Dan Buschmeyer
10-29-13
A
Tuesday Write 8: Lord of the flies and Lost connections.
(MAJOR SPOILERS)
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| Boone from LOST |
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| Simon from Lord of the Flies |
JJ Abram’s LOST and William Golding’s Lord of the flies are very similar in plot as well as symbols, characters, and motifs. An extraordinary symbol presented to the read is the connect of Simon as a Christ-like/messiah character, of on his own, discovering things of the island and conflicting the central antagonist of the Island. Many viewers of Lost might not remember Boone, but his connections to Simon as well a messiah are relevant to this paper.
The first noticeable connection to a messiah is when Boone finds the Dharma Hatch, which serves as a “Holy Land” to the survivors, Almost all religious beliefs focus on the child of god bringing his people to a promised land, a sanctuary where they are safe from others and the wrath of the environment. The safety from The Others and the safety from The Beast both create Boone as an allegory for Christ.
The second connection is the hallucinations that both Simon and Boone have of the beast, Simon's visions is of the Lord of the Flies speaking to him, saying that the beast that they all fear is nothing they can hunt because it is the violence inside the kids hearts. Boone’s vision takes place after John Locke, another spiritual character, drugs Boone for no reason, other than to see what the island will say to him. The hallucination is Boone being tied to a log with a knife in front of him, the only way out was to break his own arm. Boone calls and begs for help, only to hear calls from his sister, Shannon. Shannon is also crying for help, so Boone selflessly snaps his arm and cuts Shannon free, just as The Black Smoke arrives. Running for their lives Shannon and Boone make it to an clearing of the forest to a river, but not fast enough, The Beast grasps Shannon and brutally kills her, leaving her body in the river. Boone holds her then runs back to camp and tackles Locke. Locke points out that it was all a dream, and that Shannon is still alive and unharmed and it was only the island trying to speak to him. Locke asks how it felt for him to see Shannon dead, and Boone replies, “Relieved”. Boone separates himself from Shannon and spends all his time listening to the island with Locke. This change from a material man to a spiritual man is a clear example of a movement from the age of material need to a development of new ideas and cultural creation, similar to the movement of Christianity throughout the middle ages
The third connection comes upon when Boone and Simon are sacrificed to the island. In Lord of the Flies, Simon’s death is an allegory for Christ’s suffering and death for our sins. Boone’s death is similar, after climbing into a crashed plane to call for help the plane falls, crushing his body. The pallor of his face showed when Locke dragged him back to Jack, the only man who could save him. Jack is without bounds attempting to keep more people from dying, He performed his own blood transfusion on Boone, because he is the only O blood type. Before attempting to cut off Boone’s leg to stop the bleeding, Boone awakes from his coma and begs Jack to tell his sister he loves her and perishes, the first main character death on the island. A sacrifice to the island as well as the spiritual battle between the Beast and both these characters make Lost and Lord of the Flies an allegory for a religious and spiritual conflict between the Prince of Darkness and the Messiah like character.
In conclusion, characters, motifs, and symbols are all related between Lost and Lord of the flies, From Beelzebub and The Black Smoke, to Boone and Simon, all creations of biblical origins of evil and destruction are represented by Abrams and Golding. Good is sparse but important, as is death, sacrifice to the island ensures the evil on the island stays at bay.
