Literature Review: Lord of the Flies

Passionate Truisms: Lord of the Flies Literature Review

“…a truism can become more than a truism when it is a belief passionately held.” ~William Golding

William Golding’s premiere novel, Lord of the Flies, was published in 1954. In 1962, Golding gave a series of lectures at the University of California in which he discussed his novel and possible applicable literary criticisms. In one of his lectures, Golding specifically stated that neither a psychoanalytical theory (“The boys were below the age of overt sex, for I did not want to complicate the issue with that relative triviality.”) nor a Marxist theory (“[The boys on the island] did not have to fight for survival, for I did not want a Marxist exegesis. If disaster came, it was not to come through the exploitation of one class by another.”) was applicable to his novel (“Fable” 42). He went on to admit that he “…included a Christ-figure in [Lord of the Flies]. This is the little boy Simon, solitary, stammering, a lover of mankind, a visionary, who reaches commonsense attitudes not by reason but by intuition” (44). While Golding’s lecture was clearly an attempt to inform critics of his intentions with his writing, he also realized that critics would interpret their own truism, and admitted, “I no longer believe that the author has a sort of patria potestas over his brainchildren. Once they are printed they have reached their majority and the author has no more authority over them, knows no more about them, perhaps knows less about them than the critic who comes fresh to them, and sees them not as the author hoped they would be, but as what they are” (45). Following Golding’s lecture, critics jumped on Golding’s words in the form of both agreement and argument as they flooded the literary world with psychoanalytical, Marxist, and theological interpretations, proving that they were as passionate about their Lord of the Flies truisms as Golding was about his.          

Marxism

Golding, a British citizen, did not believe that he incorporated a class system on the island or that the boys were capable of exploiting one another through class. Many literary critics, however, strongly disagreed with Golding and found clear class distinctions among the main characters Jack, Ralph, and Piggy. In his Marxist analysis, critic Ronnie Lipschutz noted that, “Even in the late 1940s and early 1950s…British society remained pretty class bound. The public schools, in particular, made a continuing effort to sustain British patriotism and class order” (Lipschutz 106). David Spitz, who analyzed the power and authority structures in Golding’s work through a political lens, agreed with Lipschutz and noted that the boys’ ideologies were already too ingrained to be ignored:

They [the boys on the island] were the carefully chosen products of an already established middle-class society. They were socialized in, and were a partial microcosm of, twentieth century English (or Western) civilization; and they had brought that civilization, or what fragments of it they could remember, with them. Hence the values they possessed, the attitudes they displayed, the arrangements they established, and the practices in which they engaged, were all in some degree or other a reflection of the world into which they had been born and within which they had been educated and fashioned. (29)

Critics further agreed that Jack, Ralph, and Piggy held distinct class roles on the island that mirrored their class roles in England. These previously-defined class roles were immediately noticeable through Golding’s description of the boys’ physical characteristics and implied educational status. Golding himself intimates that Jack and his group of choirboys, whose grammar and dialect are proper and refined, attend a Catholic school. In Great Britain at that time, many Catholic schools were representative of boarding schools known for providing a higher level of education. These Catholic schools typically enrolled children of the upper middle class or upper class, or the bourgeoisie. Lipschutz viewed Jack as strictly upper class, noting:

Jack Merridew is more a bourgeois toff whose only real comparative advantage is class brutality. That he orders his choristers to march along the hot beach dressed in their heavy uniforms and proudly announce his leadership credentials to the rest of the boys only serves to underline his aspirations to privilege and class mimicry. (Lipschutz 106)

Ralph’s upper middle class status is defined early on when he states that his father is a commander in the Navy. His grammar and dialect are also depicted in a tone that indicates a higher level of education commonly found in the middle class or upper middle class. Paul Crawford, whose “Literature of Atrocity” analysis focuses on Marxist ideologies present in Lord of the Flies and the class divisions acting as a force breaking down the boys’ island society, stated that, “It is not insignificant that the boys who take up leadership roles, Ralph and Jack, appear to be from a privileged background, perhaps educated at public or boarding schools” (51). Lipschutz echoed Crawford’s assessment of Ralph, stating, “…Ralph is a bright, gentle, and somewhat brainless member of the ruling class…” (Lipschutz 106). Even John Fitzgerald and John Kayser, whose “Pride as Original Sin” analysis focuses mainly on the theological elements found in Golding’s work, remarked that “Ralph certainly looks the part of a leader and, unlike Piggy, he comes from the class expected to lead” (81).

