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Post by Becca Mills on Apr 14, 2014 13:23:47 GMT -5
I think it's a marvelous book. When I've taught it, I've given an assignment where students need to mine a sentence or two for all the formal elements Golding uses to get across whatever ideas he's pursuing at that point. There aren't many passages that wouldn't be fruitful. The level of attention on the sentence level is amazing. If you pause and focus on that level, there's great beauty. I don't really disagree with the particulars of your reading. Yes, individual characters are clearly associated with concepts, some of which are political, others of which aren't (Roger, the sadist, is associated with an impulse; Simon as prophet is only a "political" figure in your reading; the sow is associated with the maternal). Where I'm departing is in the way you're adding the whole thing together. You think that if Ralph were older and wiser, he would've figured out a way to handle Jack and preserve order. I just don't see any suggestion of that in the text. There's no key moment where a wiser person would've acted different, and Ralph clearly misses the boat due to his immaturity. The issue of whether or not primitive societies are more violent isn't really material. Although I'm not by any means wedded to authorial intentionality -- seriously, no one in my business even mentions it anymore -- what I see playing out in the novel is very much Golding's misanthropy. Whether that misanthropy is justified or accurate or whatever in the real world isn't really material to figuring out what G is attempting. I know the Pinker piece you mean, but I haven't read it. I remember reading a review or article when it first came out that pointed to some fishy statistical work on his part (something on the order of WWII doesn't count?) in figuring out the rates of violence in the modern world, but whatever. I just don't think it matters to reading what Golding is up to. If it's true that the 20th c. was less violent than earlier centuries, then the interesting question becomes why G was so down on humanity. That's why historicized readings of the novel are so useful -- it's an artifact of the new nuclear age and the Cold War and should be read in that context. It's not Slaughter-house Five or The Things They Carried, but the book can also be read as war literature, I think. In WWII, Golding himself was a Royal Navy officer, like the one who appears at the end of the book, and what's happening among the boys in the later stage of the novel is, basically, war. I love the sow's head as Nietzschean abyss. That's awesome. If I ever get to teach the book again, I'll use that and give you credit.  Teens certainly can understand the book, but the thing's trapped in a spiral of poor teaching. Is it appropriate for the ages at which some of my students report being assigned it? I don't think so. It's being treated as YA lit and being assigned to kids who are the same age as the protagonist (12). I think it's too disturbing for many kids that age. |
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Post by whdean on Apr 14, 2014 19:13:20 GMT -5
By dealing with Jack, I meant that Ralph had to kill Jack. That's what the hero must always do to restore justice and to avert disaster. Taking that action is the burden of all heroes. That thought never even crosses Ralph's mind, however, because he's a young, good natured, well-balanced product of a civilized society. But if he'd had what the ancients called phronesis--practical political knowledge-he'd know that Jack, as the agent of dissolution, had to die to avert that outcome. Even Piggy, the character with the brains to figure it out, never quite comes to that insight because it doesn't properly belong to the realm of the technocrat. Instead, Jack's power over the group increases and Ralph's decreases until Ralph himself is under threat of annihilation.
(As an aside, the fact that people in your business dismiss authorial intention hasn't diminished their appeals to it. E. D. Hirsch made a good case for that. And I don't know that you'd be immune to that criticism either. You're appealing to cultural context, which is arguably a proxy for authorial intention: instead of the author's intent backing the claim, you have the intent of the culture he absorbed. To me, that's six of one, half dozen of the other.)
I think the anthropological angle is relevant. Your interpretation gains force from the fact that people widely believe in the myth of primitive purity (or simply in cultural relativism). So people are inclined to the misanthropist reading you outlined, helped along by the self-righteousness that so afflicts teenagers, "We're all killers! (Well, you are all killers-we bien pensant types are above that.)" Primitive life was, as Hobbes observed, nasty, brutish, and short. If you want to satisfy yourself, do a search in the JStor, etc., for homicide rates in hunter gatherer societies. It's rather surprising that humans survived the Palaeolithic.
At any rate, I think the big picture on Golding's LotF is not misanthropy but tragedy--or, rather, the cosmic tragedy of the City of Man: Heroes must do bad things to maintain order, things that cut against their good nature. But these things are the lesser evils that prevent even worse things. To put the tragedy another way, the only options in the real world are Ralph kills Jack and saves everyone else (= an evil), or Jack kills Ralph and everyone else dies along with him (= a far bigger evil). Note the symbolism in the fire at the end: Jack spreads the fire to kill Ralph; or, the fire consumes the island in the wake of the hero's retreat.
