by airplanes above the island. Sam and Eric are tending the signal fire when they see the body, which looks strange in the darkness as the wind blows its head up and down. Screaming and running away follows. Ralph is dreaming of home when the twins wake him up. They scream that they saw the beast and that it was furry, had wings, teeth, and claws, there was something moving behind its head, and it followed them by "slinking behind the trees." By now, other boys have gathered around to listen, including our favorite troublemaker, Jack. Jack, of course, wants to hunt the thing down. Jack, Ralph, and an assortment of biguns head off to do so. Piggy says "what about the littluns?" (as in, who will watch over them while we're all off hunting for the beast?) Jack says, "Sucks to the littluns," since they've been taking care of themselves all along anyway. On that note, they let the hunt begin. They decide to head for the tail end of the island, where the rocks make a sort of bridge - they've never explored that part before, and refer to it as "the castle." Simon walks along with them, doubtful that there is such a beast as the one Sam and Eric described. Instead, he imagines "a picture of a human, at once heroic and sick." When they get to the rocks, Ralph declares he will go in and look for the beast; he's the chief, he thinks, so it's his duty. Several heart-pounding moments later, he sees that Jack has followed him. Jack says, "couldn't let you do it on your own." Not surprisingly, there is no beast inside. They have some fun exploring. And then they decide they have to climb to the top of the mountain to look for this beast thing. The other boys start swarming into the rocks ("this would make wizard fort!" one of them shouts). They have a grand old time until Ralph realizes the signal fire has gone out again. With much grumbling and muttering, the boys quit their playing and follow Jack and Ralph to the top of the mountain.

chapter 6

The boys stop to rest and eat some fruit they've found. Almost immediately, some of the boys steal off to "do their business." Ralph, by now quite dirty, wishes that he could take a bath. Oh, and cut his hair (still). But then he looks around at the other boys and realizes that he's become used to the conditions of filthiness - it has become normal. He sighs, knowing that this isn't really a good thing. Ralph stares out at the ocean - he's now on the other side of the island, no longer shielded by the lagoon. This, of course, is hugely meaningful to him. Right about this time, Ralph realizes Simon is speaking right into his ear. Simon actually does say, "You'll get back all right." Ralph thinks Simon is batty and says so - yet he is still somehow comforted. Simon seems to have some knowledge of things that the other boys don't. For a moment, they even smile at each other. But before you start feeling all comforted, notice that Simon says "you'll get back all right." Roger calls out that he's found some fresh (steaming) pig poo. The boys start on up the mountain again as Ralph thinks fondly of home: his bedroom, books, his mother and father and "good-humored and friendly" feelings. Right about now, a huge boar (that's a male pig with tusks) comes crashing out of the bushes. Ralph flings his spear, which sticks in the boar's snout for about a second before falling out. Ralph proudly shouts that he hit the boar, and then decides that maybe hunting is a good thing after all. Jack takes off after the boar, which eventually gets away, but not before wounding Jack's arm. And yet - the excitement doesn't end there; the boys reenact the scene with some poor boy (Robert) voluntarily playing the boar. Things get a little out of hand as the boys "play" at jabbing Robert with their spears. They start the chant again: "Kill the pig! Cut his throat," etc., etc. Ralph can't help joining in (!) as they finish the game with Robert screaming in true terror as they pin him down. When it's all over, Robert isn't really hurt and Ralph says it was "just a game," but even he knows that he is shamelessly lying to himself. Everyone (except Robert, we assume) wishes they could do it again. Jack playfully suggests they could use a littlun. By this time, the sun is starting to go down; the boys discuss whether to go on up on the mountain and risk facing the beast in the dark, or whether to go back to Piggy, who was left behind with the littluns. Finally, Simon goes off through the jungle to tell Piggy that they won't be back until after dark. The rest of the boys head fearfully up the darkening mountain. As the group chickens out one by one, only Ralph, Jack, and Roger are left. Jack goes ahead and sees the "beast" (the parachute man) bowing and lifting in the wind. He can't tell what it is and runs back to the other two. Then, bravely, the trio goes together to investigate. Ralph is so afraid he thinks he might pass out. They finally get a look at what they think is a giant ape sitting there, asleep, with his head between his knees. As the wind roars through the trees, the creature lifts his head, "holding toward them the ruin of a face." For the second time, much running and screaming follows.

chapter 7