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1-Page Summary of Lord of the Flies

During World War II, a plane evacuating schoolboys from Britain is shot down over a deserted tropical island. Two of the boys, Ralph and Piggy, find a conch shell on the beach. They realize it could be used as a horn to call for help. Once all the boys are gathered together, they elect Ralph as their leader and appoint another boy named Jack to be in charge of hunting food for everyone else.

Ralph, Jack, and Simon set out to explore the island. When they return Ralph declares that they need to light a signal fire so ships can see it from passing by. They succeed in igniting some dead wood with sunlight but pay more attention to playing than watching the fire. The flames quickly spread out of control and one of the youngest boys burns to death while running away from it.

When the boys first get to the island, they enjoy swimming and playing games. Ralph complains that they should be maintaining a signal fire and building huts for shelter. Unfortunately, their attempt to catch a wild pig fails. The hunters’ leader becomes increasingly preoccupied with hunting.

One day, Ralph and Piggy see a ship on the horizon. They notice that the signal fire has gone out, which is their responsibility as hunters to maintain. This infuriates Ralph because he knows it’s dangerous for them not to have one lit in case of an emergency. When Jack returns with his first kill, they’re all dancing wildly in celebration; this scares Piggy because he thinks something is wrong with them. Jack hits him across the face when Ralph tries to intervene and restore order. Everyone meets later at night and discusses what’s going on: some boys are starting to get scared because of nightmares they’ve been having since they got there, so others try to convince them that there can’t be anything scary on the island because nothing lives here during the daytime—and if something did live here, it would have no place to hide from predators anyway (sea).

Not long after the meeting, some military planes engaged in battle with each other. The boys, asleep below, did not notice the flashing lights and explosions in the clouds. A parachutist drifted to earth on Mount Fire-Signal Mountain. He was dead when he landed. Sam and Eric were responsible for watching over the signal fire at night but they fell asleep so they didn’t see him land there either. When they woke up, they saw his enormous silhouette and heard strange flapping noises coming from it that sounded like a beast’s growls or roars of anger. They thought that this was where their island beast lived so they ran back to camp as fast as possible with terror on their faces because of what had happened earlier: “The Beast!”

The boys organize a hunting trip to find the monster. Jack and Ralph go up the mountain, where they see something that looks like an ape from afar. They tell everyone about it at a meeting, but Jack accuses Ralph of being afraid and says he should be removed from office because of his fear. The others refuse to remove him as chief, so Jack storms off alone down the beach calling for people to join him in another signal fire on the beach instead of on the mountain. Most of them leave with him, except for those who stay behind to finish building their new fire before going after him.

Jack declares himself to be the leader of a new tribe and organizes a hunt. He kills an animal, which he decapitates and sticks its head on a stake in the jungle as an offering to the beast. Simon sees this, has a vision that makes him think that there is no beast but rather it’s inside each person. Simon goes to tell everyone what he saw but when they see his shadowy figure emerge from the jungle, they kill him with their bare hands and teeth.