Q1 Benchmark Rburenstein
Throughout Lord of the Flies the kids become more savage. The boys start out as somewhat civilized, but as they realize that they might not get saved, they get more savage. In several instances in our world, there have been people or groups who are against technology. The example about groups not having or wanting technology relates to the boys because they go back to their animal instincts.. The real life example hurt people for a not very good reason, and they either didn’t have or want technology. The diminishing amount of technology affects people in ways so that they revert back to their instinct of savagery.
During the book
Piggy’s glasses go from good condition to being broken. While the glasses are
diminishing, the savage instinct of the boys becomes more prevalent. A quote
from the book from where the glasses are half broken is “You didn't ought to have let that fire out... one side's broken."
page 71. During this section the kids are in the middle of being animals
humans. This quote shows that they are starting to abandon one form of
technology that they have, fire. They left the technology to go hunting; and
because of this the ship that passes by didn’t see them. If they had kept their
technology, then they would not be fighting about not getting rescued from the
ship. The fire would have also kept them from killing the pig, so that they
would be less savage. Only savages would leave something as important as the
fire, to go kill a pig for food that they wouldn’t need if they were rescued.
Many of the older boys were hunters, or wanted to be with jack to kill a
pig. Luddites were people in the early 1800’s who were against some new
technology. The new technology would do their job faster, but they claimed that
it wasn’t as authentic, or good. The luddites destroyed many of the machines,
and killed some people in the riots. The luddites are similar to the boys in Lord of the Flies, because they ignore
or demolish technology, and in the process they hurt things. This new
technology made them destroy technology, which showed how they went back to
their animal instincts, and didn’t think about anything else. The luddites were
against new technology, while the hunters were against watching the fire. Both
of them had their priorities wrong, the luddites could have found new jobs, or
solved the problem without violence. The boys had their priorities wrong
because they chose hunting, and fun over being saved.
There is a lot of symbolism in Lord
of the Flies. One big part is Piggy’s glasses. They symbolize technology,
which also shows civilization and how put together they boys are. In the
beginning of the book, when the boys are civilized the glasses are fine. When
the glasses are half broken the boys are splitting apart, and most of them are
going back to their animal like instincts. Close to the end of the book the
glasses become fully broken because of the Savagery. A quote close to when the
glasses are broken is “”How can we make a fire?” Jack squatted back and frowned
at the pig. “We’ll raid them and take fire.”” Page 136. This shows that Jack
has turned savage; he wants to steal from other kids on the island without
asking first. His animal instincts have taken over, where he thinks that
violence is necessary and doesn’t even consider talking to them. Another type
of technology that they have on the island is fire. At the beginning they use
the fire because they realize that it is an important part of them getting
saved. The first time that they let the fire go out was when they first started
to become savage. They decided to kill a pig instead of get saved by a ship.
The technology was not present, so the boys reverted back to their animal
instincts. After the boys split into two groups the fire is almost not present,
which shows that they are barley separated from animals. At the end of the book
there are two significant fires. The first one is the cooking fire, which would
not serve their purposes, this shows that they are using a different type of
technology and have disregarded the signal fire. The other fire is when they
light the forest on fire to try to kill Ralph, this fire shows how much of
savages they are; that they would destroy the jungle in order to find and hurt
one person that wouldn’t join them.
There is much symbolism around the technology in Lord of the Flies, along with much emphasis on how anyone can become savage.. Technology is one thing that separates us from animals, so when it goes away we go back to our animal instincts. The boys lost almost all of their technology throughout the book, which made their savage instincts easier to see. This happens in our world, where people loose their technology, or the technology changes and they revert back to being animal like.