How can teachers use William Golding's Lord of the Flies in the Language Classroom. The discussion topic could be human nature or evil part in minds. We would like to cultivate our students to have critical-thinking ability.

1. Cindy Chia-Hui Shen
Lord of the Flies in the Language Classroom—
Evil or Human Nature
Cindy Chia-Hui Shen
cindy422@tp.edu.tw
Department of English Instruction,
Taipei Municipal University of Education
I. Introduction
Recently, the use of English picture books in teaching in a foreign language has
drawn a great deal of attention from researchers, who suggest that children can
naturally acquire novel words from reading storybooks (Blok, 1999; Brett, Rothlein,
& Hurley, 1996; Dickinson & Smith, 1994; Huang, 2001; Lin, 2003; Nantz, 2002;
Tyan & Shen, 2006). As for the adolescents, discovering the connections between
their own personal stories and reading stories of human experience can help them
define themselves within a larger world. One way to help adolescents do this is to
expose them a quality literature from a wide variety of cultures and times, and engage
them in discussion and writing about how the people, events, and stories in these
works compare to their own lives and experience. Take William Golding’s Lord of the
Flies as an example, this is a story about two groups of young children in completely
opposite way and the main theme of the novel is about the “reciprocal relationship”
between the “good” and the “evil,” just like William Blake’ poem ‘Song of Innocence
and Experience.’ Students can discover these connections by thinking about their own
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stories.
There are three sections in this article. The first section is the introduction of this
novel and the author. The second section focuses on the critics of Lord of the Flies,
especially in the evil and human nature, and at the third section is the application of
using Lord of the Flies as the teaching material, and to investigate its effects on
adolescents’ language learning and cultivate their positive attitude and characteristic
development.
II. Introduction of Lord of the Flies and the author William Golding
Lord of the flies is a fable, a story with a moral. It also contains elements of
allegory; on one level it is an adventure story of boys on an island, and on another
level it shows us that evil resides within ourselves. The struggle between Ralph and
Jack represents the struggle between democracy and totalitarianism, two opposing
ways of organizing society.
During the Second World War, Golding served with the Royal Navy and was
profoundly affected by his experiences. After the war he taught at a boys’ school in
Salisbury. Years later he said that writing the book was ‘like lamenting the lost
childhood of the world.’ In 1962 he retired from teaching to become a full time writer.
He was inspired to write Lord of the Flies because he found the students he taught
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during his 20 years as a schoolteacher to be ripe material for probing the mind of a
child. In addition, R. M. Ballantyne’s Coral Island (1857), an adventure novel about
shipwrecked boys that Golding had read as child, provided him with plot ideas that he
eventually incorporated into Lord of the Flies.
III. The investigation of human nature in Lord of the Flies
William Golding wrote the novel Lord of the Flies with the intent to include
certain elements of moral behavior for readers to absorb. He utilized specific symbols
found scattered in the novel to portray his intended message to all those who read his
work of literature. He built his message into the novel in the form of adventure. The
actions done by characters in the novel eventually create Golding’s message to the
reader.
Lord of the Flies is an adolescent literature mainly discussing the transformation
of one’s external physical appearance and also mental state and behavior. This novel
further demonstrates the psychological struggles when human beings are looking for
the instincts and the primitive parts in their minds. In moral philosophy, evil is
described as the absence of good that ought to be found in one man and in the actions
he performs.
Traditionally there have been three different conceptions of human nature: the
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classical, the Christian and the modern view. The classical view identifies man’s
rational faculties with good, sees the mind as immortal and the reason as identical
with God while regarding his sensual desires and appetites as evil (Niebuhr 6-7). Evil
is the defeat of reason by the body, which forces man to act in accordance with the
animal passions.
It can be said that Golding describes the moral of the book in relation to the
scientific mechanics of society. The boys on the island view this ideal in the form of
the “beastie.” The “beastie” is an unseen figure on the island, which is symbolized of
the dead parachutist. This fear, however, represents the potential evil found in
humans. In addition, Kinkead-Weeks (1984) identifies three explanations of evil in
Golding’s novel.
