When William Golding sat down to write his masterpiece, he wasn't just thinking about a bunch of schoolboys stranded on an island. He was thinking about the beast within. You've probably heard about the "Beastie" or the "Lord of the Flies" itself, but the way Golding uses the Lord of the Flies animal imagery is way more complex than just a scary monster in the woods. It's about how humans project their own inner darkness onto the natural world.
Honestly, it’s kind of terrifying.
Golding was a veteran of World War II. He saw the worst of what people could do to each other. When he wrote about the boys, he didn't use animals as simple metaphors. He used them to show the slow, agonizing crawl from civilization back into the dirt. From the tiny "littluns" being compared to insects to the massive, rotting sow's head on a stick, the animal imagery in this book isn't just window dressing. It's the whole point.
Why the Lord of the Flies Animal Isn't Just a Pig
Most people think of the pig when they hear about the Lord of the Flies animal. Specifically, the sow. But the "Beast" starts as something much more vague. It's a "snake-thing." A "beastie." It's a product of the boys' collective fear.
Think about the psychology here.
In the beginning, the boys try to name it. They want to categorize it. That’s a very human thing to do, right? If you can name something, you can control it. But as the boys lose their grip on their British upbringing, the animals on the island stop being things to study and start being things to fear—or things to kill.
The shift from the "snake" (which echoes the Garden of Eden, obviously) to the "beast from air" is a huge turning point. That beast from the air? It’s just a dead parachutist. A human. But the boys see it as a monster. This is where Golding gets really clever. He shows us that the real Lord of the Flies animal is actually the human animal. We are the predators. We are the ones who bring the violence to the island. The animals are just caught in the crossfire.
The Sow as a Perversion of Nature
The scene where Jack and his hunters kill the nursing sow is arguably the most disturbing part of the book. It’s not just a hunt. It’s a violation. Golding describes it with a level of intensity that feels almost predatory.
- The boys don't just kill for food anymore.
- They kill for the "right" to be violent.
- The sow is a mother, a symbol of life and nurturing, and they tear her apart.
When they jam her head onto a sharpened stick as a gift for the beast, she becomes the "Lord of the Flies." The name itself is a translation of "Beelzebub," a prince of demons. So, the Lord of the Flies animal becomes a physical manifestation of their descent into savagery. It’s a rotting, buzzing mess that talks to Simon in his hallucinations. It tells him the truth that the others are too scared to face: "I’m part of you."
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Snakes, Butterflies, and the "Littluns"
It isn't all just about the big, scary pigs. Golding uses smaller animals to set the mood.
Early on, Simon is surrounded by butterflies. They represent a sort of pure, untouched nature. But notice what happens later. As the island descends into chaos, those butterflies disappear or are ignored. The air becomes thick with flies instead. It’s a literal and symbolic shift from beauty to decay.
Then you’ve got the littluns. Golding often describes them in ways that make them seem less than human. They are like "insects" or "apes." They scurry. They don't have voices in the assembly. By using this Lord of the Flies animal language to describe the youngest boys, Golding is showing how the hierarchy of the island is becoming more about biological strength than social order.
If you’re not the predator, you’re the prey.
Piggy’s name is the most obvious example. From the very first page, he is marked. He is the "pig" that will eventually be slaughtered. It’s a bit on the nose, sure, but it works because it links the human characters directly to the animals they are hunting. When Jack says, "I'll give you meat," he’s not just talking about food. He’s talking about power. He’s talking about the bloodlust that has replaced his desire to be rescued.
The Beast from the Water
There’s a moment where the boys debate whether the beast comes from the sea. Percival, one of the smallest boys, suggests this, and it sends a shiver through the group.
The sea is vast. It’s unknown.
By suggesting the Lord of the Flies animal lives in the water, the boys are acknowledging that the threat is something they can’t see or reach. It’s subconscious. It’s the "id" in Freudian terms. Maurice tries to rationalize it by saying his father said there are giant squids that can eat a whole boat, but that doesn't help. The fear isn't about biology; it's about the feeling that they are being watched by something that belongs to the wild, not the classroom.
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What Most People Get Wrong About the "Beast"
A lot of students—and honestly, a lot of casual readers—think the Beast is a real thing within the logic of the story. Like, they're looking for a literal monster. But the Lord of the Flies animal is a mirror.
