On The Development Of English Desert Island Literature In Lord Of The Flies

The works of William Golding, the Nobel Prize winner for literaturein 1983, are noted for their incisive style, poetic narration and keenpercipience into humanity. Lord of the Flies is Golding's first novelwhich has become one of the most widely-read, widely-admired Englishnovels, and one of the prescribed classics in the universities. It is anexploration of evil human nature and examination of the end of innocence.Its publication puts forward a new and serious proposition for the worldof literature and criticism. It is open to interpretations of various schools,whose theoretical support is drawn from different sources, includingFreudian psychoanalysis, Jung's theories of collective unconsciousnessand archetype, and many other social political theories. Thus, they differin conclusion.This paper tries to interpret Lord of the Flies in the light of desertisland literature, aiming to make a study of the development it has madeto the tradition of desert island literature. Lord of the Flies is obviouslyinspired by a long literary tradition of desert island literature. Startingwith an accidental stay on an uninhabited island, ending with amiraculous rescue, the novel shares elements with novels such as DanielDefoe's Robinson Crusoe and R. M. Ballantyne's The Coral Island. Whatdistinguishes William Golding, however, is that, by employing a simple form, he makes a reversal of the paradisiacal desert island myth, whichhas been the common picture in desert island stories before the twentiethcentury.In traditional desert island fictions, such as Robinson Crusoe andThe Coral Island, the central idea is "good defeats evil" and their writerscherish an optimistic viewpoint of human nature. William Golding is thefirst to introduce the theme of "darkness of man's heart" to desert islandliterature. Through the novel, he attempts to reveal that evil is innate inhuman nature. In this way, his novel reaches a philosophical depth that isabsent in other traditional desert island fictions. In plot, Lord of the Fliessuperficially shares the same "trilogy" with traditional island fictions:first, "being stranded"; second, "making adventures"; last, "beingrescued". But seen from its under-the-surface structure, the novel is areversal of the paradisiacal desert island myth in which the desert islandwill finally be turned into a paradise. In artistic methods, Lord of the Fliesis a perfect combination of an allegory with a desert island fiction.Golding employs some modern techniques, such as symbols andmetaphors, which are the elements of an allegory and seldom used intraditional desert island fictions. These two writing patterns completeeach other in Lord of the Flies and make it a unique novel. Lord of theFlies marks that desert island literature of the 20th century goes towards anew direction—an allegorical way of writing. Owing to the variations of its theme, plot and artistic methods, Lord of the Flies is regarded as alandmark in desert island literature and also a very significant work inEnglish literature.