What was the creature in the Lord of the Flies?

Answer 1

What does the snake.... I am going to guess that you might have intended to ask 'what does the snake symbolize?' In which case I say that the snake-thing represents the childish and irrational fear of the unknown. Logic should tell the boys that the garble tale told by a distressed six year old was a mixture of nightmare imagery, fear of being in an unfamiliar location without his parents and fear of the dark. Logic should have told the boys that snakes don't turn into creepers during the day light, logic should have told the boys that if the snake-thing had wanted to eat the littlun then he wouldn't be there, it would simply have ate him. Logic told them that there was no snake-thing and yet, the illogical and irrational fear of the unknown and mass hysteria eventually convinced almost every boy on the island of the existence of an increasing more and more illogical and unlikely beast.

Answer 2

Although on the surface the littlun's report of seeing a snake-thing is met with derisive laughter there seems to be an underlying feeling, especially among the other littluns, or an uneasy recognition of his fears and a fear that there may even be an element of truth in what the boy with the mulberry coloured birthmark on his face has said.

Answer 3

Only one boy claimed to have saw what he described as a snake-thing or beastie. That boy was the littlun with the mulberry coloured birthmark on his face. The description included remarks such as... "It came in the dark...It came and went away again an' came back and wanted to eat him... In the morning it turned into them things like ropes in the trees and hung in the trees, and will it come back to-night?" When you consider that the description was made by a six year old boy, who had just survived being jettisoned from a plane during a storm, a boy who had spent the night in the open in an unfamiliar jungle, probably alone for the first time in his life. There may just possibly have been a snake but it was probablly a vine or creeper swinging around in the storm. It is pretty obvious however that the rest of the decription is a combination of nightmare imagery and childish imagination coupled with genuine fear of the dark and the unknown.

Answer 4

The creature in "Lord of the Flies" is a manifestation of the boys' primal fears and the dark side of human nature. It represents the savagery that lies within each individual, particularly when removed from society's constraints. The creature is ultimately revealed to be a dead parachutist.

Answer 5

The "beast" was dead fighter pilot that ejected from his plane before dying. he is still attatched to his parachute, which makes it appear like he is moving.

Answer 6

The snake thing is another term for, the beastie.