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Lord Of The Flies Chapter 11 Summary {Step By Step Guide}
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Lord Of The Flies Chapter 11 Summary | Castle Rock Summary
Early in the morning, Ralph blows on the ashes of the fire to try to get any hot spot to restart the fire, but he cannot make fire without Piggy’s glasses. Piggy can see very little.
He needs someone to help him move around. Ralph is very angry at Jack for stealing the glasses that made fire possible. Piggy is very upset that Jack has stolen the glasses that made Piggy’s sight possible.
Piggy asks Ralph to blow the conch and call a meeting. A couple of littluns come, but no older boys, except for Ralph, Piggy, Sam, and Eric (Samneric).
Note: The author, William Golding, uses Sam and Eric to represent the average person, a person who does not have a strong sense of individuality, a person who is a follower.
The boys refer to Sam and Eric as Samneric because the two boys do not act as separate individuals. They make the same choices. They are followers.
They left the signal fire to go on the first successful pig hunt because Jack told them to. Now the stress of having to choose between wildness and civilization is tearing even the twin brothers apart.
In Chapter 10, the boys had wrestled with each other in the shelter before Jack attacked. Now they are always waiting and watching for danger.
Ralph puts the conch in Piggy’s hand, and Piggy says he must get his glasses back. He says he voted for Ralph to be chief and now he wants Ralph to tell them what to do. Piggy gives the conch to Ralph.
Ralph says he had thought it would be simple to keep a signal fire going so that they could be rescued. He does not understand why everything is so difficult.
He says Jack could have just asked for fire, and Ralph would have given it to him. Ralph starts to say more, but he cannot think.
Piggy takes back the conch and says that Ralph must stop talking and decide what to do. Ralph says they should clean up (to look as civilized as possible) and go talk to Jack.
Sam, who doesn’t have the conch, interrupts and says they should all take spears. Piggy takes the conch and says he will not carry a spear.
He cannot see to use it. Piggy says he will have to be “led like a dog.” The other boys laugh and Piggy says that there are boys on the island that would laugh at anything.
He reminds them of Simon’s murder and of the littlun who died in the fire. Ralph tells Piggy to stop. He says Piggy will get hurt if he goes to Jack.
Piggy asks what more can Jack do. Piggy says he will carry the conch and show Jack what Jack does not have. (Jack does not have the authority to lead and he has not been behaving in a civilized way.)
Piggy says, “I’m going to him with this conch in my hands. I’m going to hold it out. Look, I’m goin’ to say, you’re stronger than I am and you haven’t got asthma.
You can see, I’m goin’ to say, and with both eyes. But don’t ask for my glasses back, not as a favor. I don’t ask you to be a sport, I’ll say, not because you’re strong, but because what’s right’s right.
Give me my glasses, I’m going to say— you got to!” Piggy begins to cry, and he gives the conch back to Ralph. A single tear is on the conch, a tear that looks like a star.
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Note: From the beginning of the story, Piggy has been an outsider. He is not handsome like Ralph. His weight and asthma keep him from being physically strong like Jack.
He is not comfortable in nature like Simon was. Piggy, though, has been a guiding star, helping Ralph find his way as chief. Piggy had the knowledge to teach Ralph to blow the conch, the glasses to light the fire, and the encouragement Ralph needs to stay civilized.
Ralph tells Piggy that they will go with him to ask Jack for his glasses. Sam says that they better be careful because if they make Jack angry, he may kill them all.
Ralph remembers that Simon had told him (on the pig hunt on the way to look for the beast in Chapter 7) that Ralph would live and get Simon comes up behind Ralph. Simon says, “You’ll get back home. back to where you came from.”
The boys lead Piggy to the fruit trees which now have very little Fruit left. Sam and Eric think they should all paint their faces so that they will look like Jack’s boys and be accepted by them.
Ralph thinks they should do the opposite – they should get as clean as possible and remind the others that they are civilized boys. When Piggy suggests that they tie their hair back to look more civilized, Ralph says he does not want to be like a girl
He does not want to go against the customs of his time and tie back his hair. He wants to look like a strong, civilized boy but he can’t.
Ralph tries to find control. He can’t control anyone or anything on the island, not even his own hair. He remembers what he wants – smoke.
He tells the boys they need smoke, but then stops talking because his thoughts are not clear. Piggy tries to help Ralph out by saying that they need smoke to be rescued, but Ralph is insulted.
He says he had not forgotten why they needed a smoke. Piggy says Ralph is the chief. The twins realize that Ralph is losing his ability to think and lead, and they look at him as if they are seeing him for the first time – as just an overwhelmed boy, instead of a leader
Piggy is able to follow the boys down the beach by looking at the moving bottom ends of Sam and Eric’s spears. They pass the place where Jack’s tribe had danced and killed Simon. Piggy carries the conch carefully in both hands.
