Lord Of The Flies Conch Symbolism

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Lord of the Flies follows a group of boys on a deserted island and shows their journey of survival. This novel includes three major symbols that have a great importance: the conch, Piggy’s glasses, and the fire. These all affect the outcome of the novel and the boys’ lives as they inhabit the island. At the beginning, the conch symbolizes power and authority. The boys use it to call together meetings and discuss problems they have on the island. Later on the conch is broken with Piggy when he dies and without it the order the boys once had is now lost. Rosenfield writes, “Not only has his head been smashed, but also the conch, symbol of order, is simultaneously broken” (“Men”). The conch is important because it essentially instills structure…show more content…
This is important because when Piggy loses them, he begins to make poor decisions and the island goes to chaos. The boys use his glasses to start the fires on the island which cook the meat and signal any passing ships with the smoke. Someone anonymously writes, “Piggy with his glasses is the prototype of the intellectual, the rationalist. His glasses, on the one hand, represent reason, which helps light the fire of civilization and is shattered at the hands of dictatorial Jack. On the other, they suggest imperfect vision: Piggy’s common sense leads nowhere, his reason brings no solution” (“Lord”). When one of the lenses breaks it gives him a clear view of only half of the island. Even half-blinded, he still is insightful and uses this to help the island, but the boys never take Piggy seriously and they begin a downward spiral into animalistic behaviors. Overall, Piggy’s glasses have an important role in Lord of the Flies because they represent the intelligence on the island and without them the boys become…show more content…
The fire originally represents hope and the thought of being rescued, but it later signifies destruction and death. Jack’s tribe even uses fire to smoke out Ralph. “Lord of the Flies (1954) by William Golding” reads, “Fire is another symbol which stands for safety, warmth, civilization, food and the possibility of rescue, but, if not controlled, it becomes a destroyer and devastates nature in the same way as untamed human passions can undermine and subvert human rationality”. The idea of fire upsets the boys mentally, Ralph wants nothing more than to have a fire going constantly to alert passing ships, but Jack wants it to cook his prize meat and later uses it to torment others. Ralph gets distraught when the fire goes out, but Jack believes the fire should have other uses, so he steals it. The importance of the fire is to make the boys hopeful, so they work proactively to get off the island rather than using it to instill death. The fire tracks their character development and adds layers to the story that allows readers to understand the toll that the island has on every
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