When Simon goes up the mountain and sees the dead parachutist, he realizes the "beast" is just a man. A dead, decaying man who was a victim of a war the boys are currently mimicking on a smaller scale.
Simon is the only one who understands this.
He tries to go back and tell the others, but what happens? They're in the middle of a ritual dance. They're chanting. They've become a "throb of a single organism." They are no longer individuals; they are a pack. And in their pack mentality, they see Simon as the beast and kill him.
The irony is thick enough to choke on. They kill the only person who has the "human" knowledge that the beast isn't real, and they do it because they've fully embraced their "animal" side.
The Dog and the Transformation of Ralph
Even Ralph, the "good" guy, isn't immune.
At one point, Ralph is described as "snarling" or "biting the air." He starts to lose his ability to speak clearly. He loses his "human" trait of logical communication and starts relying on instinct. The Lord of the Flies animal imagery tracks this perfectly. By the end of the book, Ralph is being hunted like a pig. The boys use the same tactics—the line of hunters, the "ululation" (that weird, howling noise), and the sharpened stick—to try and kill their former leader.
He isn't Ralph anymore. He’s "the prey."
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This is why the ending is so gut-wrenching. When the naval officer shows up, he sees a group of "dirty" boys with "sticks in their hands." He doesn't see the monsters they’ve become. He just sees a "jolly good show" of British boys playing at war. But Ralph cries. He cries for the "end of innocence" and the "darkness of man's heart." He knows that the Lord of the Flies animal isn't back on the mountain. It's inside him. It's inside the officer. It’s everywhere.
Actionable Insights for Reading (or Re-reading) the Text
If you’re diving back into this book for a class or just for fun, don’t just look at the plot. Look at the verbs.
Golding uses "animal" verbs for the boys and "human" verbs for the animals to create a sense of uncanny displacement. It's a technique that makes the reader feel uneasy without necessarily knowing why.
- Track the insects: Notice how flies are used whenever evil or decay is present. They are the heralds of the Lord of the Flies.
- Observe the "Beast" evolution: Write down every time a boy describes the beast. It changes from a snake to a "thing" to a "ghost" to a "pig" to a "human." This progression is the roadmap of their psychological breakdown.
- Analyze the Hunt: Look at the three main hunts. Each one gets progressively more disorganized and more violent. The first one they fail. The second one they kill the sow. The third one they hunt a human.
Basically, the Lord of the Flies animal is a tool Golding uses to strip away the "thin veneer" of civilization. He wants to show us that under the right (or wrong) circumstances, the distance between a schoolboy and a predator is much smaller than we’d like to admit.
Take a look at your own reactions to the violence in the book. If you find yourself rooting for the "hunt" even for a second, Golding has won. He’s proven his point. The beast isn't something out there in the dark. It’s right here.
To truly understand the depth of this theme, re-read the conversation between Simon and the pig's head. It’s the most important dialogue in the book, and it’s technically a monologue. Simon is talking to his own realization. He is looking into the eyes of the Lord of the Flies animal and seeing the reflection of his own species.
That is the true horror of the island. It’s not that they are alone with a monster; it’s that they are alone with themselves.
When you're writing an essay or discussing this in a book club, focus on the "Lord of the Flies" as a psychological entity. Avoid the trap of calling it a "monster movie" trope. It's a critique of human nature that uses the animal kingdom as a yardstick for our own failures.
Next Steps for Deeper Analysis:
- Cross-reference the "Beast" descriptions: Compare the "snake-thing" mentioned by the boy with the birthmark in Chapter 2 to the description of the dead pilot in Chapter 6. Notice how the boys' vocabulary for the "animal" narrows as their fear increases.
- Examine the "Gift for the Darkness": Look at the ritualistic elements Jack introduces. This isn't just hunting; it's a form of primitive religion where the Lord of the Flies animal is the deity.
- Read Golding's "Fable" essay: Golding himself wrote about why he chose these symbols. He intended the book to be a "fable" about the defects of human society being traced back to the defects of human nature. Use his own words to back up your interpretation of the "animal" themes.
By looking at the text through this specific lens, you'll see that Golding wasn't just writing a story about survival. He was writing a warning. The animals on the island—the pigs, the flies, the imagined snakes—are all just placeholders for the darkness we carry with us, even when we're wearing school uniforms and polished shoes.