A comparison of the storm scenes in lord of the flies by William Golding and Far from the madding crowd by Thomas Hardy William Golding was born in Cornwall in the earlier part of last century, his father was a teacher and his mother was an activist for the votes for women movement. He too became a teacher like his father after attending university. During the Second World War he was in the navy and was involved in the d-day landings. This experience during the war showed him how brutal people could be and may have given him the inspiration to write his book.
Thomas Hardy lived in Dorset and based most of his books on where he lived . “Far From The Madding Crowd” is set in and around Dorset and is based and is passed on the life of the rural community in the late 19th century. Firstly we must analyse the titles of the two stories. Lord of the flies is another phrase for the devil or Satan, the devil is a symbol of evil. Jack on the island wants to be ‘Lord’ or the leader and he is portrayed in the book as an evil person; so therefore represent’s the lord of evil or the main ringleader on the island. I then think that he represents the devil.
Far from the madding crowd is based on Thomas Hardy’s area of Dorset. The title represents his time in Dorset and how far away it is from many main cities and towns. It is a telling of the seclusion of the many rural areas in Dorset. In “The Lord Of The Flies” the main storm scene is where Simon tries to explain the beast to the others. By this time the rest, bar Ralph and Piggy, have become tribal like savages and have pushed away the rules of society. When the storm breaks Simon tries to tell that the beast isn’t real, that it was only a parachutist who has landed on top of the hill and looks like is moving because of the wind.
Simon is then killed or murdered by the tribe who think that he is the beast as it is dark and they are full of adrenaline because of the chanting that they have been doing. During the storm scene in “Far From the Madding Crowd Gabriel is trying to save the stacks of hay from blowing away because much money would be lost for the farm if they were to be destroyed. The sergeant by this time has made it obvious that he does not care and does not know enough to do anything with the farm. He cares not for what will happen to the farm because he is in the barn getting drunk with the other men.
In “the Lord Of the Flies” the first sign that the storm is coming is ‘ up there for once, were clouds, great bulging towers that sprouted away over the island, grey and cream and copper coloured. The clouds were sitting on the land ; they squeezed and produced moment by moment, this close tormenting heat’. From this quote it shows that what is happening in the sky is reflecting what is happening on the ground. ‘ Great bulging towers’, this is a reflection of the boys anger with each other , it is like there anger is bulging ready to burst and to come out in one big storm.
‘ grey and cream and copper coloured’, through this you can see that the clouds are slowly getting darker much like the moods of the boys on the island. ‘They squeezed and produced moment by moment’, this is much like the boys anger, growing ever bigger and larger getting ready to burst at any moment. In Hardy’s novel the quotes that show the storm is coming are ‘ a heated breeze’ this is trying to say that the relationships between everybody are ‘hotting up’ as the storm approaches.
‘ The fields are sallow with the impure light’, this is as if the world in which they are in has been tainted in some way or is being looked through a blurred glass. This may be because Bathsheba is confused with all of the attention she is getting from the three men and is now looking on the world in a different way. This may be a reason why Oak and Troy are angry in someway with Bathsheba because she does not know how to return all of the feelings they are giving to her. This may be because she is young and is not used to men giving their affections towards her.
She cannot think of a way to return the love and affection they give her without hurting one of the others feelings. The storm may come into existence because of the tension between all of the different men as they all fell for Bathshba. ‘ All were tinged in monochrome as if beheld through stained glass’, this shows much of what I have said above, monochrome, meaning black and white or shady, means that the three men were being looked at as if they were different because Bathsheba does not know if and why they have affection for her.
She therefore cannot pinpoint their alignment to her in her mind the feelings that they try to show her are blurred. ‘As if beheld through stained glass’, is trying to heighten the effect of the blurred personalities that Bathsheba is trying to work out. This is showing that as the storm approaches the feelings and emotions that they are portraying towards her become more and more confusing to understand. The confusion that Bathsheba is in may account for some of the ferociousness of the storm because she has to bottle up the questions that she wants to ask these men.
And so therefore not getting annoyed with them only but with herself also for not being able to ask the questions that she wants answered and telling the men straight what she thinks about them. ‘ That I only stepped ath art to say that heavy rain is due to fall soon’, this is an obvious quote from Gabriel oak to say that there will be a storm coming. This is a way of showing his affection to Bathsheba and that he is “better” than her current husband sergeant Troy, who does not know the ways of the country farming life.
This shows that Gabriel cares for Bathsheba as he does not want the ricks to get damaged by the rain and the wind, he wants to show that by saying this he cares for her and her assets. Also he wants to show off his talent to her by showing her that her knows the way of the countryside. ‘Mr Troy says that it will not rain’ , this is an important quote as it is showing that troy wants to look better than Gabriel by asserting his power over him and also look as if he knows what he is doing.
Troy may also know that it is going to rain and is just saying this to spite Gabriel because he knows that Gabriel likes Bathsheba so he does not want Bathsheba to think that Gabriel is better than he is. His anger may be a part of the storm as a bit of jealousy over Gabriel being able to get so close to his wife. ‘ Huge brown garden slug’, this is a natural sign in the book that a storm is coming, this shows Gabriel that it is going to get wet because when it rains slugs tend to come out because they enjoy the damp environment.
This explanation is backed up by the second quote of ‘ It was natures second way of hinting to him that he was to prepare for foul weather’, this quote is explaining the reason why the slug has come out. It is a conformation of his prior thoughts that it was going to be bad weather. ‘ They were crowded close together’, this shows to Gabriel for a third time that he was right about the weather because when it is going to rain animals huddle together. ‘ They now had a terror of something far greater than the terror of man’, this explains why they are huddled together in such a manner.
They are like that because they are scared of the wind and the rain and what it might do to them. Gabriel knows this and is getting frustrated with Troy because he will not accept his point of view about the ricks. ‘ Every voice in nature was unanimous… This complication of weathers being uncommon was all the more to be feared’. This whole block explains how nature is reacting to the up and coming storm. Animals are supposed to be the most in tune with nature and in this paragraph it suggests that this storm is nothing like they have ever seen before. The sheep don’t know that the rain is coming but do know about the storm.
Where as the other creatures know that the rain is coming but do not know about the storm. This shows that if the animals do not even know, Gabriel can figure out that the storm is going to be big and heavy. ‘ Time went on, and the moon vanished but not to reappear.. , Which might have been linked to a death, and now was nothing’. Through this you can see that this is the classical phrase known as the calm before the storm. Everything is leaving to hide away from the storm. Hardy explains this as if ‘ it was the farewell of the ambassador previous to war’; meaning that there was no more room for discussion, the storm was immanent.