First are Piggy and Ralph. They believe in “the essential goodness of people and
the island. If things ‘break up,’ it is the fault of individuals who deviate because there
is something wrong among them.”
Jack, on the other hand, thinks “evil and destruction are live forces.” In a world
of power, there are powers at work (Beast, Devil, or God) which are stronger than
men, but these powers can be propitiated by ritual, ceremony and sacrifice.”
Finally, there is Simon who declares that the first and the second explanations are
simultaneously right and wrong. “There is evil, but it is not either outside men or
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confined to certain men, it is inside of everyone” (Kinkead-Weeks 45). It is Simon’s
explanation that Golding obviously favors.
In the novel Jack first appears leading the choirboys. After Ralph is elected Chief,
he gives the choir to Jack to lead and Jack decides that they will be hunters (Golding
15-19). Jack, the leader, is recast, not as an innocent boy, but as a criminal element
that is dangerous. Jack spends the first night around the campfire telling ghost stories
to make the other boys scream and cry. It is Jack, and not the imaginations of the
little’un, who installs fear into the boys. He then uses their fear as leverage to scare
the others into joining the safety of the hunter-tribe. The novel, in contrast, has the
beast invented and perpetuated by the imagination of the youngest boys. The novel
makes us sympathize with Jack
‘Who thinks Ralph oughtn’t to be chief?’
He looked expectantly at the boys ranged round, who had frozen. Under the
palms there was deadly silence.
‘Hands up,’ said Jack strongly, ‘whoever wants Ralph not to be chief?’
The silence continued breathless and heavy full of shame. Slowly the red drained
from Jack’s cheeks, then came back with a painful rush. He licked his lips and turned
his head at an angle, so that his gaze avoided the in embarrassment of linking with
another’s eye.
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‘How many think-’
His voice trailed off. The hands that held the conch shook. He cleared his throat,
and spoke loudly….The humiliating tears were running from the corner of each eye.
‘I’m not going to play any longer. Not with you.’ (Golding 139-140)
In this scene we see Jack as the outcast boy. He’s not so much bad as desirous of
fitting into the group. There is pathos in his tears. Golding’s novel shows that the fear
of ourselves is pervasive among us all and evil is a universal characteristic of men.
Golding is trying to tell us that evil is stronger than good and even is the best thing
to have evil in humans. The whole novel is about the struggle of good and evil which
take the roles of symbols. Ralph takes part in one of the hunts (122-126) which serves
as “a revelation of his own darker side; he discovers in himself the excitements, the
‘fright and apprehension and pride’ the others have known” (Kinkead-Weeks 41).
The theme in Lord of the Flies is that children are savage at heart, ultimately
reverting back to an evil and primitive nature. As a reader, I realize that despite the
strong sense of civility that has been instilled in these children throughout their lives,
they have shown the underlying savage side existent in their inner minds. The author
William Golding tries to convey a message that it is threatening for human beings due
to the irrationality and urge for destruction. That is, the novel demonstrates that it is
not difficult to revert back to the evil nature inherent in man.
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Furthermore, in the novel, Simon is a peaceful person who tries to show the boys
that there is no monster on the island except the fears that the boys have. In other
words, Simon tries to state the truth about there is a beast, but it is only us. It is
understandable that young children would have fears of monsters, especially when it
is taken into consideration that the children are stranded on the island which is far
away from their home. The sense of fear about beasts or an unknown future make
people do something may be extremely out of orders. Fear is an emotion that is
instinctive and active in humans from the very beginnings of their lives. This
revelation uncovers another weakness in humans, supporting the idea or belief that a
human being is pathetic and savage at the very core of his existence.
“It was dark. There was that -- that bloody dance. There was lightning and
thunder and rain. We were scared!”
This describes how the boys have gone beyond the point of fun and games. They
are no longer boys playing on the island but a bunch of savages.