Piggy, although intelligent, is noticeably different than Jack and Ralph with his below average grammar and an unrefined dialect, which immediately indicate he is a member of the working class, or the proletariat. Another indicator of Piggy’s working-class status is the fact that he does not live with his parents, but with his aunt, who owns a candy store and must work everyday to earn a living. Crawford stated, “Piggy himself is very much a ‘lower-class’ outsider whose accent—a ‘mark of class’—is mocked. Indeed, Piggy’s ‘main persecutor’ is Jack who has strong notions of hierarchy because of his privileged education and previous status as head boy of his school choir” (51). Lipschutz agreed with Crawford again, stating that Piggy was a “working-class bursary boy at some nameless and, no doubt, little-respected public school…” (Lipschutz 105).

Critics who focused on analyzing Lord of the Flies through a Marxist or political lens largely agreed that this predetermined island class structure and resulting differences in leadership styles were the ultimate catalysts for the demise of civilization on the island. While Jack and Ralph were leaders of the two main groups of boys—the savage and the civilized—their leadership methods were representative of the groups they led. Basirat and Farhoudi, critics who, in part, examined a group-centered leadership strategy compared to a tyrannical leadership strategy, stated “Ralph’s group prioritizes the members’ common interests over the personal interests of any single individual” (194). They believed Ralph’s leadership style, which was focused on the betterment of all the boys on the island and securing rescue of all the boys, led to “a cooperative atmosphere in which there is no room for any great discrimination between the leadership and the main body of the group” (Id.). In stark comparison, Basirat and Farhoudi noted that Jack’s “tribe clearly represents many ordinary citizens who were mentally prepared to accept the tutelage of a totalitarian leadership” (197). Jack’s leadership strategy focused on his wants and desires only; he did not prioritize the well-being of the group over his own wants at any point. L.L. Dickson discussed several literary criticisms, including Marxism, in his book, The Modern Allegories of William Golding, and agreed with Basirat and Farhoudi that “Lord of the Flies accommodates a political allegory in which Ralph represents democracy and Jack totalitarianism” (21). When Jack and Ralph’s differing leadership styles clashed, chaos reigned and civilization on the island began to crumble. Lipschutz noted that as the boys began to focus on their separate goals, the division of labor “…fragment[ed] social solidarity and foster[ed] individualism and alienation” (Lipschutz 109). As with many societies, Lipschutz stated that this “…apparently neutral language of ‘division of labor’ masks power relations that can easily become violent” (Id.). This violence is evidenced when the boys kill Simon and Piggy, and attempt to kill Ralph. While Lipschutz believes the boys’ differing leadership styles brought about by their class status was the key to civilization breaking down on the island, critic Suzanne Gulbin disagrees. She admits that the two boys symbolize “…a form of government—Jack (tyranny or anarchy) and Ralph (democracy),” but believes that “the more dynamic individual captures success for the type of government he advocates” (86), which is why Jack’s savage and fear-inducing leadership ultimately beat out Ralph’s civilized and democratic approach to leadership and took control of the island.

Psychoanalysis

Golding’s comment that the boys were not of the age for overt sex implies that he may have considered Freud’s psychological theories limited to sexuality and sexual attraction. While Golding may have tried to dispel the applicability of psychoanalysis to Lord of the Flies as a whole due to this one limited interpretation, many critics disagreed with Golding yet again. In fact, although those critics disagreed with Golding, they were largely in agreement with one another that one psychoanalytical theme reigned supreme in Lord of the Flies: id, ego, and superego in the form of Jack, Ralph, and Piggy, respectively.

