Question 1

1) What is the major theme of this novel? Why is this theme important to a teenager living in 2007?

The major theme of this novel is about a world without adults. The isolated island with no adults but only young boys had to be ruled by the boys themselves. The boys, having not enough experience and not knowing a lot about laws and cooperation, struggled in the world that has no rules to organize them. The place they were living was a mess, and they ended up killing each other to survive. The book contains the story of people dividing into several groups because there is no law to make them unify. People have different values and opinions so they sometimes fight over things they think is true. However they need to try to cooperate to live in same community although they have different perspectives. If they cannot help suppressing it, there is a law that prevent them fighting, or there are some position such as adults, wise people who help the people who have trouble with others. The world without adults in this story is the same case. Ralph wanted to unify the group of boys by holding an assembly with his conch, he knew how to make them cooperate, and had them tell their opinions to maintain their community peaceful and prevented them from being dangerous. However, I think, his effort didn’t work well because they didn’t have basic law in their community and because they didn’t have it, Jack came out to rule the group by himself. I thought the world without rule was very dangerous and without law, we get ourselves into troubles. So if there is a community, there should be the law that maintains the place peaceful and safe. This is what the book tells about to us in 2007. I knew law was important, but I didn’t think that it would be so crucial in communities and it is what people, especially us, need to understand, because it will be us that will create out community to a better place.

Question 2

2) Are there any current situation in the world that relate to the novel? What are they, and how do they relate? Does the novel shed any light on how current situation could be resolved or “fixed”?

The current situation I want to talk about is one of the problem is about teenagers. These days, the teenagers are one problem because of their inadequate behavior, opposite from the teenagers in old days. It is common because the social atmosphere changed a lot and the development of computer and television made the teenagers exposed to violence with violent television programs and movies. They also are exposed to it with violent computer games that they are easily hooked on. Also there are a lot of parents who both go to work during the day, and they do not have many chance to look after their sons and daughters. They do not even know what way their children are going to. They do not expect them to get crooked and spend time with dangerous friends because while they are in work, the teenagers might not be where they should be, and when the parents are present, they pretend they are working hard on their studies or things that appropriate teenagers do. So there are a lot of juvenile delinquencies happening around us, mere of severe.
I think this problem relates to the story I read very much because the increasing of juvenile delinquency is because there are not much guardians that look after their children and teach them in what way they should behave and act. There is not many parents that that realize that the way of their children spending time is wrong, and they don’t correct them. It is a same thing happening to the boys in the book that there was no adult to control them. Teenagers these days, even if there are some laws they are disobeying, need adults as guardians to teach them how to behave.

Question 3

3) Who are the main characters in the novel? Do you like them? Why or why not? What is special about them? What do they reveal about the universal human experience?

Ralph- Ralph is a leader of the abandoned boys in the island. He is courageous. He knows how to make their community ruled well. He organizes well for the ruling of his group. He knows that they need some rules to makes them stay in the community and to stay safely in the island. He though uses Piggy’s wisdom for ruling. He cares about the group, and knows that he is responsible for them. He wants peace in the group without violence. He reveals the ruling in peace and in form of democracy.

Piggy- Piggy is innocent and timid. However he sometimes is very brave. At first, I thought he was nothing but an ordinary boy, but he knows a lot. He is the wisest and one of the most important person in the tribe. He shows respect to Ralph, and he also cares for the tribe like Ralph with some ways, using his knowledge. He reveals the need of knowledge and wisdom for ruling.

Simon- Simon is my favorite character because he seemed kind to me. He helps Ralph and Piggy with ruling their tribe. Simon can predict and assume things that might happen well, and he is also very clever like Piggy, too. Also, he has courage to find out what the so-called beast is at top of the mountain and spy on the others.

Jack- He is the most hated character to me. He is very selfish, full of pride, very violent, cold-hearted, greedy, hatred and very restless. He hates to be ruled, and he neglects people under him. He is a kind of s ruler of military system and an autocrat person.

Question 4

4) What is the climax of this novel? What happens? How do the events of this novel make you feel?

