shopping cart
Save up to 30% on our Staff Picks
Call us:  800-878-7323 HELP
McAfee SECURE helps keep you safe from identity theft, credit card fraud, spyware, spam, viruses and online scams.
Interviews | Yesterday, 9:15am

Dave: IMG Finding John Irving: The Powells.com Interview



[Editor's note: The following is a reprint of our 2005 interview with John Irving, whose new novel, Last Night in Twisted River, has just come out... Continue »

Ships free on qualified orders.
Add to Cart
$15.00
New Trade Paper
Ships in 1 to 3 days
Add to Wishlist
Qty Store Section
2 Burnside Literature- A to Z
25 Local Warehouse Literature- A to Z
25 Remote Warehouse Literature- A to Z

Other titles in the Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century series:

  1. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
  2. Beloved
  3. Cannery Row
  4. Cup of Gold (57 Edition)
  5. Dangling Man
  6. del Amor y Otros Demonios
  7. Ethan Frome
  8. Good Soldier
  9. Gravity's Rainbow
  10. Heart of Darkness
  11. Heart of Darkness: Great Books Edition
  12. Heart of Darkness: With the Congo Diary
  13. Henderson the Rain King
  14. Henderson the Rain King
  15. Herzog
  16. Him with His Foot in His Mouth and Other Stories
  17. Humboldt's Gift
  18. In Dubious Battle
  19. It All Adds Up: From the Dim Past to the Uncertain Future
  20. Lord of the Flies (50th Anniversary Edition)
  21. Mosby's Memoirs and Other Stories (68 Edition)
  22. My Antonia
  23. News of a Kidnapping
  24. Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard
  25. Noticia de Un Secuestro
  26. Of Love and Other Demons
  27. Of Mice and Men
  28. Of Mice and Men
  29. Of Mice and Men
  30. On the Road
  31. Once There Was a War
  32. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
  33. Pearl
  34. Ravelstein
  35. Red Pony
  36. Shadow-line (86 Edition)
  37. Short Reign of Pippin IV (94 Edition)
  38. Strange Pilgrims: Stories
  39. Summer (93 Edition)
  40. Swann's Way
  41. Sweet Thursday
  42. The Actual
  43. The Adventures of Augie March
  44. The Adventures of Augie March: Great Books Edition
  45. The Age of Innocence
  46. The Buccaneers
  47. The Dean's December
  48. The Grapes of Wrath
  49. The Heart of the Matter: Great Books Edition (Large Print)
  50. The House of Mirth
  51. The Log from the Sea of Cortez
  52. The Metamorphosis and Other Stories
  53. The Moon is Down
  54. The Nigger of the Narcissus
  55. The Pastures of Heaven
  56. The Pearl
  57. The Pearl
  58. The Portable Conrad
  59. The Portable Steinbeck: Revised Edition
  60. The Red Pony
  61. The Red Pony
  62. The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale
  63. The Victim
  64. The Winter of Our Discontent
  65. To a God Unknown
  66. Tortilla Flat
  67. Travels with Charley in Search of America
  68. Typhoon and Other Stories
  69. Under Western Eyes
  70. Victory
  71. Waiting for the Barbarians: Great Books Edition
  72. Wayward Bus (75 Edition)
  73. White Noise: Great Books Edition
  74. Youth, Heart of Darkness, the End of the Tether

Lord of the Flies: Great Books Edition (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)

by William Golding

Lord of the Flies: Great Books Edition (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century) Cover

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

William Golding's compelling story about a group of very ordinary small boys marooned on a coral island has become a modern classic. At first it seems as though it is all going to be great fun; but the fun before long becomes furious and life on the island turns into a nightmare of panic and death. As ordinary standards of behaviour collapse, the whole world the boys know collapses with them — the world of cricket and homework and adventure stories — and another world is revealed beneath, primitive and terrible.

Lord of the Flies remains as provocative today as when it was first published in 1954, igniting passionate debate with its startling, brutal portrait of human nature. Though critically acclaimed, it was largely ignored upon its initial publication. Yet soon it became a cult favorite among both students and literary critics who compared it to J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye in its influence on modern thought and literature.

Labeled a parable, an allegory, a myth, a morality tale, a parody, a political treatise, even a vision of the apocalypse, Lord of the Flies has established itself as a true classic.

