essay on ralph lord of the flies

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Lord of the flies – charcater essay on ralph.

Choose a novel with a character who you find interesting. With reference to the text show how the writer made the character interesting.

In The Lord of the Flies by William Golding Ralph is a very interesting character. In the novel a group of boys become stranded on a desert island and must fight to survive. Ralph is a compelling character because he is the one who fights to keep civility alive amongst the boys and tries to stop them becoming savages. We can track how he does this throughout the novel.

The first way Ralph proves to be interesting is when he establishes a sense of order on the island. He finds a large conch and gathers the boys together and tells them “I’ll give the conch to the next person to speak, they won’t be interrupted”. We can see clearly here that there is a sense of democracy, any boy who wishes to speak will be given the chance to do so. The idea that they won’t be ‘interrupted’ shows that Ralph expects the boys to listen to each other and give each other respect even if they don’t agree with one another. Ralph is also clearly the leader here as he is the one in charge of where the conch goes. This makes Ralph interesting as he is clearly the authority figure and he is clearly in charge at this point.

Ralph continues to exert his authority over the boys. The younger boys begin to slack off from their work and the older boys don’t pay attention to the fire and so Ralph shouts “I’m calling an assembly” and the boys immediately gather at the point. This shows that Ralph is still the boss at this point and it shows the boys still have a sense of civility as they conform to Ralph’s instructions. This is interesting because it shows Ralph is still able to control the boys at this point and there is still a sense of a functioning society.

Ralph sees that the boys are starting to move away from their civility as time passes and he tries to remind the boys of who they are. The older boys let the fire go out and Ralph, furious at them asks “Are we savages or what?” The tone of this is angry and he is trying to tell the boys that they need to behave better. The loss of fire is a loss of hope of rescue. Letting the fire go out suggests that some of the older boys aren’t actually fussed about getting off the island. This scene is interesting because it shows Ralph is starting to feel exhausted from being the only authority figure and he is getting frazzled at trying to get so many boys to conform to rules that will ultimately save them.

Ralph starts to lose his authority when Jack begins to openly challenge him. Jack punches Piggy and steals his glasses in order to restart the signal fire, Ralph calls him out on it saying “That was a dirty trick” and we are told “Ralph felt his lip twitch”. Ralph is openly identifying Jack’s deviant actions whereas in the past he would have let Jack away with it. He is trying to control Jack here. His lip twitching is an involuntary action but it betrays Ralph’s dislike for Jack. This scene is interesting as the group of boys can now see the split between Jack and Ralph and will be forced to take sides, and Ralph here actually looks weaker because he is not using brute strength.

Finally Ralph loses control of the boys completely but refuses to join them as he still clings to civility over savagery. When Simon is mistaken for the Beast and murdered Ralph is the only one who will admit “that was Simon, that was murder” and when they are finally rescued and the naval officer asks jokingly had they killed anyone Ralph responds “Only two” and Golding reveals “The officer knew when people were telling the truth. He whistled softly.” Ralph’s first statement is just that, a clear acknowledgement that the boys’ savage behaviour has led them to kill someone. Ralph’s response to the naval officer implies that the boys could have ended up killing more boys if rescue hadn’t occurred. Ralph is not scared of the truth. Ralph is interesting because he is the one boy on the island who has matured and grown a strong moral centre prizing civility over savagery.

In conclusion, Golding makes Ralph an interesting character by showing him grow as a leader and then remain the only boy who will not succumb to savagery by joining Jack’s group. Ralph is there to show us what could happen when savagery takes over from civility.

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Lord of the Flies

William golding, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

Ralph Quotes in Lord of the Flies

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Ralph's Leadership in "Lord of the Flies": A Beacon of Democracy

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Introduction

Ralph's leadership skills.

Establishment of Order

Moral integrity, commitment to democratic principles, symbolism and allegory, bibliography:.

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Sample Essay

How does William Golding set the scene for the novel in the opening chapter?

The opening chapter of ‘Lord of the Flies’ is very effective in laying the foundation for the rest of the plot. Characters become instantly recognizable and significant. The surroundings around the characters become very clear and leave you with a vivid image in your mind whilst reading. Also, the use of the language helps the situation become familiar, with spectacular detail being during descriptions. All of these factors together help build a very strong and effective chapter as the script from then on becomes vaguely predictable, with the readers expecting to know the characters and lay out well enough to recognise their reactions to any/all situations that may arise.

The introduction of characters opens the chapter in suspense as all is not revealed immediately: “ The fair boy & the fat boy.” Golding’s approach in the opening chapter to the characters is effective as it doesn’t introduce them by name, but more by personality type. Upon reading this, you automatically believe you know the two characters and feel comfortable envisaging the two children stranded on an island rather young and clueless to the dangers of the island, with the concept of no food, water, shelter or food not phasing them. This also shows their immaturity, as a normal adult would immediately try to work a logical & strategic yet plausible plan of getting back to reality or how to survive. The fact that later on ‘the fat boy’ later is addressed by ‘Piggy’ strengthens the stereotype placed upon him, with ‘the fair boy’ being given quite a polite and gentle name of Ralph.

