The Importance of Common Ground
In everyday life it's important to find common ground, to relate to one another, in order to get things done. It's an essential part of life. This theme of “Finding Common Ground” is represented in the texts, The Lord of the Flies by William Golding and Once Upon a Time by Nadine Gordimer in a variety of ways.
In The Lord of the Flies Golding introduces to the story privileged boys that have crashed onto an island and must find common ground in to survive. Golding’s message is that everyone has an inner savage, and that civilization is forced onto us. One of the central themes is that these boys have inner savages, and it causes them to do horrible things. For example, we watch one of the boys - Roger - go from a simple boy, to bullying littluns (Golding 62), to dropping a boulder on Piggy’s head (Golding 181). Roger gives into his inner savage and becomes less civilized as he becomes more detached from his island mates.
Golding also shows that there is good in other characters, such as Simon. He encounters a personification of the inner savage (143-144), except he doesn’t give in like Roger. He also finds what the littluns thought was the beast - a dead parachutist (146). When he goes to tell the other boys what he’s found they tear him apart out of fear that he was the …show more content…
Golding views humanity as innately evil and that everyone has an inner savage that causes people - even young children - to do despicable things such as murder. Gordimer doesn’t view humanity as evil, but she shows that humanity lets our fear divide. Golding shows that the children are able to do evil things like murder - usually out of their own free will, or by listening to their inner savage, but Gordimer’s characters don’t hurt their son on purpose, but by giving in to their fear they inadvertently cause their son’s
In everyday life it's important to find common ground, to relate to one another, in order to get things done. It's an essential part of life. This theme of “Finding Common Ground” is represented in the texts, The Lord of the Flies by William Golding and Once Upon a Time by Nadine Gordimer in a variety of ways.
In The Lord of the Flies Golding introduces to the story privileged boys that have crashed onto an island and must find common ground in to survive. Golding’s message is that everyone has an inner savage, and that civilization is forced onto us. One of the central themes is that these boys have inner savages, and it causes them to do horrible things. For example, we watch one of the boys - Roger - go from a simple boy, to bullying littluns (Golding 62), to dropping a boulder on Piggy’s head (Golding 181). Roger gives into his inner savage and becomes less civilized as he becomes more detached from his island mates.
Golding also shows that there is good in other characters, such as Simon. He encounters a personification of the inner savage (143-144), except he doesn’t give in like Roger. He also finds what the littluns thought was the beast - a dead parachutist (146). When he goes to tell the other boys what he’s found they tear him apart out of fear that he was the …show more content…
Golding views humanity as innately evil and that everyone has an inner savage that causes people - even young children - to do despicable things such as murder. Gordimer doesn’t view humanity as evil, but she shows that humanity lets our fear divide. Golding shows that the children are able to do evil things like murder - usually out of their own free will, or by listening to their inner savage, but Gordimer’s characters don’t hurt their son on purpose, but by giving in to their fear they inadvertently cause their son’s