William Golding's novel “Lord of the Flies” is an exploration of the idea of the wild natural instinct of human evil. It is suggested that Golding's novel is partly based on his real-life experiences with the violence and brutality of the Second World War. The novel defines the struggle within all human beings to distinguish between the learned civilized instinct and the wild human instinct. The civilized instinct is the impulse to obey rules, behave morally, and act lawfully. The wild instinct is the impulse to seek brute power over others, act selfishly, forget morals, and indulge in violence. At the beginning of the novel the boys elect Ralph as a leader with a strong civilized instinct. He quickly tries to restore order and direction to the boys stranded on the island. Ralph appoints Jack as leader of the hunters in charge of hunting and keeping the signal fire burning. At the beginning all the kids still have the civil instinct that they have learned as a moral foundation. This is evident from the fact that Jack cannot kill a pig caught on a vine in the t...
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