Critics viewed Jack’s tyrannical leadership as representative of the id and its “primitive, selfish, unorganized state” (Parker 123). Throughout the novel, Jack thinks of his own selfish needs rather than helping the group of boys as a whole. Jack’s selfishness is witnessed early on when Ralph reminds Jack that, “‘The best thing we can do is get ourselves rescued,’” Jack responds with, “‘Yes, of course! All the same, I’d like to catch a pig first’” (Golding, Lord 56). Claire Rosenfield wrote “Men of Smaller Growth,” one of the most well-regarded psychoanalytical criticisms of Lord of the Flies, prior to Golding’s 1962 lectures and his dismissal of psychoanalytical criticism, but her analysis highlights Freud’s tripartite model nonetheless. She stated that Jack’s behavior epitomizes the id because he is “…an externalization of the evil instinctual forces of the unconscious” (93). Similar to Rosenfield, but many years later, K. Chellappan took a semiotic approach to her analysis and examined signifiers and signifieds as applicable to the id, ego, and superego. She agreed with Rosenfield that Jack “tries to impose an individual meaning” for everything on the island, and he works to “exploit the present” rather than thinking of the future (5). Taking a different approach but still using psychoanalysis to interpret Golding’s text, Basirat and Farhoudi believed first that Jack and the boys on the island suffered from a lack of desired tutelage. Second, they interpreted Jack’s subsequent behavior, resulting from the lack of adult supervision, as the id in the form of a “leader [of the hunters, who] assumes some specific personal qualities that would evidently be akin to those of the primal father, such as…narcissism, self-confidence and independence” (194). Although these critics interpreted Jack’s character through different angles within psychoanalysis, they all agreed that Golding constructed a character that unmistakably represents Freud’s id.

Opposite Jack’s id is the superego found in Piggy. Piggy as superego, the “moralizing conscience, with its rules and sense of right and wrong,” is focused on returning to the life he knew before landing on the island (Parker 123). Piggy’s need for rules, his voice of reason to Ralph, and his unrelenting focus on lighting a fire large enough to be seen by rescuers miles away defines him as the superego. When the boys on the island aren’t working hard enough, Piggy scolds them, “‘How can you expect to be rescued if you don’t put first things first and act proper?’” (Golding, Lord 47). Piggy not only wants the boys to follow the rules they established regarding the work schedule, but he also wants them to remain focused on the group’s long-term goal of being rescued. L.L. Dickson covered several literary criticisms in his book, The Modern Allegories of William Golding, including Freud’s tripartite model, and reinforces the analysis that “from a particular psychological viewpoint, the tripartite organization of the human psyche—ego, id, superego—is dramatized symbolically in the characters of Ralph, Jack, and Piggy, respectively” (20). He goes on to specify that “Piggy, the fat, bespectacled rationalist, reminds Ralph of his responsibilities, makes judgments about Jack’s guilt, and generally represents the ethical voice on the island” (21). Piggy’s obsession with responsibilities and rules revolves, in large part, around the conch. The conch represents not only the power to speak on this island, but also the power to be heard and uninterrupted. Piggy works to protect the conch at all costs and assiduously follows the rules associated with the conch. Chellappan agreed that Piggy represents the definitive superego and states in his semiotic analysis of the tripartite that “signification is a human act, and the shell [conch], not in itself significant, generates various meanings. … To both Piggy and Jack the external or adult significance of the noise as a means of power matters—though in different ways: to the regressive Piggy it is a protective device, to the aggressive Jack it is an expression of power” (5). Piggy’s association with the conch shell is particularly important at the time of his death. When Piggy, the definitive superego in most critics’ eyes, is killed and the conch is simultaneously destroyed, the hope for a future on the island that includes a moralizing conscience or any type of civilization is also destroyed.

