Conservation in Lord of the Flies Essay

Lord of the Flies v. Conservative views

In William Goldings, Lord of the Flies the trials and tribulations of real life are seen through the eyes of school children. After a plane crash a group of boys become stranded on an island, and human nature begins to take full effect as the boys begin to organize themselves to survive. Throughout the duration of the novel a constant theme and/or struggle is presented, which illustrates many conservative undertones.

According to Edmund Burke, a conservative thinker, order and a traditional way of running government is the correct direction that human nature and society, as a whole should strive to attain. In the Novel, one of the central characters, Ralph, represents this struggle in which many Conservatives have to obtain this goal of order. When Ralph was first elected as the leader of the boys, they established central goals for the new society of having fun and getting rescued via a fire signal. In the beginning, many of the boys were willing to work toward the same goals by building shelter and dividing up tasks such as watching the fire. This orderly society that Ralph envisioned is in direct correlation with that of Edmunds organic view of society, which compares everyones task to an organ. Thus, all of the individuals are coming together to work in harmony to have a flourishing society.

A true conservative is longing to conserve something whether it a physical possession or mere power. In the Lord of the flies, this is evident because power is a developed theme that is shown throughout out the piece. First, the conch shell in which the boys find to call the others is a symbol of power. The person that has this shell has the right to speak and it is used to govern when they meet. This symbol relates to the conservative outlook because Hierarchy is also established within the book because the boys are split into different groups such as "biguns" and "littluns." Dividing into these groups gives credit to the conservative view of giving meaning and stability to the society as a whole. As the book progresses, Jack and Rodger, leaders of the their new founded tribe decide to overthrow Rodger. When this hierarchy is disturbed, conservatives believe that society, as a whole, will be destroyed. If Ralph is used as a figure of conservatism, the boys fight and a man hunt for him in the end is used as a representation of what will happen if the orderly and traditional outlooks are over run by human nature. Thus, this

All and all, it is my opinion that the Golding used Conservative ideology to construct his final thought of the book. It can be construed that the underlining idea is - without the attempt to preserve or conserve order and traditional values, human nature will take effect and result in the ultimate demise of a society. Although the boys may have wanted what was in their best interest, Ralph may have been thinking about the best interests for everyone. Therefore, this book allows us to realize conservative ideals may have the same intent.