William Golding’s use of descriptive language builds a clear image of the scenery: “ All round him the long scar smashed into the jungle was a bath of heat” . Such attention to detail allows us as the readers to be part of the story, placing us right in the scenery. The use of onomatopoeia such as ‘smash’ put emphasis on the beforehand scenes we aren’t exposed to, as we aren’t told they’re in a plane crash, yet the fact the scar ‘smashed’ into the island lets us know it was something with pretty heavy impact, it is quite a violent term. Describing it as a ‘Scar’ also tells a story as you regard a scar as being something unsightly and unwelcomed, possibly damaging attractive scenery. It shows us that it has damaged the island significantly. The metaphor ‘scar’ may also imply that the damage caused was irreversible as scars often are, which in turn just emphasises the impact the children/previous events have had on the island.

The way the characters are portrayed hints at a possible chance of survival: “Nobody don’t know we’re here”. During a conversation early on between Piggy & Ralph, Piggy intends to inform Ralph they’re stranded as no-one actually knows they’re there, but in matter of fact expresses that somebody does in fact know they’re on the island. This is because the double negative comment actually contradicts itself, and by intending to say nobody knows their whereabouts’ he actually does the opposite. This could be argued that Golding is doing this intentionally to push you to read on by leaving you, in a sense, subliminal messages. This also shows the importance of the characters personality type, as Piggy can be perceived as quite ‘dopey’, and only through him can William Golding voice such un-educated comments, and effectively and at the same time very cleverly hint at survival.      

The conch acts as a means of authority and Ralph soon becomes graced with power: “The children gave him the same simple obedience that they had given to the men with megaphones”. This shows Ralph as the natural leader and puts him in the same figure head roll as the parents. The conch shows authority and is soon likened to the megaphones of the parents. It almost shows Ralph as a religious symbol, as if he has the power of God now he has full control of the island, and everyone is at his lead while he stands on a rock taller than everyone there with the conch. It is argued that this is a very important factor during the opening chapter of ‘Lord of the Flies’ as you wonder whether the conch is going to fall into the wrong hands, and in turn, the authority and power that comes with it – soon over powering the natural but fair leader; Ralph.

Some of the aspects previously mentioned lead me to believe the ‘Lord of the Flies’ is going to be very eventful and could go either way in terms of surviving or making it off the island. After simply reading just the first chapter I find myself wanting to get answers to such questions as “How can a series of young boys create a survival plan and make it off the island?” or “was Piggy deliberately talking in double negatives to make us believe on thing contrary to another?” William Golding has created a very effective opening scene and should appeal to a vast audience, urging them to read on further after appealing so strongly during the opening chapter.

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Essay: Lord of the Flies Ralph Character Analysis

