Dear Friends,
I confess with some embarrassment that for the first time I have read
William Golding's novel, "Lord of the Flies." I made the mistake, as
it were, of reading it before retiring each night ... only a chapter
at a time ... and discovered that with each successive night, my sleep
became more and more disturbed. What a horrible and sad tale, so at
odds with my affectionate beliefs, or delusions apparently, of the
basic goodness of boys! Powerful. Powerful.
I've seen the film several times, and was pleased to see how closely
it followed Golding's work, although the movie excluded the disturbing
conversation had between Simon alone in the thicket and the pig's
fly-encrusted head on a pole. Nevertheless, reading the novel, and
diving into his prose, affected me far more profoundly than the movie
ever had. I readily suggest that, my friends, if you have not yet
read it, do so. It represents the quality of art that earned Golding
the Nobel Prize later in life.
Many lauded experts have attempted to explain the deep significance of
"Lord of the Flies." Was it a condemnation of human nature, a treatis
on the ultimate disintegration and decay of all charity that we
cherish and value, an apocalyptic vision of a sick society that must
result when we abandon love and sympathy for one another?
Well, who am I, relatively untutored and unread in the classics, to
comment intelligently on Golding's purposes? E. L. Epstein's
analysis, presented in the volume that I read, at least depended on
Golding's own brief and somewhat superficial motivation, and I think
him spot on.
With one exception ... and it is one that upset me. In the passages
where Roger and Jack mercilessly attack and slaughter the sow suckling
her piglets. There is considerable horror and revulsion, simply done
in a masterful way, as Golding describes the boys plunging deep into
her with their spears. Now, in his interpretation, Epstein noted that
this represented the uncomfortable sexual awaking of young adolescent
boys ...
And that analysis, which had never and would never occur to me, was
ever more so revolting than the murder itself!
Do you think Golding intended such a thing, or had Epstein gone
bonkers like so many other social scientists, over such a Freudian
idea?
I hope soon to post here several nice clips I've collected from this
wonderful movie, including a few outtakes.
Sincerely yours,
HMS Victor Victorian, NP-g18
God Save the Queen.
God Bless the Prince of Wales.
God Preserve the Windsors.
Rule Britannia!
|
|