An Archetypal Interpretation Of The Tragedy In Lord Of The Flies

The primary concern of this thesis is to interpret the tragedy of Lord of the Flieswritten by Nobel literature laureate William Golding from Northrop Frye’s theory ofarchetypes. In Lord of the Flies, irrationality prevails over rationality, demonic imagesprevails over apocalyptic image, and barbarian rituals take place of civilized meetings,which leads to the tragedy.The thesis explores the tragedy from archetypal characters, archetypal images andarchetypal rituals. Lord of the Flies seeks to discuss the conflict between rationality andirrationality, which is similar to numerous Greek mythologies. Jack and Roger arerepresentatives of irrationality, while Ralph, Piggy and Simon are representatives ofrationality. From the perspective of archetypal criticism, Jack can be perceived as thearchetypal character of Dionysus, Roger the archetypal character of Agave, Ralph andPiggy double displacement of Pentheus and Simon archetypal character of Jesus. Jackwho is the source of fever and disasters is obsessed with brutality and murder. AndRoger is the henchman of Jack. Jack and his gang kill Piggy and Simon and hunt Ralphin the end. Ralph, Piggy and Simon try to maintain rule and order on the island, but theyare persecuted by Jack’s gang. The demonic images prevail over apocalyptic imageswhich also causes the tragedy. The fire of death prevails over the fire of civilization andlife. The water of death prevails over the water of life. Darkness prevails over brightness in the novel. The image of evil Serpent dominates the island. The barbarian ritualsincluding revelry rituals and sacrificial rituals take place of civilized meetings in thenovel. In Lord of the Flies, the hunters had a desire to re-experience the pleasure ofhunting and dancing is chosen to deliver their biological instinct. Their dancing isindeed a revelry ritual to imitate hunting. When the mimetic pig-hunting ritual changesinto a real man-hunting ritual, the ritual is a sacrificial ritual. The violent rituals,containing revelry ritual and sacrificial ritual demonstrated the bestiality and barbarityof the boys.The irrationality, demonic image and barbarian ritual are caused by the evil ofhuman nature. And it is the evil of human nature that causes the tragedy in the novel.Golding writes the novel with an aim to trace the defects of society back to thedefects of human nature. It is an unchangeable fact that human nature is evil. Goldingreveals the evil nature of human beings so as to strive for self improvement. It is onlywhen human beings have full recognition of the innate evil that they have a promisingfuture.