Stuck squarely between Jack and Piggy is Ralph as ego, the “realist organizer and planner that mediates between the id and the superego” (Parker 123). Rosenfield saw Ralph as relatable to most readers due to his constant struggle to balance the selfish desires of the id (Jack) and the entirely unselfish desires of the superego (Piggy). She believed “Ralph is every man—or every child—and his body becomes the battleground where reason and instinct struggle, each to assert itself” (94). Along a similar vein, Chellappan believed that “Jack tries to impose an individual meaning, whereas Piggy is for the inherited one—and he always wants to ‘retreat’ to the adult world whereas Jack wants to exploit the present and Ralph the explorer is somewhere between the two” (5). Dickson also noted Ralph’s clearly defined dilemma as the ego when he stated, “The conflict between Ralph, the level‐headed elected leader of the boys’ council, and Jack, the self‐appointed head of the hunters, corresponds to an ego‐id polarity” (20). Ralph’s struggle between good and evil is continuous throughout the novel. One of the most poignant of Ralph’s failures is when he allows Jack to rile him into going along with the murder of Simon and not stopping the boys from committing such an evil act. As the sacrificial dance begins with Jack and his hunting crew, “Piggy and Ralph, under the threat of the sky, found themselves eager to take a place in this demented but partly secure party” (Golding, Lord 174). Yasunori Sugimura, who examined Golding’s novel from a purely psychological perspective, at that moment interpreted Ralph and the other boys as “typical sacrificers who intend to exorcize symbolic confusion by liquidating the chosen victims for the solidarity of the community, but instead suffer adverse effects” (53). Ralph allows Jack’s selfish and primitive wants to influence him, but he immediately regrets his actions as he realizes that he cannot undo this horrific error in judgment when he tells Piggy, “‘I’m frightened. Of us. I want to go home. Oh God, I want to go home’” (Golding, Lord 181). Simon’s death is a turning point for Ralph when he consciously becomes aware of the necessity to choose the superego’s wants rather than the id’s wants if the remaining boys on the island are to survive. This conscious decision is apparent when Ralph, Piggy, and Samneric are trying to light a new fire and Ralph says, “‘We don’t want another night without fire’” (Id. 186). Ralph, as the realist ego defined by psychoanalytical critics alike, knows that another night in the dark might lead to more unforgivable violence.

Theological

One final, and popular, critical analysis of Lord of the Flies comes in a theological form. Many critics knew that Golding considered himself to be a strong Christian moralist and, as a result, interpreted his work as a modern day Biblical representation. Although the critics’ theological analyses took many forms, two main themes emerged: Simon as a Christ figure and man is inherently evil.

Most critics agree not only agree that Simon is representative of a Christ figure, but that Simon’s parallels to Jesus begin early in the novel with him feeding the hungry littluns when he “…found for them the fruit they could not reach, pulled off the choicest from up in the foliage, passed them back down to the endless, outstretched hands” (Id. 59). The night before Simon’s death, Golding describes him as “thirsty, and then very thirsty” (Id. 151), similar to the way Jesus was described in the Bible on the night before death. Dickson noted in his critical analysis that, “Simon’s fasting, helping the little boys, meditating in the wilderness, going up on the mountain—all these actions solidify the Christ parallel” (15). However, Arnold Kruger, whose essay, “A New Look at the Character of Simon,” reveals a theological criticism arguing directly against the interpretation of Simon as a Christ figure. Instead, Kruger believes Golding made Simon a clear representation of the apostle, Simon, whose name was later changed to Peter. “This picture of Simon/Simon Peter placing ripe fruit into the hands of children, is clearly an allusion to the nurturing and proselytizing roles of Christ’s apostles within the Church…” (61). He goes on to make several other parallels between Simon and Simon the apostle, including the manner in which Simon is killed, stating that Simon “…died ‘crying out something about a dead man on a hill’ … much as the biblical Simon Peter must have” (62). Although no critics specifically disagree with Kruger’s statements, I was unable to find any other critic who was in agreement with Kruger’s interpretation.

Simon’s prophetic nature appears to be the characteristic that most connects him to Jesus in the eyes of theological critics. James Baker noted in his “Why It’s No Go” essay that, similar to the story of Jesus, “Simon (the inarticulate seer) rises to utter the truth in garbled, ineffective phrases: there is a beast, but ‘it’s only us.’ As always, his saving words are misunderstood, and the prophet shrinks away in confusion” (26). Critic Marijke Van Vuuren, whose critical essay analyzes the parallels between the story of salvation and Lord of the Flies, agreed with Baker that “Simon is Christlike in his prophetic role and in his priestly function of not only offering, but being a sacrifice for the others” (20). Fitzgerald and Kayser also agreed with Baker and compared Jesus’ offer of salvation with the idea that “Simon’s insight into the beast offers the boys the possibility of salvation on the island …” (84-5). Critics Jose George and R.L.N. Raju added to the critics’ assessment of Simon as a Christ figure with their mirroring of Simon and Christ and the notion that Simon, like Christ, was free from worry of evil because he understood that evil was within every man, and man would overcome that evil. They stated:

The children were under constant fear of the beast lurking in the dark. Only Simon is free of all such thoughts. He does not share the fear of the others. Simon believed in the evil within man and that goodness had to prevail in the end. If man is able to master the beast within him, the search for the devil outside would not arise. (178)

