摘 要

《蝇王》作为英国著名小说家同时也是诺贝尔奖获得者威廉·戈尔丁的著作，通过对纯真孩童的发展变化的描写，揭示出人性中的邪恶，由此引发读者对人性的反思。人性一直是中外学者广为讨论的话题，本文着重于人性的研究，基于对主人公的性格缺陷与野兽真相的分析，探讨主人公对人性恶的漠视，从他们自欺自人行为中探究其对人性恶的托辞。同时，本文认为每个人的本性皆恶，区别在于人们如何对待人性恶，逃避反思人性实际上就是对人性恶的漠视。本文旨在让读者更加全面地了解《蝇王》中人性的观点，意识到人性中邪恶的一面，进行自我探究与自我反思，杜绝托辞与漠视，学会自我控制与自我约束，不断弘扬人性善，这才是正确对待人性弊端的正确方式。

关键词：《蝇王》；人性恶；漠视；托辞

Lord of the Flies, written by William Golding, a famous British novelist and Nobel Prize winner, reveals evil humanity from the development of innocent children, and triggers readers to rethink themselves. Humanity has always been considered as the main research direction of literature and discussed widely at home and abroad. The thesis puts the focus of study on human evil, based on the analysis of the protagonists' character flaws and the beast's truth, revealing their pretermssion to human evil and probing into their pretexts of evil humanity from their self-deception. Also, the thesis points out that everyone is same with the evil inherent nature, yet the difference lies in the manner and attitude toward it. To evade reflecting on human nature is virtually a pretermission for human nature. It is expected that the thesis is conducive to allowing readers to fully understand the view of human nature in Lord of the Flies, to realizing the evilness in human nature, to conducting self-inquiry and self-reflection. It's imperative to eliminate pretermission and pretext, to master self-control and self-discipline, and continue to carry on the goodness, which is the correct way to deal with the inherent evil and recognize oneself.

Key Words: Lord of the Flies; human evil; pretermission; pretext

1. Introduction 1
2. Literature Review 3
3. Brief Introduction of the Characters in Lord of the Flies 5
   1. Ralph: vanguard of order and civilization 5
   2. Jack: representative of evil and savage 5
   3. Simon: embodiment of fact and truth 6
   4. Piggy: incarnation of science and reason 6
4. Pretermission of Human Evil 8
   1. Character defects: non-perfect, idealism and barbarism 8
   2. Truth of lord of flies 9
5. Pretext for Human Evil 11
   1. Self-deception: face paint 11

5.3 Pretext for Simon’s death 13

1. Reflection on Human Evil 15
2. Conclusion 17

References 18

Acknowledgements 19

Pretermission and Pretext for Human Evil as Reflected in Lord of the Flies

Introduction

William Golding, a British novelist, graduated from Oxford University. He joined the Royal Navy in 1940 and after World War II, he embarked on his writing and then became a schoolteacher. It was the war experiences that imprinted profoundly on his outlook on life and view of humanity, with far-reaching effects on his writing. His great sensation came with his first novel, Lord of the Flies, he resumed to hammer at literary writing, publishing Pincher Martin, The Brass Butterfly, Free Fall, The Spire and so on. Symbolism, absurdity, sarcasticism, etc used in his works render his language plain but dignified.

Lord of the Flies, one of his masterpieces in 1954, has aroused widespread concerns in the literatus and Golding himself won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983 and became one of the most acclaimed writers. Being regarded as a model of English literature, Lord of the Flies highlighted the theme that Golding relentlessly explored---the goodness and evil in humanity, and established Golding’s reputation. And humanity evil is a signal that Golding sent to all of human beings. (Zhang yinghong, 2014) He warns the world that kindness requires civilized protection; without the civilization, goodness is powerless to overcome evil.