Piggy External Conflict

In The Lord of the Flies, written by William Golding, the genre of the novel is fiction. In the novel, conflict is present all around, from the physical altercations of Jack and Ralph to the inner conflicts of Piggy and his insecurities. External conflict is the conflict between a person and an outside force or another person. Internal conflict is the conflict between a person and himself or what is going on inside his mind. In the novel Lord of the Flies, Piggy experiences external conflict and Simon internal conflict. Piggy did not want anyone in the group to know his old nickname because he didn't want the boys to think less of him. Piggy doesn't care what they call him, as long as they “don’t call [him] what they used to call [him] in …show more content…
Simon is at a meeting when “[he] opened his mouth to speak but Ralph had the conch, so he backed to his seat.” (115). Simon tries to express his idea but the shyness overwhelms him and he sits back down. The quiet Simon not speaking shows the internal conflict that he is facing. Simon’s thought that it was very important to tell the others that the real monster was the boys, but “to speak in the assembly was a terrible thing to him.” (119). The internal conflict of Simon is not giving him the confidence to speak. Simon struggles with internal conflict throughout the novel and that conflict affect the way he communicates with others. In the novel Lord of the Flies, Piggy experiences external conflict and Simon internal conflict. Piggy has a hard time fitting in with the other boys. According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Piggy does not fulfill the love and belonging need. The boys think that the problem is each other, but Simon knows otherwise.The shyness and lack of confidence of Simon restrict him from expressing his ideas. Simon does not fit well into the esteem need of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. If Piggy and Simon had gotten over their personal conflicts, there would have been a very different outcome in the