Blind "Ego" In Dilemma

Lord of the Flies(1954) is William Golding's first novel and also a masterpiece in English literature. On the basis of this book, Golding attained the greatest success and won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983.Lord of the Flies tells us a fictional story about a group of English boys marooned on a deserted tropical island after their plane was shot down during a raging war. In the beginning, they enjoyed their free and harmonious life without adults. But good times didn't last long, with the growth of conflicts and wild nature, they killed each other irrationally, and finally turned into a group of savages.This thesis takes Freudian personality theory as the theoretical instruction, the characters in Lord of the Flies as the study object, and tries hard to analyze the frangibility of "ego" in human nature and its lost process. In exploring the loss of the self and the breakdown into savages of the characters free from the imposed constraints of civilization and society eventually, the thesis demonstrates a fundamental human struggle:the conflict between the impulse to obey moral rules and behave lawfully and the impulse to ignore moral rules, seek power over others, advocate violence and behave selfishly to satisfy one's own desires. That struggle also reflects the conflict among "id", "ego" and "superego" which are the components of Freud's personality theory. When there is no constraint of "superego", "ego" always has to be driven by "id" and lost in dilemma.The whole thesis strives hard to analyze "ego" in dilemma. Freud believes that "id", "ego" and "superego" respectively represent the different states of mind and follow the different moral principles, and they need to be well-balanced in a harmonious environment in order to interact on each other effectively. However, the stimulation in the external world always causes the contradictions among these three components. Once "id" becomes uncontrollable and gets rid of the restraint of "superego", then "ego" has to be driven by "id" unfortunately.In Lord of the Flies, "id", "ego" and "superego" can be reflected by the main characters and their instincts. In addition, there are so many symbols such as the beast, the lord of the flies, the conch shell, and the signal fire, etc.,which embody these three elements as well. Driven by their own "id" and the chaos of the nature, the boys on the island free themselves from the moral rules and progress from the well-behaved, orderly children who long for being rescued to the cruel savages who don't hope to return to the civilization, "ego" in the instinct is lost eventually. Unexpectedly, killing becomes the only "game" on the island and innocence is no longer in existence. Rescue at last can not change the tragic ending for adults bring the children into another "battlefield" and lead them to be lost in the end. The savage instinct in human beings and the tragedy of self truly make us to be sunk in the deep thought. We have to ponder that beneath our civilized society and our civilized race, there are human inner darkness and the savage "id". When we can not restrain this instinct, what the human nature will be and how the humanity will be rescued.