Tag Archives: Lord of the Flies

Thoughts on Book Bans

By Robin Bates | Published: August 25, 2024

Books are unsettling, which is why they are often banned. But we need to be unsettled to get a handle on the chaos that confronts us.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged "Hill We Climb", Allison Bechdel, Amanda Gorman, Beloved, Better Living through Literature, Book banning, Circle, David Eggers, Forever, Fun Home, Judy Blume, Robin Bates, Romeo and Juliet, Stephen Chbosky, To Kill a Mockingbird, Toni Morrison, William Golding, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Is Golding’s Novel True? Sadly, Yes

By Robin Bates | Published: May 11, 2020

A recent Guardian article about actual shipwrecked boys raises doubts about the psychology of “Lord of the Flies.” Sadly, the book is still true.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged authoritarianism, Donald Trump, Fascism, Rutger Bregman, William Golding | Comments closed

Miami Locker Room, Lord of the Flies

By Robin Bates | Published: November 16, 2013

Richie Incognito may have played Jack in “Lord of the Flies” to Jonathan Martin’s Piggy.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged bullying, Coral Island, Football, Jonathan Martin, NFL, R. M. Ballantyne, Richie Incognito, William Golding | Comments closed

The Rape of John Lauber’s Locks

By Robin Bates | Published: May 14, 2012

The high school incident where Romney forcibly cut a classmate’s hair is less “Lord of the Flies” and more “Rape of the Lock.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Alexander Pope, bullying, Mitt Romney, Rape of the Lock, William Golding | Comments closed

Teaching Kids to Stand Up to Bullies

By Robin Bates | Published: September 28, 2011

Michael Gerson writes that “Lord of the Flies” gives kids a picture of the bullying they experience and “To Kill a Mockingbird” the courage to stand up to it.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged bullying, Education, Harper Lee, Romeo and Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, William Golding, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

American Politics as Lord of the Flies

By Robin Bates | Published: September 22, 2011

Recent Republican political tactics against Barack Obama have me thinking of the battle in William Golding’s “Lord of the Flies.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Barack Obama, GOP, politics, William Golding | Comments closed

Emily Dickinson’s Deathbed Fly

By Robin Bates | Published: June 26, 2009

Okay, here is a second post on poems about small winged pests, written in honor of President Obama’s cool and cold-blooded killing of a fly. When I was a child, I used to enjoy the poem about “the funny old lady who swallowed a fly.” It is one of those repetition poems, with a new […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged death and dying, Emily Dickinson, Gulliver's Travels, Hansel and Gretel, I heard a fly buzz when I died, John Donne, Jonathan Swift, The Flea, There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly, William Golding | Comments closed