The Lord of The Flies
January 13, 2007
"Lord of the Flies" by William Golding
Capricorn 1959 paperback edition
What you might call the best example of the "accessible classic" (such as the dystopian trifecta of "1984," "Brave New World" and "Fahrenheit 451"), this is a novel that is written in clear language, which characters that are mostly stand-ins for the author's ideas, and has a fairly obvious sub-text that makes it easy to teach to high schoolers. Does this take away from its power as a novel? Not really. Detailing the events following a plane wreck that leaves a group of British schoolboys stranded on a jungle island, the novel quickly becomes a lean, effective parable about the thin veneer that is civilized behavior. While the boys are able to stay in order for a while, savagery soon takes hold and the few who cling to the rules of society find themselves hunted by those who have chosen to go wild. As entertaining as it is frightening, the novel's powerful imagery has entered our collective cultural vocabulary. The best thing you were ever forced to read in school.
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