J.S. Piven, in his critical essay that discussed theological, psychoanalytical, and sociological interpretations of Golding’s work, also saw Simon’s prophecy and the events leading up to it as his strongest parallel to Christ:

One of the most powerful images of the novel is Simon, face to face with the decaying head of a pig mounted on a spear, like Christ in the wilderness facing the Lord of the Flies himself. Here we have the human being confronting the evil of his nature, witnessing the barbarism of his kind, attempting to understand himself through the face of death. (Piven 56)

The other major theological interpretation in Lord of the Flies revolves around the theme of man as inherently evil or full of sin. Golding stated in his lectures that, “Man is a fallen being. He is gripped by original sin. His nature is sinful and his state perilous” (“Fable” 41). Many critics have taken Golding at his word and published numerous literary interpretations of Lord of the Flies that state the fall of civilization is due to no reason other than man being inherently sinful. In fact, Baker, in his essay, “Golding and Huxley: The Fables of Demonic Possession,” states that Golding’s message in Lord of the Flies is so strong that he “…would not let us transcend original sin and the disastrous history of the last 50 years” (311). Dickson agreed with Baker and bluntly stated, “The Lord of the Flies is only an externalization of the inner evil in all humans” (17). Piven added to the notion that man is inherently evil, always has been and always will be, when he compared the boys on the island to Shakespeare’s Hamlet, a story hundreds of years old, “Just as the death of Hamlet’s father is not merely one murder but a cosmic recreation of good and evil through biblical imagery, so Lord of the Flies uses the theological to remind us that this is the struggle of souls against their own devastation” (Piven 55).

Other critics argued against Golding, Baker, Dickson, and Piven, stating man’s evil nature does exist, but that evil is not necessarily inherent. David Anderson, in his critical essay, “Golding's Difficult Christianity,” blamed original sin on man’s distant relationship with God, stating, “The Christian doctrine of Original Sin is about the rupture of man’s relationship with God; it is not about the incompleteness of evolutionary development” (56). Fatima Anjum disagreed with Anderson and claimed that, “The schoolboys who were left on the island without any grownup illustrate his concept of innate violent nature of man which emerges out in the absence of any civilization” (125). Anjum believes that, contrary to Anderson’s claims, “Golding suggests that civilization provides an enchanting cloak to the essential evil nature of a man and this is what the children lost …” (125). George and Raju agreed with Anjum when they were analyzing Jack’s behavior and stated, “… without being challenged nor cautioned by a grown-up hand he [Jack] unashamedly turned himself and his choir boys into savages and openly indulged in hunting and murdering, not only animals, but even fellow human beings” (177). Yet another critic, Leon Levitt, believes that man’s evil nature is not inherent, but learned and a direct result of Western culture imposing their ideology on children. He states that the boys’ behavior on the island “… clearly confirms the premise that it is Western society, Western culture, Western values, Western traditions wherein the evil lurks, not primordially in the hearts of men” (522). In fact, Levitt claims that the boys:

…come to the island already acculturated. And what do they bring? They bring a tradition of carnivorous blood-lust, human violence, tribalism, ingenuity in warfare (it is a truism that the technological progress of the Western world has consistently been the direct consequence of a struggle for supremacy in weaponry), ant-intellectualism, and the vivid memory of the carnage they were trying to escape. (522)

Spitz agreed with Levitt that Western ideology was so ingrained in the boys that no definitive conclusion about the inherent evil of man can be found, upending one of the most common messages interpreted in Lord of the Flies and leaving the reason for man’s evil nature in the balance:

…we still don't know, any more than we know from the story of Robinson Crusoe, what man, innocent, naked, non-socialized man is really like. We still don't know what is innate and what is environmentally conditioned in man. Nor can we ever hope to attain this sort of knowledge; for the individual apart from society is an inconceivable thing-he is always, no matter how peculiar or unique a person, still a social animal. And if it be said, despite this, that all societies are evil, or that there is evil in all societies, which means that men however created or evolved are necessarily the source of that evil, it is still not shown what in man or in his circumstances produces that evil, or why, and whether this is irredeemable. (30)

Since the publishing of Lord of the Flies, numerous critics have written their own analytical interpretations and truisms regarding the messages they found in Golding’s literature. Both in agreement and disagreement with Golding’s stated intentions for his book, and in agreement and disagreement with one another, critics created Marxist, psychoanalytic, and theological analyses that helped open readers’ eyes to the complexities of this simple story about British schoolboys stranded on a remote island. Although these critics may not have worked to prove all of Golding’s personal beliefs about Lord of the Flies to be true, these critics’ interpretations did prove Golding correct when he stated “…a truism can become more than a truism when it is a belief passionately held” (“Fable” 41).