Additionally, the struggle between two groups illustrates human’s fear of losing
control, which is another example of selfishness and weakness, a part of human
nature. The fear of beasts is natural and the fear of losing power is inherited. The
author points out that any type of uncontrolled fear contributes to human’s instability
and will ultimately lead to spiritual desperation.
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The island represents the isolation of human beings a frightening and mysterious
state. The novel leads us to see the darkness of human nature, even though it is a
release from adults’ control and the main characters are young children. They seem to
be forced to become mature and behave as adults, and this island is symbolized as a
small society, in which there is a hierarchical relationship within them. These children
not only kill animals, but also kill their partners. The bloody things are the results of
violence and war.
“Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his blood!”
This expresses the increasing intensity of the boys’ savagery. The paradoxical
concepts of morality and evil, and rules and savages among human beings make us
start to think the identification of ourselves.
Ultimately, their fragile democracy is replaced by a tribal community based on
fright and superstition. At the end of the book, the paradisal place has become a
burning inferno. Ralph, the protagonist, echoes Golding’s own grief when he weeps
“for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart…” (223).
With the respect of pedagogical implication, adolescents, being active and
responsive readers, need to be encouraged to think what is the meaning of life and
they should start to make further reflections, listen to their own inner voices, and have
critical thinking since life is a journey, which may accompanied with lots of
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adventures and challenges. They should start to choose the appropriate way to their
destination because evil is not simply the manifestation of something animal or
primitive, but a complex human phenomenon.
IV. Pedagogical implication and application in the language classroom
In the L1 learning environment, there have been lots of teachers use adolescent
literature as one of the reading materials in class. For example, a high school teacher
named Arver (2007) sets up a virtual world to augment students’ reading of Lord of
the Flies. Students in her class interact as additional characters, discuss, and solve
problems based on the circumstances of the story, and complete classroom
assignments within a virtue environment. In addition, based on William Golding’s
Lord of the Flies, there are great number of lesson plans designed to help students
that, not only on a literal level, i.e., the novel deals with what happens to a group of
boys stranded on an island, but also on a symbolic level, i.e., it investigates what
happens to civilized people when the social structures of civilization disappear. The
main activity in the lesson could involve students forming groups to present
arguments and to judge who was responsible for the events on the island. It includes
objectives, materials, procedures, adaptations, discussion questions, evaluation
methods, extension activities, annotations of suggested readings and web links,
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vocabulary, and related academic standards and benchmarks addressed in the lesson
plan. The lesson plan could also contains a description of a video clip related to the
lesson, comprehension questions related to the video clip, and answers to those
comprehension questions.
Helen and Tuomas (2002) suggested that teachers can discuss with colleagues
how drama can be used in the teaching of English as a foreign language. Students can
be encouraged to dramatize William Golding’s Lord of the Flies.
Another suggestion raised by Sunderman (1999) indicated that teachers can
divide students into several groups to have collaborative works. Teachers can pose
questions for students to grapple with and debate. The process of students talking,
analyzing, quoting passages, evaluating, and questioning were much more important
than the answers. For example, the theme of the day could be “conflict” and the
discussion questions could be ‘What conflicts arise in this novel?’ ‘What cause the
conflicts to arise?’ ‘Are the conflicts resolved?’ ‘If yes, how are they resolved?’ ‘Are
the boys’ conflicts similar to the conflicts you encounter?’ Group discussion for an
initial brainstorming session and then students can debate Ralph’s strength as a leader
vs. Jack’s leadership qualities. Ralph is strong, mature, and confident, and he acts and
speaks with self-assurance and consideration for others; his first priority is to be
rescued. On the other hand, Jack is immature, selfish, careless, and motivated by
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blood lust. His priorities are hunting and sustaining his image and position among the
boys. They can analyze Ralph’s inner struggle, i.e., to have fun on the island or to
work to be rescued. They can further debate who was responsible for Simon’s death.
And Piggy’s death symbolizes the total destruction of culture, civilization, and reason
by evil and violence. Teacher can further guide them to think the inter-relationship
between person vs. person, person vs. nature, and person vs. self.