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Post by Becca Mills on Apr 14, 2014 22:28:43 GMT -5
Sorry not to be clear about authorial intention. I meant to say I am making an intentionalist argument, very ... intentionally. But I do define authorial intention as a series of conscious choices on the writer's part. I think cultural influence, which would be expressed in a work without a conscious plan, is very different from intentional design and often works against it in interesting ways. Psychological forces, too. If you collapse all non-conscious influences into authorial intention, it's no longer a useful concept. Certainly people in my field continue to work with intention, as I define it. They just never talk about it. Yeah, Ralph could've killed Jack and Roger and solved the problem early on. But there's simply no suggestion of that in the book. This is sort of like saying Jane Eyre could've just lived in sin with Rochester instead of running away, thereby avoiding the whole fire and maiming and death business. But she never considers it. That choice is not part of the fabric of possibilities woven into the novel (unlike, say, the choice of whether to marry her cousin). Similarly, Golding never offers even a hint of the idea that Ralph could or should murder the two evil alternative leaders. We never see him sensing but not grasping the possibility, the way he senses but can't chase down the truth Simon sees. Saying that this flubbed decision is what the whole novel is really about when there's no sign of it at all in the text doesn't make sense to me. I agree that the fire at the end is meaningful. It's both the fire Jack has wanted (destruction of Ralph) and the fire Ralph has wanted (it's what finally catches the attention of a passing ship). It also connect to the earlier fire, which killed at least one of the littler boys. You could do an ecocritical reading of the book, since the human beings come to this beautiful place and destroy it utterly. There are really a lot of ways into this novel. |
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Post by whdean on Apr 15, 2014 11:42:19 GMT -5
I think part of Ralph’s choice is subtextual: (1) it’s the perennial choice of heroes, (2) Ralph’s age makes knowledge of this choice unavailable to him, and (3) he loses his grip on leadership. To 1 and 2, he can’t become Hamlet or Odysseus yet because he’s too young to go either way. He’s still Telemachus, unsure about what to do about the suitors, but knowing that he must do something.
I think 3 is an important point that you’re overlooking. Everyone looks to Ralph for leadership in the beginning. Even Jack begrudgingly accepts his natural authority. But he’s shown losing more and more power to Jack as time goes on and not knowing how to respond. So why did Golding set it up this way? Why make the natural leader losing out to the demagogue the dominant movement of the plot? He could’ve shown everyone descend into irrationalism or tribalism—the war of all against all. I say it’s because he has a tragic view of the human condition, not a misanthropist one.
Put another way, Ralph is portrayed as a natural leader, as knowing what to do in a technical sense to be rescued (i.e., the signal fire), and as knowing how to keep his own head and maintain calm and order—again, in a technical sense (e.g., the conch, secure food and shelter, keep clean). In short, he’s a good Boy Scout. This fact goes against your earlier suggestion that Ralph and Piggy were ineffectual leaders. They did in fact do all the right things under the circumstances.
But Ralph did not know what to do about the resurgent Dionysian in not knowing what to do about Jack and the forces Jack was manipulating to gain power. I say that that’s because Golding wants to show that being civilized isn’t enough to maintain civilization. Being a Boy Scout isn’t enough. One requires knowledge of statecraft to stop the decent into chaos. This is grown-up knowledge that grown-ups protect boys from until they’re old enough—and, what’s more likely Golding’s point, some grown-ups pretend it’s an unnecessary relic of more primitive times.
(Actually, the absence of girls may be significant in the way events unfold. If Ralph had had a girlfriend of the sort the conventional alpha male has in such stories, she’d have taken the measure of Jack right away—via women’s intuition!—and persuaded Ralph that Jack had to be dealt with.)
Other indirect evidence for this interpretation abounds in Ralph’s frequent moments of uncertainty, where Golding has him recognize that he should be doing something about Jack without knowing what it is. I can’t think of a specific passage, but I remember Ralph’s bouts of uncertainty, and I recall them striking me as occurring at pivotal points. I may have to look at the text again.
(As for Roger, I think Jack’s ascendency is the vehicle for his sadism, so he’d have been forced back into his shell without Jack. The release of his evil is just further evidence of the wickedness that Jack’s irrationalism unleashes. Jack is the linchpin for dissolution, just as Ralph is the linchpin for order.)
Another point to consider is the asymmetry between the outside world and the island for the misanthropist reading. If Golding meant to show that the island was a microcosm of WWIII, why not have two morally equivalent tribes fight it out and destroy each other and the island? Yet the island society doesn’t break down into warring tribes (with or without the veneer of civilization); instead, it just dissolves into primitive irrationalism.
And why make Ralph, Piggy, and Simon the way they were and make them good to boot? A misanthropist doesn’t make redeemable characters: he makes everyone fit on the continuum from venal to wicked. Nor, I think, would a misanthropist have saved Ralph. The sailor could’ve just as easily come upon Ralph as he was being bludgeoned to death. The last light was not extinguished. The hero lived to fight another day and, more importantly, the hero now knew (or should’ve known) what he should’ve done all along to prevent the outcome: kill Jack.
