What Is Piggy Symbolize In Lord Of The Flies

Words: 724
Pages: 3
Open Document
The fact that Piggy is in trouble in William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies is clear as soon as the plane crashes. The first voice heard in the book is Piggy’s saying, “Wait a minute, wait a minute.”(p.1) He is fat, uncoordinated, and already cannot keep up with Ralph as they climb over the rocks at the lagoon. Piggy’s character is highly symbolic, which his nickname implies. As the novel unfolds, he becomes the weak character, which leads to the other boys killing him. He has that animal name. But the symbolism is more complicated than that: In many ways Piggy symbolizes civilization, and his death is its death. As the story unfolds and the boys become less and less civilized, and Piggy becomes more and more their opposite; the growing difference is part of the point of the story. When he is intelligent, they are not. And where they are strong, he is not. Finally, where they are the hunters, he is the prey. At his death the conch shatters, and chaos rules. Civilization has been killed. In the first way they stand as opposites, He is intelligent and the other boys are stubborn. An example of this is when Piggy tells Ralph how to blow the conch …show more content…
As time goes on, they shed their clothes; Piggy becomes so different that they end up killing him. The difference is illustrated by their descriptions in the scene before Piggy dies. Roger is a hunter in war paint up on a cliff and “below him, Ralph was a shock of hair and Piggy a bag of fat.” (p. 180) Ralph and Piggy have less than human form to the hunters. Piggy is trying to tell them to have rules and agree to do things the “right” way, but they ignore him and throw rocks. This fight is between good and evil, and the author has used the boys’ development and the polarization with the weak kids, like Piggy, over the course of the novel to show how bad human nature can
Show More

Related Documents: What Is Piggy Symbolize In Lord Of The Flies

Lord of the Flies Literary Analysis Essay example

books. The use of symbolism in William Golding’s novel The Lord of the Flies is the most essential aspect to the function of the story. At first glance you may not think the symbols are very important, but with some in-depth thought you can see how it is necessary to explain the microcosm of an island. The conch shell is the opening symbol in the novel and lasts roughly to the very end of the story. The conch is found by Ralph and Piggy, which they use to summon the boys together after the crash…

Words 1277 - Pages 6

Human Nature And Violence In Lord Of The Flies

Lora White Dr. Richard Baker English 355 7/8/14 Human Nature and Violence When William Golding wrote Lord of the Flies he explained the theme of his novel as “an attempt to trace the defects of society back to the defects of human nature. The moral is that the shape of society must depend on the ethical nature of the individual and not on any political system however apparently logical or respectable” (Epstein 204). Golding understood that human nature has many flaws but did he believe that we are…

Words 2301 - Pages 10

Most Dangerous Game Comparison

trapped on an island with a murder could be dangerous. Both Ralph and Rainsford were trapped on an island with Jack and General Zaroff, the murders. Jack and General Zaroff both symbolize violence in Lord of the Flies and in “The Most Dangerous Game”, by Zaroff killing humans, Zaroff is a hunter, and Jack gets Piggy ,and Simon killed. In “The Most Dangerous Game”, General Zaroff is a hunter, and to be a hunter you have to be a little violent or you wouldn’t be able to kill a living thing. “Mounted…

Words 403 - Pages 2

Loss Of Innocence In Lord Of The Flies Quote Analysis

story. Lord of the flies by William Golding is a Novel that was published after WWII, in 1954. The book is about a group of boys who were from a all boys boarding school. They all were on a plane, and the plane was shot down. They all ended up on an island, and they all had to learn how to adapt on the island and learn how to survive. All the boys in the book symbolizes the theme loss of innocence in the book Lord of the Flies. Ralph is a big example of the theme loss of innocence in the Lord of the…

Words 699 - Pages 3

Lord Of The Flies Comparative Essay

films and read a novel called Lord of the Flies. The novel was originally written by William Golding in the year 1954. The main characters that hold an importance in all three versions of Lord of the Flies are Ralph, Piggy, Jack, and Simon. Out of all of these characters Ralph is the main protagonist with Piggy supporting him all the way until his death by the hands of Jack and his gang. Jack is the antagonist in all three versions of Lord of the Flies who symbolizes turmoil. Jack has the ability…

Words 1006 - Pages 5

Piggy In William Golding's Lord Of The Flies

In the book Lord of Flies, Piggy doesn't seem like a very important character to the book. He was a unique character because he looks and acts different from the others. When analyzing some of the quotes in this book I realized Piggy is a very important character to lord of the flies. When piggy is described in the book there were some things that specifically stood out to me. Piggy wasn’t the most athletic, in shape, fit kid, but he was extremely smart "The fat boy waited to be asked his name…"(…

Words 654 - Pages 3

Personality In William Golding's Lord Of The Flies

to it. Freud’s theory separates the personality into three different parts that each develop at different times throughout a human’s life. Using Freud’s theory of personality, William Golding created three main characters for his novel Lord of the Flies: Jack, Piggy, and Ralph. The Id, source of all of the instincts, impulses, and desires, can be found in humans from birth. Jack, the novel’s symbol of evil and brutality, clearly represents the id theory, doing whatever he wants whenever he feels.…

Words 1020 - Pages 5

Piggy's Glasses In Lord Of The Flies Analysis

In William Golding's Lord of the Flies, The Conch, Piggy's Glasses, and The Island are symbols that show Civilization & Order, Technology, and Heaven. The Conch shell in Lord of the Flies has a very strong meaning throughout the book. The shell holds the political legitimacy and democratic power that governs the boys on the island, which is shown by the assemblies that they have. As the boys group starts to get smaller and more issues within the group of boys grow, the conch shell loses its color…

Words 253 - Pages 2

Piggy's Glasses: Symbolism in Golding's Lord of Flies Essay

people by what they have. Sometimes it’s true but other times there’s more to it. In the novel Lord of the Flies, William Golding uses a symbol to impact the overall meaning of his work. He uses the universal theme of civilization vs. savagery, and how the intelligence of the boys is trumped by the power and the need for civilization. Golding uses Piggy’s glasses throughout the story to represent intelligence, touch the boys back to civilization, and power, by connecting them to Piggy and the signal…

Words 605 - Pages 3

Lord of the Flies Essay

civilization, but privately they choose Jack,the beast and savagery. Then when Simon slips away from the camp, he returns to jungle glade, where he finds the sow’s head impales on the stake in the middle of the clearing. The sow's head is the Lord of the Flies, which symbolizes that the evil exists within all human being. The weather is not mentions in the chapter 8,but there are from “dawn-pale beach” and “a white blob against the place where the sun would rise,” [179] we can image that it is a sunny day…

Words 672 - Pages 3