In terms of evil and human nature, we can describe the religious imagery in Lord
of the Flies: the forces of good and evil, a fall from grace, a savior, and eventual
redemption. And we can ask students to dramatize the distinctive character traits and
the human quality of each major character (Ralph: practical; represents desire for
common sense, responsibility, desire for normal, civilized life, embodiment of fears
suffered by man, savagery of man; Jack: red-haired, authoritative, natural leader,
Satanic, animalistic; Piggy, knowledgeable, rational, logical, parental, scapegoat,
wise, chubby, inactive; Simon: epileptic, kind, bashful, visionary, Christ-like, e.g.,
“Ralph stirred uneasily. Simon, sitting between the twins and Piggy, wiped
his mouth and shoved his piece of meat over the rocks to Piggy, who grabbed
it. The twins giggled and Simon lowered his face in shame.”
This quotation reveals that Simon is kind and sincere. Teachers can guide students
how to write their own scripts through group discussion.
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Finally, readers and instructors can find a rich education resource pack of drama
scripts, character analysis, and reading comprehension questions, and questions for
discussion written by Cadbury (2008) on the Pilot Theatre website.
After reading Golding’s Lord of the Flies and some critics and application of this
novel, I think I will read this novel for my EFL young learners in the near future. My
teaching objectives will be presented as follows:
The novel highlights key themes in literature through the use of important
literary elements. Students will gain an understanding of the influence of literature on
their daily lives, society in general and the world as a whole. There are three main
themes discussed in class, i.e., the loss of innocence, the presence of evil in mankind,
the fear of the unknown and the instinct of humans to struggle for power and control.
Through an understanding of the context in which the novel was written, the
exploration of the text itself, and the literary elements used by Golding throughout,
students will find the key themes illustrated in a variety of ways.
Focusing on Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies as the basis for the unit, student
work will center around the major themes which allow for the interpretations of such
questions as: “How do people lose their innocence? When does this take place? Is it
sparked by one event or something bigger? What are the ways this loss manifests
itself in human nature? What causes people who are seemingly ‘civilized’ to commit
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evil acts? Are men born evil or is evil a trait that men acquire? What initiates evil
deeds? Are men themselves to blame for evil behavior or is there an outside
influence? What causes fear? Why do we fear that which we do not know? What are
some of mankind’s reactions to fear? What is the relationship between our fears and
our behavior? What makes man struggle for power? What are some of the ways that
men have struggled for (and gained) power in the past? Does evil behavior
accompany the acquisition of power? How do we judge our leaders? What right do we
have to judge human nature (if any)? How do leaders deal with power? With fear?
With evil? Does the struggle for power correspond with the ‘loss of innocence’?
How?” These interpretive questions lend themselves to critical analysis and personal
expression and provide the foundation for the study of Lord of the Flies throughout
the unit.
Students will explore these major themes and, in turn, interpret the questions that
correspond to the themes through their study of the literary techniques. Moreover,
through participation in group performance, such as role-play or drama performance,
and personal writing assignments as their reading journals, students will learn to
recognize and analyze Golding’s use of plot, theme, characterization, foreshadowing,
symbolism, irony and satire. Students will use these literary elements as the
foundation for formulating reasonable responses to the questions raised by the major
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themes presented in the novel. Most important, the activities, such as teamwork and
practice in public speaking for developing confidence and self-esteem, will broaden
their views and minds toward the diversified human characteristics in one society. It is
important to highlight the educational process by participating in a real-world
connection as a very rewarding experience for young people, offering opportunities
for personal development in many areas.
Last but not least, daily lessons will also focus on building core knowledge of
literary terms and concepts in order to provide students with the necessary skills on
which to build their interpretations and opinions. Incorporating “mini-lessons” into
the unit plan that illustrate the core content of the English Language Arts curriculum
provides a scaffolding for students to build on in order to formulate personal
responses founded in the principles of literary writing and expression.
In brief, providing students with the knowledge, concepts and skills necessary to
come to grips with the essential questions raised will completely prepare them for
formal and informal assessment of the major themes presented in Lord of the Flies.
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