I think the climax of this novel is when Jack and his tribe killed Simon. Simon was at Jack’s tribe after Simon got caught when he was spying on Jack’s tribe. In front of Ralph and Piggy, he was beaten up to death by the tribe. After Simon’s death, Ralph and Piggy, got nervous and began to beware of them more because they knew Jack and his tribe would kill them too, because they were obstacle to the tribe. They get more scared of Jack and ascertain their violence. It was an event that everything could not be back as before since Simon was dead. Not only that, they had commited their first crime. I felt sorry for Simon for being murdered, and for the tribe boys that they had to do it to survive. The event made me think that Jack would kill every one of them and it was scary, even to me although I wasn’t in the story, to think about Ralph and Piggy being in greater danger when they found out how the tribe was more like savages when they killed Simon. It would have been far scarier if it was really happening to me. And it would be terrifying to see a friend being murdered. If I think about this, I wonder why Ralph and Piggy didn’t try to save Simon. I know they would be dead if they helped, but I feel a little sad that Simon couldn’t get a chance not to be murdered.

Question 5

5) What is the mood of this novel? Do you find this novel saddens you in any way? Why?

The mood of this novel is dark, strain and tension for we do not know what would happen next and who will be murdered in any way. And it is more severely felt because there is no adult and there are only a number of boys who you don’t know when they will become more violent. If I think of this story, I see the color dark green, shaded and dull. I thought about color green because it is an island full of trees and leaves, but there is some dangerous elements exposed to young and old boys and I think it might be very nervous if I were in their situation. I both feel sorry for the boys and don’t feel very sad about this story. If I think about that it is natural of any person to be like the boys in the book, at least more violent and dangerous, if there are no adults in the place nor they do know much about importance of rules. Being only with people who are not fully grown, they had to become violent to survive and end up killing others while they became violent. And it is also why they started to feel fear in themselves and began to see objects as beasts in the abandoned place they alone are in without no one to protect them and encourage them. However, if they had known better about having more rules to protect them from changing and murdering, they wouldn’t have been killing each other. I feel sorry for them in this point of view that they had no choice to be under savage-like Jack and Roger to survive under strong position.

Question 6

6) Please choose one passage from the novel that is significant to you. Why is this passage meaningful? Please type it into one of your entries and comment on what you think about the passage.

The passage I am quoting is when the group of boys starting to visualize the fear in to beasts they saw and recognize them before they get parted. There were some short parts that some boys indicated that the beast they saw was not real; it was only an illusion, and that the beast they saw was a form of fear in them, which could be also mentioned as the characteristic of beast inside them. They started to recognize the beast that it was the real characteristic of savageness hidden inside them which was not shown but will be shown afterwards when they struggle to survive.

“ ‘We’ve got to talk about this fear and decide there’s noting in it. I’m frightened of myself, sometimes; only that’s nonsense! Like bogies. Then, when we’ve decided, we can start again and be careful about things like the fire.’ A picture of three boys walking along the bright beach fitted through his mind. ‘And be happy.’ ” (pg. 82)
“ ‘Maybe,’ he said hesitantly, ‘Maybe there is a beast.’ … ‘You, Simon? You believe in this?’ … ‘I don’t know,’ said Simon.… ‘What I mean is . . . maybe it’s only us.’ … Simon went on ‘We could be sort of. . . .’ ” (pg. 89)

These parts were when I thought Ralph and Simon were clever to scent out that the real beast was in them. I wouldn’t have thought that way if I were them. This part was meaningful that the beast were shown to them as a fear but most of them did not fear themselves and didn’t seem to realize that they were “the beasts.” And this is what I think we should be aware of that we do not know the severe problem in ourselves and we do not expect what is happening inside of us.

Question 7

7) Are there any settings in this novel which you have found to be beautiful? Or disturbing? Or memorable? Describe these settings and comment on why they were meaningful to you.

I would say that the most beautiful setting in this novel is that there was Piggy and Simon beside Ralph to help him with his ruling the party. Ralph was not a great ruler, he wasn’t outgoing and he was afraid of things that might happen to them. He looked out for Jack’s influence to his party and he was afraid of that Jack might do away with him to rule the party by himself, so he didn’t work that hard for doing his job. However, Piggy helped him from the beginning of his meeting Ralph until his death. His wisdom and his advise could make Ralph a better ruler, and it was possible for him to stand aside Jack without being a coward. Simon didn’t influence Ralph as much as Piggy did, but he had great courage to look for the identity of the beast. He also could make Ralph realize the reality of the beast. It was more saddening than disturbing, but if there were a disturbing setting, it is the good friends of Ralph were all murdered. Also, what was saddening was at the very last part of the story. It was sad that things changed and they had to go through a war, and they were found a little late after things got worse and they changed. That time, nothing could be changed any more for they were found by the Navy at the war site.