Chapter Three Simon: Based on the Archetype---Jesus..10

Conclusion..13

Works Cited14

An Archetypal Analysis of Lord of the Flies

Introduction

William Golding(1911-1993), a distinguished British novelist after WWII, was born in Cornwall in 1911. Golding studied at Oxford University. His father hope him be a scientist. However, Golding finds that he was interested in English Literature and changed his major two years later. Since then, his literary journey was started. His first novel Lord of the Flies, published in September 1954, was an immediate success. After that, he published The Inheritors (1955), Free Fall (1959), The Spire (1964), Darkness Visible (1979), Close Quarters (1987) , Fire Down Below (1989) and so on. Golding believes that people are born with the original sin. In his works, he always discusses the dark side of human nature.文献综述

    Golding won won The Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983 for Lord of the flies. This novel tells an adventure story about a group of schoolboys ranging from 6 to 12 years old, who survived after a plane crash during WW3 on an isolated island. At the beginning, the boys try to imitate the adult’s world, establishing a democratic society, and elect Ralph as their leader, who is the representative of social order and civilization. However, Jack, who is addicted to violence and hunting, always undermines Ralph’s leadership, and soon has his own followers to form another tribe, which is totally different from Ralph’s tribe. Gradually, the educated children lose their rationality, being the savages, and the civilization seems fragile and collapses finally.

    Many scholars have done a lot of researches on Lord of the Flies after its winning the Nobel Prize. The researches abroad on Lord of the Flies mainly focused on the following aspects. Some academics focused on the analysis of the theme. They explored the revelation of the original sin and the defect of human nature. For example, S.J Boyd discussed such theme in The Novels of William Golding, showing the loss of innocence of children by making comparisons between Lord of the Flies and King Lear and concluded that there is a terrifying tendency towards cruelty in children. (46) Some scholars focused on the analysis of the symbolic meanings. For example, the symbolic meanings of the names. Such as Ralph, Jack, Piggy, Roger and so on. Some professors focused on the analysis from a political aspect. While some other scholars make connections with the great literary tradition. Unfortunately, not so many researches can be found which are fully related to the archetype theory.  

    Lord of the Flies also draws much attention at home. Most scholars are still focused on the darkness of human nature in this novel. For instance, Fu Xiaona pointed out that the life on isolated island is the epitome of the society at that time. She believes that Golding aims to reveal the theme of the dark side of human nature through the description of the changes among the children. (37-39) Wang Jiayin found that the darkness in human nature will never disappear and would lead to man’s tragedy. (96-98)

Besides, some critics advocated understanding the novel from the perspectives of feminist criticism because there is no single female in the book. Yu Kaiyan believed that the absence of women is a precedent phenomenon in history. (548-551)

    This thesis attempts to analyze the characters in Lord of the Flies by applying the theory of Frye’s archetypal criticism. This thesis is pided into three parts. The introduction briefly introduces the author William Golding, the novel Lord of the Flies, and studies on Lord of the Flies abroad and at home. Chapter One tries to make an introduction to the archetypal criticism. For instance, the definition of archetype, the archetypal criticism of Frye Northrop and other two major person who made great contributions to Frye’s archetypal criticism, G.Frazer and Carl Jung. Chapter Two and Three are the core of this thesis, introducing the archetype of characters in Lord of the Flies based on Frye’s archetypal criticism. The archetypes are mainly derived from Greek Mythology and the Bible. In conclusion, Dionysus is the archetype of Jack while Pentheus is the archetype of Piggy. Jesus is the archetype of Simon. We would have a better understanding of the dark side in human nature and the original sin by the exploration of the archetypes in this novel.来!自~吹冰论-文|网www.chuibin.com