Banned Books: Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

A plane filled with school boys has crashed on an island. Slowly the boys began to gather with the assistance of the sound from a conch shell. The shell would begin to represent order and civility for the boys who would choose a leader in Ralph and eventually begin setting up shelters and a fire to signal a rescue. The oldest boys were around twelve with the younger children only six years old. Together they have to find a way to survive without the assistance of any grownups. Food was an issue of course. One could only survive off so much fruit. Hunters were established, under the leadership of Jack, who was once the head of the boys’ choir in what seems like a lifetime ago. Survival is the key until they are rescued. But fear slowly begins to take over. The younger children fear a beast in the forest. Nightmares haunt their sleep and the fear is spreading to some of the older boys. Discord between two of the leaders takes place and it becomes a struggle for them to work together. As time passes nothing gets easier for the group and their innocence slowly starts to fade away.

                Lord of the Flies is a cunning and brilliant examination of the loss of innocence. Take a group of school boys, drop them in the middle of nowhere, and watch what happens. How will they interact? Who will take responsibility for the actions of the group as a whole? Who will care for the younger children who don’t know how to care for themselves? This novel starts off with the best of intentions but human nature starts to take over. The characters start to value their own lives over the lives of the group as a whole. The only voice of reason, found in an overweight boy called Piggy, is criticized from the very start and ignored by the majority of the other boys. The lack of respect causes the boys to start fighting among themselves, choosing sides and causing deeper divides. These boys are so young that you can blame most of their decision making on immaturity but their actions prove otherwise. The worst is coming as the mob mentality takes over and things start taking a turn for the worst.

                Golding produced an amazing novel full of depth and beautiful writing in an unimaginable situation. I was immediately enveloped into this world and full of concern, shock and disbelief. I’ve read this book before, years ago, and I don’t think I fully understood the weight these young boys carried. Now I understand how easily they could have cracked under the pressure and made some of the horrible decisions they made. This observation of the true nature of people and how easily one can revert back to being savage is disturbing to say the least. I want to describe this novel as raw and ruthless. Regardless of its level of intensity this novel has never been successfully banned but it has been challenged numerous times at many different high schools across the US. The American Library Association list reasons for the challenges ranging from being demoralizing, excessive violence and bad language. In my opinion, this is the kind of book, that makes you analyze the type of people in your life to try and decipher their true character. These boys shed their skin and presented themselves at their worst. The revelation found in each character was eye opening and absolutely amazing. High school should be exposed to that kind of exploitation.

http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/classics/reasons  Retrieved May 2014