By the way, the most disturbing scene for me was Simon’s death. I found it almost unbearable.
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Post by Becca Mills on Apr 15, 2014 18:19:24 GMT -5
I don't see Golding as a simplistic misanthropist (all human beings are bad). He sees that people vary a great deal, and that some of them are exceptionally good (Simon), lovable (Piggy), well intentioned and responsible (Ralph), or simply innocent (the littluns). His misanthropy attaches to the species overall, not individuals -- we have good in us, but the good is constantly inadequate in the face of the bad. In a way, this makes it worse. there's promise there, but it's never realized. there's good there, but it's always destroyed. One could call his attitude toward the species "tragic" instead of "misanthropic," but I think that word doesn't quite get across the thread of revulsion present in G's treatment of the adult world.
The boys do very much descend into two warring camps. When the division comes, Ralph's camp ends up much smaller: him, Piggy, Simon, Samneric, and some of the littluns. Most of the bigger boys gravitate to Jack because he can provide meat. Samneric are eventually forced into Jack's camp -- Jack lets Roger torture them. Piggy and Simon die. The littluns wander off. Eventually Ralph is isolated. This is war, with one side winning. I don't think the conflict represents primitive irrationalism, exactly. Ralph's side is the one that holds onto the things of civilization. They continue to *want* to be rescued. Jack's side eventually comes to embrace life on the island. Jack pretty clearly no longer wishes to be rescued. He's a position of power there. Why want to go back to being a powerless child? So the two groups are to me pretty clearly distinct groups with irreconcilable ideologies that force them into conflict. Jack cannot get what he want if Ralph gets what he wants, and vice versa. Thus, war.
That said, I don't see Roger as under Jack's control. There's a scene earlier in the novel where he throws rocks at a smaller boy. the narrator talks about there being an invisible line around the boy, and Roger doesn't throw the rocks so that they'd pass within that line. the narrator attributes this reticence on Roger's part to the linger effects of society's rules, but implies those rules are fading. Am I wrong in remembering that Roger takes it upon himself to kill Piggy with the rock, surprising Jack? I think that's right, but I could be forgetting.
Simon's death, yes. He alone is brave enough to approach "the beast" and find out what it really is. he alone is compassionate enough to lay the man to rest. all along, he's the only truly compassionate person on the island -- and this continues as he rushes down to relieve the other boys' fears by telling them there is no beast after all! But then he dies as the beast, and he's called such all through his death scene, except once.
It could all be too on the nose, too over the top, which would ruin the emotional connection by making you feel like you're getting hit over the head with The Message, but G. pulls it off. The beautiful apotheosis that follows, too. It's one of the best passages in the book.
You know, G uses a strong, omnipotent narrative voice, and it does pull back to comment on the action from a strange half-child/half-adult perspective at a number of points. If he had wanted us to get the idea that Ralph is supposed to kill Jack but doesn't understand it, I think he'd suggest that idea to us through the narrator. Or he'd have Ralph think about the act of killing Jack without really understanding that's what he's thinking about -- have him looking at Jack's temple and thinking about how there's a soft spot there, a vulnerable spot. there are tons of moments like that in the book. G is very good at getting across ideas his characters are not mature enough to consider in a fully aware way.
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Post by whdean on Apr 15, 2014 21:19:04 GMT -5
I’m not seeing warring camps, I’m seeing regression from civilization into barbarism. All the motion in the plot speaks to it: The ever-shrinking number of people in Ralph’s camp. The fire first burning strong, then sputtering, then being neglected altogether. The death of the key figures of civilization. From hunting to get meat to mythologizing the hunt and the painted faces, to finally the wild blood frenzies and howling dances (from those who used to be choirboys no less!). Everything declines, everything becomes more primitive. There’s never even a real faceoff between the parties.
I meant that Roger’s pathos can only really manifest itself under Jack. His wickedness would be suppressed under Ralph as it was originally in adult society.
If you want real misanthropy, read H. G. Wells. The Island of Dr. Moreau is pure, unadulterated misanthropy. I can’t even put Golding in the same league.
