: Are writers and film-makers responsible for the interpretation of their own texts? Essay

As seen with William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, composers of texts are not responsible for the interpretation of their works as the reading of a text is greatly influenced by the audience’s personal beliefs and ideals. Texts such as Lord of the Flies have been so greatly scrutinised since being published that it is impossible to contribute one’s reading and interpretation of the text solely to the author. Influences and beliefs such as those demonstrated from a Christian, Marxist and Freudian viewpoint make it apparent that the characters, themes, motifs and underlying meanings within Lord of the Flies can be interpreted in any number of ways and, as such, writers are not responsible for the interpretation of their own texts.

The nature of Golding’s text is such that it allows a multiplicity of potential readings and, as a result, many have interpreted the Lord of the Flies differently to the author. A widely believed interpretation of the text is that from a Christian perspective. Throughout the text, the island on which the boys are stranded is associated with Eden: a beautiful, pristine and verdant garden, surrounded by darkness and violence. They live free of all constraints of the modern adult world. Like Adam and Eve, the boys are not aware of the capacity for evil that lies within them and, as upper-class British schoolboys, their initial reaction to being on the island is one of excitement at the absence of adults, as well as one of faith that they will be able to establish a civilized society like the one to which they are accustomed (Oldsey, 1965, p. 29). The Christian interpretation of the text draws parallels between the clairvoyant character of Simon and Jesus Christ, Simon being the one who arrives at the moral truth of the novel, and ultimately is killed sacrificially by the other boys as a consequence of having discovered this truth; he is killed as the beast, while trying to impart that there is no beast. The most gentle, compassionate, and...