Ralph’s group sees Castle Rock, and they are afraid to leave the forest to go closer. Sam says he sees a little smoke, and Ralph is upset because he knows it is not a signal fire and it was made with Piggy’s stolen glasses.
It must be a cooking fire, and Jack’s boys will have their hunting spears. He tells the boys they must all go on, but he wants Piggy to come up next to him and the twins to follow.
Ralph leads his group across the narrow walkway to Castle Rock. A stone he kicks falls forty feet down to the rock below. Piggy is very scared. He cannot see well, and he is afraid he will fall.
From up above, by the boulder that has the lever under it, Roger calls out loudly to ask who has come to visit Jack’s camp. Ralph tells him that Roger can see who it is. Ralph asks Piggy for the conch.
Ralph blows the conch to call an assembly. Many of Jack’s boys appear. They have painted faces. Ralph says he wants to talk to Jack about Piggy’s glasses and the fire. Robert says Jack is out hunting.
When Jack and two of his hunters come back from hunting, Jack leaves a headless dead pig in the bushes and asks Ralph what he wants. Piggy is very scared and tells Ralph not to leave him. The twins step between Ralph and Jack.
Jack tells Ralph to go away back to Ralph’s end of the island. Ralph says that he will not leave because Jack is a thief who stole Piggy’s glasses to make a fire, instead of just asking for a fire.
Jack gets angry. Ralph yells, “Thief! Thief!” Ralph and Jack begin to fight. When Ralph and Jack stop to rest, Piggy reminds Ralph to tell Jack that they have come for Piggy’s glasses and to get everyone to help with a signal fire.
Ralph asks Jack for the glasses and tells Jack that a cooking fire will not help the boys get rescued. Jack steps up and orders his boys to tie up Sam and Eric.
At first, no one moves, but then Jack’s boys see the “otherness” – the civilized look of the unpainted twins. They tie the completely surprised Sam and Eric up.
Jack had known that Ralph would fight for the twins. Ralph says Jack is a “beast,” a “swine,” and a “thief” and then Ralph charges. They move in circles around each other and hit each other. Jack’s tribe cheers.
Piggy says, “Let me speak!” He holds up the conch and, after some booing, the boys are quiet and wait to hear what Piggy will say.
Piggy tells the boys that they are acting as a “crowd of kids.” He asks the boys if it is better to be a “pack of painted Indians” or to be “sensible like Ralph.”
Piggy also asks if it is better “to have rules and agree, or to hunt and kill.” Finally, Piggy asks if it is better to have “law and rescue, or hunting and breaking things up.”
While Piggy speaks, Ralph notices that someone is throwing rocks, but he does not give them his attention. Ralph focuses on Piggy’s words. Roger is the boy throwing the rocks.
He is still up high on Castle Rock, by the lever under a big rock. He recognizes Ralph by his hair and thinks Piggy looks like “a bag of fat.”
Jack starts yelling, and Ralph yells back. They and the other boys pick up their spears and get ready to fight. Roger puts all of his weight on the lever, and the big rock begins to move.
The other boys watch and see Ralph escape the big rock. The rock hits Piggy, and the conch is broken. Piggy falls forty feet and lands on a square red rock in the water. He dies and the waves carry his body away.
After Piggy dies, there is complete silence. Ralph cannot speak. Suddenly, Jack yells that Ralph will get the same as Piggy. (He wants to kill Ralph, too.)
Jack tells Ralph that the conch is gone. There is no tribe for Ralph. Jack is the chief. Jack throws his spear at Ralph.
Jack’s spear tears skin and flesh off of Ralph’s ribs. Roger’s spear and another spear miss Ralph. Ralph runs away. He jumps over the body of the headless pig that Jack had left near the entrance of the forest. Tree branches and leaves hide Ralph’
Jack and his boys return to Castle Rock. Roger comes to Jack, and Jack is mad because Roger was supposed to stay on watch. Then Jack yells at Sam and Eric for coming to Castle Rock with spears instead of joining Jack’s tribe.
Jack starts poking Sam with his spear. Roger thinks he can do a better job of hurting Sam and Eric. He tells Jack he is not hurting them enough, and Roger says he will hurt them himself. Sam and Eric are very scared.
Note: The author, William Golding, says that after Piggy was hit by Roger’s big rock, “Piggy’s arms and legs twitched a bit, like a pig’s after it has been killed.”
This makes readers see a connection between the mother pig and Piggy. Both took care of the young and both were killed by Jack’s tribe.
Golding gives the boy with glasses the name of Piggy to help his readers see how much like a mother pig Piggy was and to help readers think that Piggy would be killed just like the mother pig.
Also, Ralph can only escape by jumping over the body of another headless pig Jack has killed. This makes readers see that only evil and destruction are left on the island.
Piggy and the conch are both destroyed at the same time because both represent Civilization. Piggy represents intelligence, reason, and technology. The conch represents order and authority. When both are destroyed, it is clear that no civilized behavior remains on the island.
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