Essay on Lord of the Flies Diary: Simon

May 10th, 1954: The Evacuation

Today started like any other day. I was in school, in Social Studies, learning about the geography of Europe. I was chatting with one of my friends when Mr. Anderson burst into the classroom and started talking to Mr. Joe swiftly and trying to be calm. About a minute later they turned to us and told us to get up and follow them in a single file line. They led us out the door where they separated the class up and me and my friends got separated. There were sirens everywhere, pounding at my ear drums.  I was put on a bus with lots of people I didn’t know. I was very scared at this point and wanted to know what was happening, as did everyone else. We started going and we drove for about 2 hrs. Lots of us must have fallen asleep and we all woke up as we hit a big bump. I looked outside where I saw a huge open space with many planes. We all got out and got sent into a dark building and sat there for what must’ve been hours.

May 11th, 1954: The Flight

I woke up to people talking and light shining, illuminating all of us students. They yelled for everyone to get up and we all went out into the night. By the position of the moon, I assumed it was about 1:00 in the morning. We got split by boys and girls and got loaded onto multiple planes. We started hearing noises, explosions maybe, in the distance. All around, one after another, it sounded like a battlefield. We saw planes flying and shooting overhead one after another.  It took over an hour to get all of the planes going but then we started taking off. We didn’t fly for long when all the boys started up in noises and screams. Barely, I got a peak out the window and there it was. Must’ve been thousands of miles high and wide. A huge puff of red and orange and yellow smoke coming for us. The pilot muttered something to an adult but all I heard was 2 haunting words. “Atom Bomb” “Didn’t you hear what the pilot said? About the atom bomb? They’re all dead” (Golding, 16). This coming from a boy a couple of rows ahead. “They’re all dead”, repeated in my head still to this moment, haunting my dreams. Then all of the sudden, screaming. Everyone yelling but I didn’t know what was going on. It felt like I was falling, and then black. 

May 12th, 1954: The Recovery

I woke up, my head spinning, early morning. Someone talking. I got helped up. A group of people, the choir. Man was I glad to see people made it out. But made it out of where? Where were we? The plane! “Where’s the plane”, I asked. “I think we crashed” one of the boys said. Once I got myself together, I searched around and got a hold of my surroundings. A beach on one side, dense forest on the other. Over the next hour, we searched for anything we could find, food, supplies, other survivors, anything! And then we heard a spine-chilling noise. A low belch. We all started to follow where the sound came from. We eventually came to a group of boys all gawking and an older boy with a conch in his hands. We waited longer for all the people to come and then we started chattering. After some time, we came to a conclusion. The plane crashed and we are stranded. It is only boys here and no adults. We eventually started our interesting path on the island by choosing a leader. It came down between Ralph, the boy who blew the conch, and Jack, the leader of the choir. We all voted and it ended as a close call but Ralph was officially the island leader. Jack ended up being in charge of his choir and they were going to be the hunters. “Jack’s in charge of the choir. They can be—what do you want them to be?” “Hunters” (Golding, 30). 

June 21th, 1954: The Advancements

We’ve been on the island for I think about a month if I counted the days right. We started off by making fire on the mountain. We needed it for the smoke to signal anyone who might come along. The choir boys were supposed to take turns watching the fire so that it didn’t go out. Ralph and Jack don’t seem to get along too well. While they were focused on the fire, it spread to the forest. We lost a youngling in the fire and it’s all our faults. I wish we would be more responsible. Jack is too self-centered to help Ralph. Ralph and I worked on huts by ourselves because the little ones just wanted to play and all Jack wants to do is hunt. Jack made a big mistake one day. We were having a chat and Jack was out hunting with the choir. All of the sudden Ralph saw something in the distance and then we did as well. There was a boat chugging along the horizon. But we realized too late, the fire was out. Jack and the other boys came back happy that they had caught a pig but Ralph was infuriated. Over the next week or so they kept at it. Ralph trying to take charge but Jack doing his own thing. Fire, pig, conch, the same things over and over again. No one sees the importance of sticking together like I do. If we want to survive, we need to stick together. I have been spending lots of times in the woods. It calms me, the peacefulness and quietness. I am sitting here now as I write this, it helps me think. The little ones have been whispering about a monster in these woods and stirring up a whole lot of fuss. Now everyone is hooked onto these stories. I don’t believe it myself and I know it’s all in their heads. 

June 30th, 1954: The Aftermath

“It was all gone like that.” I have spent time in the woods every day thinking about this island. It drives me crazy just thinking about it. It’s all a bunch of bogus. All of the people I’m stuck with are fools. One morning I woke up to explosions coming from the sky. A couple minutes later we were woken up by the twins. They claimed they had seen the monster and it had attacked them. I didn’t believe it for a second, but the others did. Eventually they all believed it was real. Jack was getting tired of Ralph and tried to assume control over him. There were no votes for him and Ralph remained as leader. Jack didn’t like that so he went off on his own. The choir boys followed him off and the groups split. I ended up going into the forest alone to find out what the real monster is. While there I found someone. He called himself “The Lord of the Flies” and he gave me wisdom. He told me there was no monster on the island and that the only monsters were the boys themselves on the island. We went on looking and I eventually found the culprit. There was a soldier hanging from the trees, dead. I have much respect so I cut him free and lowed him to the ground. I was very excited to see that there was no real monster so I wanted to share my wisdom with the others. It was dark and I heard noises from the boys from a different side of the island, so I assumed that they had gotten together again. As I approached, they did the unthinkable. I assume that I scared them and with the thought of the monster, they came charging at me. All of them, Ralph, Piggy, Jack, the choir, all of them. I got smacked and punched and beat. I tried to warn them but I was too injured. Eventually the beating slowed down but the pain didn’t. Until it did. And then I felt nothing. All I saw was myself, lying there, by the water, drifting away. And it was all gone, like that.

May 13th, 1954

If anyone is reading this, it means I am dead. I have shared with you my time on the island in this journal and I hope it will be of some use. I enjoyed getting to know all of the boys and I hope we make it off the island.

Sincerely,

Simon Cowell.