Lord Of The Flies And The Human Mind Analysis

The dictionary describes the human mind as the totality of conscious and unconscious mental processes and activities. It directs and influences the entirety of human behavior, driving all of our thoughts and actions. In his novel Lord of the Flies, William Golding represents the human mind through an allegory that pertains to all who read the classic piece. The work’s timelessness significantly contributes to the book’s great success over such a large span of years. In Lord of the Flies, a plane crash leaves a group of boys stranded on a remote, mysterious island, where they build their own society devoid of adult supervision. In doing so, they establish a power system by using a conch shell to regulate who speaks during assemblies. The conch symbolizes power because it allows the holder to influence the rest of the group with his ideas. Golding’s representation of different characters’ perceptions of the conch embodies the different ways in which the human mind views power. Through Ralph, Piggy and Jack’s …show more content…
The distinct manners in which the mind thinks about power are depicted in the ways that different characters interact with the conch in Lord of the Flies. As Ralph, Piggy, and Jack handle the conch in various fashions, Golding reveals his stance on the workings of the human brain. Jack’s role in the breaking of the conch uncovers Golding 's idea that the savagery of human nature is the reason behind the destruction of order on the island, suggesting that there are major similarities between the minds of early and modern man. Golding warns the reader as he illustrates the result of allowing the mindset of man’s earliest ancestors to control their own thoughts and actions. He proposes that man needs to balance the different ways of thinking about power, because if man is not careful enough to preserve society’s conch in this manner, it too will