Lord of the Flies: Context

Lord of the Flies: Context

1. Golding's experience in WW2

   • Had profound effect on his view of humanity and the evils of which it was capable.
     • Nazi concentration camps
     • Japanese treatment of prisoners
     • Hiroshima and Nagaski
     • His involvment in the Navy
       • He served in command of a rocket-launcher
         • While carrying out his duties he ordered the destruction of German ships and submarines
       • Participated in the invasion of Normandy.

2. Golding's life

   • William Golding was born on September 19, 1911, in Cornwall, England
   • Tried to write a novel as early as age twelve.
   • Followed his parents wishes and studied the natural sciences at Oxford University
     • Changed in his second year to study english literature
   • His jobs
     • Theater actor and director
     • Wrote poetry
     • Schoolteacher in an all boys public school
   • Died aged 81 on 19th june 1995 of heart failiure

3. Lord of the Flies

   • Golding wrote Lord of the Flies in 1954, less than a decade after World War II, when the world was in the midst of the Cold War.
   • In 1983, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature
   • It was rejected by 21 publishers before being accepted by Faber and Faber
   • In Lord of the Flies, Jack and the hunters, who offer the luxury of meat and the comforts of a dictatorship. In exchange for his protection, the other boys sacrifice any moral reservations they may have about his policies and enthusiastically persecute the boys who resist joining their tribe.
   • As a schoolteacher, Golding experienced the reality of schoolboy behavior and tendencies, which provided him with valuable literary material.