Works Cited

Anderson, David. “Golding's Difficult Christianity.” Bloom's Guides: Lord of the Flies New Edition, edited by Harold Bloom, Infobase Publishing, 2010, pp. 55–58.

Anjum, Fatima, et al. “Loss of Civilization and Innocence in ‘Lord of the Flies.’” Language in India, vol. 12, no. 8, Aug. 2012, pp. 123-130.

Baker, James R. “Golding and Huxley: The Fables of Demonic Possession.” Twentieth Century Literature, vol. 46, no. 3, 2000, pp. 311–327.

---. “Why It's No Go.” Critical Essays on William Golding, edited by James R. Baker, Boston: G. K. Hall, 1988, pp. 22–31.

Basirat, Sasan, and Fatima Farhoudi. “Lord of the Flies and Implications of Tutelage.” International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences, vol. 42, 8 Oct. 2014, pp. 189–199.

Chellappan, K. “Vision and Structure in Lord of the Flies: A Semiotic Approach.” Bloom's Modern Critical Interpretations: William Golding's Lord of the Flies, edited by Harold Bloom, Infobase Publishing, New York, 2008, pp. 3–10.

Crawford, Paul. “Literature of Atrocity.” Politics and History in William Golding: The World Turned Upside Down, University of Missouri Press, 2002, pp. 50-79.

Dickson, L L. The Modern Allegories of William Golding. Tampa: University of South Florida Press, 1990, pp. 12-26.

Fitzgerald, John F., and John R Kayser. “Golding's ‘Lord of the Flies’: Pride as Original Sin.” Studies in the Novel, vol. 24, no. 1, 1992, pp. 78–88.

George, Jose, and R.L.N. Raju. “Personal Accountability to Evil in William Golding's Lord of the Flies.” Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, vol. 6, no. 6, Nov. 2015, pp. 174-178.

Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. The Berkley Publishing Group, 1997.

Golding, William. “Lord of the Flies as Fable.” Readings on Lord of the Flies, Greenhaven Press, 1997, pp. 40–46.

Gulbin, Suzanne. “Parallels and Contrasts in ‘Lord of the Flies’ and ‘Animal Farm.’” The English Journal, vol. 55, no. 1, Jan. 1966, pp. 86-88, 92.

Kruger, Arnold. “A New Look at the Character of Simon.” Bloom's Guides: Lord of the Flies New Edition, edited by Harold Bloom, Infobase Publishing, 2010, pp. 60-62.

Levitt, Leon. “Trust the Tale: A Second Reading of ‘Lord of the Flies.’” The English Journal, vol. 58, no. 4, Apr. 1969, pp. 521–533.

Lipschutz, Ronnie D. “States & Regulations.” Political Economy, Capitalism, and Popular Culture, Rowman & Littlefield, 2009, pp. 99-118.

Parker, Robert Dale. How to Interpret Literature: Critical Theory for Literary and Cultural Studies. 3rd ed., Oxford University Press, 2015.

Piven, J.S. “Civilizing Massacre: Lord of the Flies as Parable of the Invention of Enemies, Violence, and Sacrifice.” Free Associations: Psychoanalysis and Culture, Media, Groups Politics, vol. 61, May 2011, pp. 35-60.

Rosenfield, Claire. “Men of a Smaller Growth: A Psychological Analysis of William Golding's ‘Lord of the Flies.’” Literature and Psychology, vol. 11.4, 1961, pp. 93-101. Autumn.

Spitz, David. “Power and Authority: An Interpretation of Golding's ‘Lord of the Flies.’” The Antioch Review, vol. 30, no. 1, 1970, pp. 21-33.

Sugimura, Yasunori. “Golding as a Psychological Novelist.” Kawauchi Review, vol. 5, Mar. 2006, pp. 49-63.

Van Vuuren, Marijke. “Good Grief: Lord of the Flies as a Post-War Rewriting of Salvation History.” Literator, vol. 25, no. 2, Aug. 2004, pp. 1-26.