Survival Defense Mechanisms in Lord of the Flies

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CHAPTERS (5 to 8) Marria Qibtia Sikandar The novel “Lord of the Flies” is a constitution of human psychology that aptly explores the dynamics of human nature with particular reference to the primal survival instinct that is well embedded within each individual. Survival Instinct acts as a center pin that gels the novel and relates it to the chief theme of the novel, the tendency of man for evil. Golding wrote the novel as a reaction to the destructive World War Two that was intended as a “war to end all wars”. Initially Golding, as he states in his essay “Fable”, contended that “a reorganization of the society” was possible through the “removal of social ills.” His contentions received unbearable thrashing as a consequence of the World War, compelling him to realize the fact that “man produces evil as a bee produces honey”, which he advocates in his novel, Lord of the Flies .With respect to the conundrum of the boys in the novel, Golding remarked, “the boys try to construct a civilization on the island; but it breaks down in blood and terror because the boys are suffering from the terrible disease of being human”. Being human, they are not void of the inherent streak of evil that permeates their character which is a by -product of their survival instinct. Idea of Survival instinct, though chiefly heralded by Darwin by the exposition of his theory of the “survival of the fittest”, has been propagated by other notable theorists, philosophers and intellectuals. Thomas Hobbes in his famous book “Leviathan” opines that “Whether we assert that we are killers or not, why then do we lock the doors of our house at night”. He opined that Survival and evil share a close nexus. For survival in a competitive environment man employs evil, to salve his ego. Freud views this in a similar avatar. To him man is governed by his survival instinct which impels him to employ a wide

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