Lord of the Flies
In Lord of the Flies the boys are stripped of the boundaries that civilization and society bring and savagery takes over while the evil inside each boy is unleashed. Through the deaths of Piggy and Simon, it becomes obvious that there is no more intellect and morality on the island, and savagery has become more prominent and stronger than civilization. In Simon’s death we see that the boys were so focused on hunting, and killing is second nature to them as they murder Simon thinking he is the beast. Through Piggy’s death it is evident that the boys (Roger in particular) have become killers on the loose and they have completely forgotten about rules and boundaries of their “old life”. Roger’s change in character shows us that no matter how harmless a boy, when too much freedom is given and no restrictions are put in place, the true character and sin in a boy is shown.
Through Simon’s death it is clear that civilization on the island has lost complete innocence and the boys have lost all their humanity. The boys think he is the beast and kills him, proving that they do not think before acting now. The boys have lost all sanity and the lack of parents and guardians allows them to act in such savagery without being punished. They no longer need to think about consequences and so they act out of complete craziness. Simon represented the little good and innocence left on the island. He was the only person who stayed sane and believed the beast did not exist. He was able to cancel out the fear of his own imagination instead of conforming to the fear that the other boys were having. Ironically, before he was killed, he was on his way to tell the boys that he knew who the beast was, and that it was no one, but their own imagination. Unfortunately he was killed before getting the chance to share this new found intelligence that could have changed the island and the way the boys acted. They thought by killing they were protecting themselves from the beast, but the truth was that each and every boy created their own beast in their head and after being alone for so long.
Piggy’s death symbolizes the loss of intellect and common sense on the island. Roger shoves a boulder down the mountainside while Piggy is trying to remind the boys about rules and boundaries of the island. The boulder collides with Piggy, shatters the conch shell he is holding, and knocks him off the mountainside to his death. The fact that Roger killed Piggy while he was talking already shows the boys craziness and loss of morals on the island, no one even tried to stop him from killing Piggy. At this point, the boys have become immune to wrong and have acted on the deceiving and sinful ways that that they grew up learning to act against. When Piggy dies, the boys no longer have a voice of reason, telling them to reconsider their actions. No one will try and stop the hunters from killing, or remind Ralph that rescue is the number one priority. They don’t have Piggy to tell them to stop, but now they are lost without Piggy’s intellectual comments that keep some sort of common sense in their minds, while slowly leading a life of savagery.
Roger truly portrays the change between the rules and boundaries of civilization, to a life of savagery. At the beginning of the book we see him as an innocent boy that throws to miss and cannot get away from the “taboos” of his old life. He is
