Thematic Importance of the Nature of Hunting There is a beast in everyone; it just takes a certain situation to bring the savage out. In the novel Lord of the Flies William Golding uses the nature of hunting
Of hunting to show the progression of savagery of the boys on the island to how the boys attitude and the way they act changes for the worse as the novel progresses. The idea of hunting on the island continually gets more aggressive and more savage and Golding uses this progression to show that there is a beast in all of us. The hunting in the novel starts as a want of Jack and turns into an obsession as he turns out the beast in all the boys. In the beginning of Lord of the Flies, Golding shows that the boys are still attached are happy to be out of the sight of parents and of society, but soon the boys realize that there are many things that they need the parents for. Jack and the rest of the choirboys are named hunter by the chief (ralph) who gets his power from the conch. Golding gives the knife to Jack to show that he will be the aggressor as the story progresses. On the first hunting experience when Ralph, Simon and Jack go out to search the premises and sees a pig trapped in vines; Jack is unable to get himself to actually stab the pig and is worries about being ridiculed by the rest of his peers for not being able to do his duty and regrets not stabbing the pig in time. Jack stabs the tree and says next time I will do it, this is foreshadowing in the next situation that Jack has the opportunity to kill he will without question. The second situation in the novel where there is hunting is when referred to is when Jack and his hunters or as Ralph to refers to them, “boys with sticks”, go out to find meat for the boys to eat. Jack is actually able to kill the pig this time but his biggest accomplishment is also his biggest failure in the way that in killing the pig he forgets to keep the fire going and Jack misses the chance of the boys being rescued. Golding uses the fire going out and Jack getting the kill to show the obsession that Jack is so obsessed with the idea of hunting and killing that he is willing to do/risk anything, such as the rescue of all the boys to get the kill. Next is the biggest transition that William Golding uses in the novel, the killing of the sow. In this scene we see that Simon has gone into his special spot to be with him and nature. Simon watches Jack and the boys kill a mother pig. The description of this kill is unlike the others; Golding uses diction that one would use to describe a scene of rape. Golding says that the “sow’s squeal turned into a high pitched “scream”, this is important because the usage of the word “scream” is a word that is used to describe a human. The reason why this is important because it shows that the boys have gone into craze with the killing the pig and the way the the boys feel after they kill the pig by shoving the spear “inch by inch” into the anus of the sow, the boys are described as “heavy and fulfilled” which shows that the boys have an enjoyment and excitement of the