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Post by Becca Mills on Apr 18, 2014 0:32:24 GMT -5
I’m not seeing warring camps, I’m seeing regression from civilization into barbarism. All the motion in the plot speaks to it: The ever-shrinking number of people in Ralph’s camp. The fire first burning strong, then sputtering, then being neglected altogether. The death of the key figures of civilization. From hunting to get meat to mythologizing the hunt and the painted faces, to finally the wild blood frenzies and howling dances (from those who used to be choirboys no less!). Everything declines, everything becomes more primitive. There’s never even a real faceoff between the parties. I meant that Roger’s pathos can only really manifest itself under Jack. His wickedness would be suppressed under Ralph as it was originally in adult society. If you want real misanthropy, read H. G. Wells. The Island of Dr. Moreau is pure, unadulterated misanthropy. I can’t even put Golding in the same league. I haven't read Moreau, but The Time Machine is a favorite of mine. It's decidedly misanthropic. Interestingly, the rather dreadful movie made of it in 1960 erases the misanthropy entirely, even while introducing some good old Cold War anxiety. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 18, 2014 8:52:42 GMT -5
I love unnerving books so Lord of the Flies was awesome to me! I went to a pretty crappy backwoods school that had very little required reading as far as classics went. I tried to read some of what was required in other schools just to find out what it was all about but seriously - the teacher had to read 1984 out loud in class just to make sure the other students would get the information. I was one of maybe two or three not on sports teams and the others refused to take the time to read a book. They'd take a failing grade first.
My greatest worry is that to maintain the interest of younger folks, writers will have to start using text talk. I cringe every time I see that and have trouble holding my tongue when I see it outside actual cell messages. I know it's only a matter of time before someone does it... (and if I'm just out of touch and someone already has... please let me live in my delusional world where it's still just an unpleasant thought)
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Post by Deleted on Apr 18, 2014 9:19:38 GMT -5
Classic literature. Ah, yes. For those of you with incomplete educations, or who simply want to be entertained in 3-minute chunks, you can't go wrong with Thug Notes. Sparky Sweets, PhD, is a genius. A genius, I tell you! Be sure at least to watch the episode on "Lord of the Flies." Seriously, this stuff is hilarious. And mysteriously educational. Thug Notes |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 18, 2014 9:28:33 GMT -5
I've been reading for pleasure since we first started getting those Scholastic Book Club catalogs in elementary school. Oh, man, it was like Christmas when the Scholastic Books arrived! I will say though, that I had an awesome teacher for one of my English classes in High School. I specifically remember reading "The Sacketts" by Louis L'Amour and "The Dragon and the George" by Gordon R. Dickson. I met Gordon R. Dickson once in the late 70s. He was giving a lecture at the University of Minnesota. Neat guy. I loved "Dragon and the George." I think I still have my copy around here somewhere. |
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Post by Deleted on Apr 18, 2014 9:32:58 GMT -5
The only required reading I HATED was Chaucer and True Grit. Other than that, I enjoyed the books I got assigned. Old Man and the Sea. Anna Karennina. Even Hamlet was cool, just for the prose. Chaucer stank. But I loved True Grit. Old Man and the Sea, Anna Karenina, yes and Hamlet too... loved them. I'm totally addicted to reading. I have to have my fix for at least an hour every day. Couldn't live without it. I just recently read "True Grit" for the first time. What an interesting prose style. Jarring at first, but I loved it. "The Old Man and the Sea" is my favorite Hemingway. I have a 1st edition sitting on my bookshelf. I read it on a beach on Key West. Seemed fitting. |
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Post by whdean on Apr 20, 2014 21:21:34 GMT -5
I’m not seeing warring camps, I’m seeing regression from civilization into barbarism. All the motion in the plot speaks to it: The ever-shrinking number of people in Ralph’s camp. The fire first burning strong, then sputtering, then being neglected altogether. The death of the key figures of civilization. From hunting to get meat to mythologizing the hunt and the painted faces, to finally the wild blood frenzies and howling dances (from those who used to be choirboys no less!). Everything declines, everything becomes more primitive. There’s never even a real faceoff between the parties. I meant that Roger’s pathos can only really manifest itself under Jack. His wickedness would be suppressed under Ralph as it was originally in adult society. If you want real misanthropy, read H. G. Wells. The Island of Dr. Moreau is pure, unadulterated misanthropy. I can’t even put Golding in the same league. I haven't read Moreau, but The Time Machine is a favorite of mine. It's decidedly misanthropic. Interestingly, the rather dreadful movie made of it in 1960 erases the misanthropy entirely, even while introducing some good old Cold War anxiety. The Time Machine was about as misanthropic as Moreau. The film with Brando was better than it was treated by critics, I thought. |
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Post by Becca Mills on Apr 20, 2014 22:05:54 GMT -5
I haven't read Moreau, but The Time Machine is a favorite of mine. It's decidedly misanthropic. Interestingly, the rather dreadful movie made of it in 1960 erases the misanthropy entirely, even while introducing some good old Cold War anxiety. The Time Machine was about as misanthropic as Moreau. The film with Brando was better than it was treated by critics, I thought. I'll have to get around to Moreau one of these days. |
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