Skip to main content

Do characters display any similar qualities/traits in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet and William Golding's Lord of the Flies?

In both Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet and William Golding's Lord of the Flies, due to the character trait of hotheadedness, characters regress to acting on instincts rather than on rational thought; furthermore, their instincts drive them to act upon wild, passionate emotions.

In Romeo and Juliet, Tybalt serves as one example of a character who acts based on the primal instincts of wild, passionate emotions as a result of his hotheaded, fiery temper. One example can be seen in even the very first scene. The moment the two Capulet servants, Sampson and Gregory, break out into a fight with the two Montague servants, Abraham and Balthasar, Benvolio rushes out to break up the fight, saying, "Part, fools! / Put up your swords; you know not what you do," and according to the stage direction, "beats down their swords" with his own (I.i.50-51). Yet, Tybalt sees Benvolio with his sword drawn and, rather than rationally assessing the situation, as a result of his fiery temper, is driven by his instincts to conclude that Benvolio has started a fight with the servants and rushes out with his own sword to join the fray. Had he had a calmer, more rational temper, Tybalt would have used his rational thoughts to recognized what Benvolio was really doing and joined him in trying to make peace.

Similarly, in Lord of the Flies, the boys on the island are driven by instincts to act on passionate emotions rather than on rational thought. Such instincts lead to heinous acts, including the murders of Simon and Piggy, and it is primarily Jack, an equally hotheaded and even arrogant boy, who leads the boys to act upon their wild, instinctive emotions.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Is 'efficate' a word in English?

I routinely hear the word "efficate" being used. For example, "The most powerful way to efficate a change in the system is to participate." I do not find entries for this word in common English dictionaries, but I do not have an unabridged dictionary. I have checked the OED (I'm not sure if it is considered unabridged), and it has no entry for "efficate". It does have an entry for "efficiate", which is used in the same way. Wordnik has an entry for "efficate" with over 1800 hits, thus providing some evidence for the frequency of use. I personally like the word and find the meaning very clear and obvious when others use it. If it's not currently an "officially documented" word, perhaps its continued use will result in it being better documented.
Post a Comment
Read more