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Ralph is the representation or symbol of leadership, civilization, order, good, etc. This quote ‘He was old enough, twelve years and a few months, to have lost the prominent tummy of childhood and not yet old enough for adolescence to have made him awkward. You could see now that he might make a boxer, as far as width and heaviness of shoulders went, but there was a mildness about his mouth and eyes that proclaimed no devil’ physically describes him as at least 12 years old, having no baby fat and no adverse effects of puberty, ‘fair’, attractive, has ‘fair’ hair, has the body of a boxer, athletic, and last, but not least, mild eyes and mouth, and in a nonphysical sense, also is charismatic, intelligent, shows common sense, a natural leader, diplomatic. Ralph is the one who makes the meeting place for the boys to get together to talk, the fire for warmth and a way to get the boys rescued, and the huts for shelter against bad weather and also uses Piggy’s intelligence and realizes that the boys’ fears and superstitions stop them from surviving. He shows his ability to be a leader when he was able to think and act cautiously and with sense when the other boys panic over mistaking the dead soldier with a parachute on the mountain for the ‘beastie’ and tries endlessly to make the boys focused on hoping to get rescued and also when he was the only one to explore the castle rock even though he is afraid of the ‘beastie’ At first, Ralph was expected having adventures on the island but as time goes on, he becomes unexcited about the boys’ independence from adults and wants to go to his ‘old’ life which is shown when he daydreams about his ‘other’ life and also about bathing and grooming in the quote ‘Once, following his father from Chatham to Devonport, they had lived in a cottage on the edge of the moors. In the succession of houses that Ralph had known, this one stood out with particular clarity because after that house he had been sent away to school. Mummy had still been with them and Daddy had come home every day. Wild ponies came to the stone wall at the bottom of the garden, and it had snowed. Just behind the cottage there was a sort of shed and you could lie up there, watching the ‘akes swirl past. You could see the damp spot where each ‘ake died, then you could mark the ‘rst ‘ake that lay down without melting and watch, the whole ground turn white. You could go indoors when you were cold and look out of the window, past the bright copper kettle and the plate with the little blue men. When you went to bed there was a bowl of corn’akes with sugar and cream. And the books’they stood on the shelf by the bed, leaning together with always two or three laid ‘at on top because he had not both- ered to put them back properly. They were dog-eared and scratched. There was the bright, shining one about Topsy and Mopsy that he never read because it was about two girls; there was the one about the magician which you read with a kind of tied-down terror, skipping page twenty-seven with the awful picture of the spider; there was a book about people who had dug things up, Egyptian things; there was The Boy’s Book of Trains, The Boy’s Book of Ships. Vividly they came before him; he could have reached up and touched them, could feel the weight and slow slide with which The Mammoth Book for Boys would come out and slither down…. Everything was all right; everything was good-humored and friendly.’ However, Ralph’s experiences on the island have destroyed his naivet?? and destroyed his innocence which is shown when he becomes more faithless about assemblies or meetings even as he gets more experience with them when he bitterly says “Don’t we love meetings?” because only him, Piggy, and Simon does anything productive toward the boys’ survival on the island. As time goes on, he loses his verbal ability and his ability to organize his thoughts properly like how order and rules have disappeared because his mental ‘workings’, like his clothes, have been worn down by the primitive life on the island like when he tries and fails to develop an agenda for the meeting and when he cannot remember why he wants a signal fire and that Piggy has to tell him in the quote “remember what we came for. The fire. My specs.” However, he still has his ability to think abstractly when he responds to the lost rescue opportunity’s crisis. The quote “with a convulsion of the mind, Ralph discovered dirt and decay” shows that he figuratively discovers the dark nature of humanity but also, at the same time, he recognizes that the only things that can ‘hold’ the evil at bay are intelligence, empathy, and last but not least sensitivity which is hown when he ‘smiled jeeringly,’ like how adults might ‘look back’ with skepticism on ideals they had when they were children, when he recognizes the hardships of life on the island compared to his first impression of glamour on the island. ‘He jumped down from the terrace. The sand was thick over his black shoes and the heat hit him. He became conscious of the weight of clothes, kicked his shoes off ‘ercely and ripped off each stocking with its elastic garter in a single movement. Then he leapt back on the terrace, pulled off his shirt, and stood there among the skull-like coconuts with green shadows from the palms and the forest sliding over his skin. He undid the snake-clasp of his belt, lugged off his shorts and pants, and stood there naked, looking at the dazzling beach and the water’ Ralph’s first action is stripping off all of his clothes which is never a good thing because it is the first step toward becoming lawless and savage stripping is never a good sign and even though Ralph is just thinking practically when he took off his clothes to get cooler, it also shows that Ralph is just as savage as the other boys which is shown when he “shrieks with laughter” when Piggy told him his name which shows that although he is a good kid. The quote ‘Ralph entered into the play and everybody laughed…Ralph, carried away by a sudden thick excitement, grabbed Eric’s spear and jabbed at Robert with it…Ralph too was ‘ghting to get near, to get a handful of that brown, vulnerable ‘esh. The desire to squeeze and hurt was over-mastering’ shows that Ralph looks depraved when he hunts when he talks about wounding a pig for the first time with excitement and thinks that “hunting was good after all.” Also, when he and Piggy’s went to Jack’s party, ‘Piggy and Ralph, under the threat of the sky, found themselves eager to take a place in this demented but partly secure society. They were glad to touch the brown backs of the fence that hemmed in the terror and made it governable.’ which turns into Simon’s murder although Ralph tries to deny that he was involved in the murder of Simon by saying that “we left early,” it is false because he helped kill Simon which goes to show that even Ralph has the beast living ‘inside’ him. When Ralph “launched himself like a cat; stabbed, snarling, with the spear, and the savage doubled up,” he shows that he is all animal-like at the end of the novel. Last but not least, Ralph realizes that the order back home is just fragile ‘cover’ of civilization and that he is going to be as savage as anybody else given the chance during a meeting in the late afternoon when everyone and everything looks different in his quote “If faces [are] different when lit from above or below’what is a face? What is anything?” which basically means that people lose their meanings when they are at the island because the boys become like savages, they are completely different than the regular British boys that arrived on the island. However, even though he becomes ‘frayed’ by the primitive life’s ‘fears’ and ‘trials’ and is slowly becoming a savage by the other boys, he is the one who thinks of the death of Simon as murder and has a unbiased view of his involvement with Simon’s death and so feels both loathing and excitement over it. When he becomes ‘prey,’ he recognizes that he is an outcast in that he is the only person with common sense and the only civilized person with a moral conscience which shows when he meets the officer on the beach that he is upset over his appearance because it is dirty rather than being relieved that he has been saved from a painful death which shows that after everything that has happened on the island, he still has his civility. He gave up his innocence and naivet?? and gained an understanding of the nature of humanity which is that everybody has evil in them and that everyone needs intelligence, spirit and mysticism, and last but not least, hopes and dreams to resist evil and last, but not least, this knowledge makes Ralph an tragic figure because even though Piggy and Simon are murdered, he is the only one who have to go back to civilization with the knowledge that he is, like everybody else, just a lawless and orderless savage.

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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Lord of The Flies — The Link Between The Society In “Lord of the Flies” And Modern Society

The Link Between The Society in "Lord of The Flies" and Modern Society

• Categories: Lord of The Flies William Golding

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