Fear In Lord Of The Flies Essay

Fear can act as an extremely powerful motive in the subconscious mind. We tend to interpret having fear as being scared of something like the dark, for example. But this is not its only effect. Fear can act as a subconscious control over the mind. It can influence your actions and drive you to do things against people whom were once your friends. This can cost dearly in both your happiness and your reputation. When the boys first arrived at the island they were all nice British school boys who followed the rules, but then quickly deteriorated into malicious killing savages. The physical and psychological deterioration of the boys in The Lord of the Flies is largely due to how the emotional experience of fear is powerful enough to spark off several other emotions like a trail of dominoes. ‘Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering’. This quote is a famous line spoken by Master Yoda in Star Wars whilst giving wise advice to Luke Skywalker. This advice can also be looked at in The Lord of the Flies. It gives a fantastic portrayal of how one feeling or emotion can trigger off several others
The Beast kicks fear into the boys all of which except Simon who doesn’t believe in it. Simon is probably the quietest of the boys on the island but at the same time, the wisest. He realises that the Beast will only exist if you believe in it as the fear created puts an image into your head and causes you to be scared by the Beast. The fear created by the Beast highly deteriorates the boys as shown when they brutally murder Simon. They do this out of fear rather than hatred, a feeling created by the false imagery of the Beast. Simon never did anything wrong, he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time so to speak. Therefore, the act of murder represents the fear which the boys have which shows how much it is responsible for their