Differentiate Between Good And Evil

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

To the reversal of The Lord of the Flies, The Inheritors (1955) his second novel begins with innocence, which H.G.Well’s Outline of History (1920) warns us of the Neanderthal man being bumped off by the Homosapines. The Neanderthal tribe noted for compassion and communal harmony is doomed after they met the civilized Cro-Magons, Golding himself considers this novel to be his finest masterpiece because it deals with the theory of evolution where the fallible human inherit the Neanderthal peaceful environment and leads the Inheritors to commit genocide giving us a picture of the end of innocence with the New people inheriting the place with darkness within and around them. This visualizes the extermination of the Jewish race that Hitler propounded for the survival of the fittest. Pincher Martin (1956), like that of Robinson Crusoe concentrates on the individual realization of the past during his last hour facing death after his ship is torpedoed. Clung on to a rock, out of his sheer desire to survive, he realizes his power of will and self-assertion fails to rescue him, as evil has been manifested within himself. He is a dominant person on the world of eating and killing where his selfish inferno shadows metaphorically the absence of innocence. Golding again highlights the conflict of sinful life and realizes that there are really challenging powers in the world. Golding being a spiritual man brings in the idea that "God" is our everything and he is our refuge and Golding gives a solution "God is the thing we turn away from into life, and therefore we hate and fear him and make a darkness there" (qtd Kulkarni 152).

The Free Fall (1959) set in the contemporary society is nothing but a novel of the act of will and Sammy submitting his life to lust. Given a dramatic form of guiltiness and like Milton’s Paradise Lost it hints at the original sin. Golding’s view towards Christian life is lured in every of his novel. He believes in the removal of egoistical notion in life. Golding through Sammy gives a vision of a descending nature of man who victimizes the weaker sex, no matter how true and valuable they are. Beatrice is exploited sexually though she remains sincere and devoted. He cries for his end of innocence and tortures himself in the cell. Golding gives his characters a sense of resurrection in all of his novels which is also given to Sammy at the end when he is fit to face his final ordeal at the last minute of his life.

A novel that shares some of the ideas of Iris Murdoch’s novel The Bell (1958) is Golding’s The Spire (1964). With corruption and egoistic will, Dean Jocelin is ready to sacrifice his fellow members on his sole decision to build the spire. He does not give penance for humility nor does he give up his unconquering faith to build the spire against all the laws of nature. Blind and deaf to reality Jocelin accumulates evil where utmost forgiveness is rejected. He is guilty of his sins at the end with his refracting consciousness at the end.

The Pyramid (1967) is again like The Inheritors and Pincher Martin is about the loveless relationship of Oliver. As a martyrdom he is a victim of the system of War and disgust at human sexuality.

The historical triology Rites of Passage (1980), Close Quarters (1987) and Fire Down Below (1983) portrays the life of Napoleanic Wars. It reached the height of success where it won the booker prize. It gives a destination of concern over the nature of good and evil. Golding’s The Paper Men (1984) again narrates the life of Wilfred Barclay who refuses to have Tucker as his biographer. The entire novel gives a precarious picture of Barclay’s damnation and salvation. His mysterious life, the filthy truth in his past life pushed Barclay to be isolated from the light of the world. Golding’s The Paper Men , may be called as an autobiographical novel where he is caught between his sinful life and his self where he is called as a poorly defined individual.

The Double Tongue (1995) which was published two years after his death, tells the story of an old woman Arieka, the protagonist who surveys her life in terms of the utmost equivocation. She was chosen to become a Pythia, the voice of Apollo’s oracle at Delphi and becomes involved in fraud and high politics along with Ionides who is gay, cynical and charming. This novel concentrates on the darkness of man and how arbitrarily power is wielded through skeptism and how always women are instruments to be played on by God’s or men. Golding seems to pose the question, Are the priest and priestess true to their service to God and their service to humanity? Golding adapts the myth into the modern concept and examines the diseased human nature. Throughout the novel, Golding’s delightful description of the ancient landscape and culture continues to fascinate the readers. The novel’s reflections on the traps and trappings of high politics are enhanced through the conversations which Arieka and Ionides have with the Roman Proprietor, Lucia Galba. Golding’s handling of Ionides end and Arieka’s final revelation cleverly combines abstract philosophical ideas with a fast-moving narrative

Golding is different from his contemporaries not only in handling the form of the genre but content too. Philip Redpath comments on the art of Golding and says: "Golding’s art is an art of discovery but not an art that seeks to explain. The discovery it makes is that the universe is inexplicable and cannot be wholly described in words and yet words are all the novelist has with which to describe the universe" (13).

Golding visualizes the universe as "Cosmic Chaos". He seems to suggest that the Universal order defies all rational efforts to fully grasp its complexity and to resolve its seeming contradictions. In Golding’s universe, the fall of man is a destined event as he moves from innocence to experience. While he is akin to the Greek tragedians in his preoccupation with the human tragedy he also resembles Melville and Conrad in his emphasis on the natural chaos of existence. In Golding’s world chaos manifests itself in various forms and Golding’s fiction focuses on the significant aspect of man struggling for order and encountering in the process ,chaos within and without.

The vision of William Golding can be characterized as apocalyptic vision Northrop Fyre in his The Great Code defines the apocalyptic vision: "The panoramic apocalypse is the vision of staggering marvels placed in a near future and just before the end of time… This in turn means that it is essentially a projection of the subjective knowledge of good and evil acquired at the fall .(136)

It seems that the end of an individual’s life as well as the end of the world is anticipated and visualized with a sense of horror. His novels are a revelation of the historical processes of human blunders and crimes resulting in sorrow and suffering which has cast an ominous shadow over the future of man. From the publication of his first novel itself , Golding seems to be preoccupied with the theme of the fate of man on this planet. The disintegration of human entity and disruption of the moral fabric of life are visualized in terms of apocalyptic structures which form the basic pattern of Golding’s major novels.

Both Thomas Hardy and William Golding are intensely preoccupied with the fundamental problems of human existence. Their novels communicate a tragic sense of humanity. Hardy and Golding are very sensitive and keen observers of life. Pain, suffering and disappointment are outstanding characteristics of human existence. The World Wars made them realize what one man could do to another and man’s inhumanity to man. Fishing in the deep and treacherous river of life they have found more evil than good. Golding considers man as morally diseased creature and Hardy looks upon man as an impulsive creature. Both the novelists are concerned with the darkness that exists in the heart of human beings. They explore this darkness in their novels. They penetrate deep into the human psyche. Furthermore, their novels are an examination of human nature on a universal level. Hardy and Golding probe deeper into man’s nature, not only in relation with man but also in relation with his society and universe. Golding has visualized the universe as "Cosmic Chaos". Man must learn to live with the natural chaos of existence. Hardy is conscious of the "Immutability of Nature" and the struggles of human personalities in the universe. The predicament of the modern man is their theme and they explore tragedies in personal as well as universal aspects. In fact their novels are detailed and developed pictures of what the world is like and how the human beings are placed in it and how by consequence they ought to live. It is true that a vein of melancholy runs through their novels. But they are not downright pessimists. They have faith in humanity. They are not like swift who depicts man himself as a degraded contemptible creature. Hardy and Golding believe in human values and virtues. Though they have given us a tragic vision of life, they have faith in the spirit of man and that human life could be better if man would care for it in the right spirit. They share a common concern for the betterment of humanity.