Lord of the Flies
William Golding · 1954
Golding's 1954 parable of civilization's fragility has influenced every "what happens when order breaks down" story since. Its argument with Rousseau is perpetual: children are not innately innocent; savagery is the default. Golding won the Nobel in 1983, partly on the strength of this single book.
The case against
Golding's boys are chess pieces: Piggy is Reason, Jack is Savagery, Simon is the Mystic, and each does exactly what the allegory requires. As anthropology the thesis is shaky; the famous real case of marooned schoolboys ended in cooperation, not spears. And the naval officer arriving on the final page is the baldest deus ex machina in the postwar canon.
Literary Fiction · the Pro canon
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
if this one calls to you, so will these →