Review:

"Like any orthodox moralist Golding insists that Man is a fallen creature, but he refuses to hypostatize Evil or to locate it in a dimension of its own. On the contrary Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies, is Roger and Jack and you and I, ready to declare himself as soon as we permit him to." John Peter, Kenyon Review

Review:

"[S]parely and elegantly written....Lord of the Flies is a grim anti-pastoral in which adults are disguised as children who replicate the worst of their elders' heritage of ignorance, violence, and warfare." Joyce Carol Oates, New York Review of Books

Review:

"[T]his brilliant work is a frightening parody on man's return (in a few weeks) to that state of darkness from which it took him thousands of years to emerge. Fully to succeed, a fantasy must apprach very close to reality. Lord of the Flies does. It must also be superbly written. It is." The New York Times Book Review

Review:

Born in Cornwall, England, in 1911 and educated at Oxford University, William Gerald Golding's first book, Poems, was published in 1935. Following a stint in the Royal Navy and other diversions during and after World War II, Golding wrote Lord of the Flies while teaching school. This was the first of several novels including Pincher Martin, Free Fall, and The Inheritors and a play, The Brass Butterfly, which led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983.

Synopsis:

Few works in literature have received as much popular and critical attention as Nobel Laureate William Golding's Lord of the Flies. Since its publication in 1954, it has amassed a cult following, and has significantly contributed to our dystopian vision of the post-war era. When responding to the novel's dazzling power of intellectual insight, scholars and critics often invoke the works of Shakespeare, Freud, Rousseau, Sartre, Orwell, and Conrad.<P>Golding's aim to "trace the defect of society back to the defect of human nature" is elegantly pursued in this gripping adventure tale about a group of British schoolboys marooned on a tropical island. Alone in a world of uncharted possibilities, devoid of adult supervision or rules, the boys attempt to forge their own society, failing, however, in the face of terror, sin, and evil. Part parable, allegory, myth, parody, political treatise, and apocalyptic vision, Lord of the Flies is perhaps the most memorable tale about "the end of innocence, the darkness of man's heart".

About the Author

Born in Cornwall, England, in 1911 and educated at Oxford University, William Gerald Golding's first book, Poems, was published in 1935. Following a stint in the Royal Navy and other diversions during and after World War II, Golding wrote Lord of the Flies while teaching school. This was the first of several novels including Pincher Martin, Free Fall, and The Inheritors and a play, The Brass Butterfly, which led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983.

Table of Contents

One: The Sound Of The Shell
Two: Fire On The Mountain
Three: Huts On The Beach
Four: Painted Faces And Long Hair
Five: Beast From Water
Six: Beast From Air
Seven: Shadows And Tall Trees
Eight: Gift For The Darkness
Nine: A View To A Death
Ten: The Shell And The Glasses
Eleven: Castle Rock
Twelve: Cry Of The Hunters

What Our Readers Are Saying

Add a comment for a chance to win!
Average customer rating based on 2 comments:
waitingtoleave, February 9, 2007 (view all comments by waitingtoleave)
When I read this in my high school English class, my best friend and I were convinced "Lord of the Flies" was a religious metaphor, and everyone else thought we were crazy, until the teacher sided with us. I cannot emphasize how helpful it can be to read Messiah stories to question your own faith; this can be a chance to test your own beliefs, or if you aren't Christian, a great look at how Christianity uses themes that translate to great storytelling. The Bible is the most popular book of all time, you know!
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(9 of 17 readers found this comment helpful)
luckygreen, January 31, 2007 (view all comments by luckygreen)
An fantastic tail of the good and evil of mankind. Golding shows both the good and the inner demons of humans.
Was this comment helpful? | Yes | No
(6 of 15 readers found this comment helpful)
View all 2 comments

Product Details

ISBN:
9780140283334
Subtitle:
Great Books Edition
Author:
Golding, William
Publisher:
Penguin Books
Location:
New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
Subject:
Boys
Subject:
Interpersonal Relations
Subject:
Classics
Subject:
British and irish fiction (fictional works by
Subject:
Adventure stories
Subject:
Americans
Subject:
Human relations
Subject:
Islands
Subject:
Golding, william, 1911-1993
Subject:
Adventure fiction
Subject:
Castaways
Subject:
Survival after airplane accidents, shipwrecks, etc.
Subject:
Fiction, Adult
Subject:
Survival after airplane accidents, shipwrecks
Series:
Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century
Series Volume:
135
Publication Date:
October 1999
Binding:
Paperback
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Illustrations:
Y
Pages:
192
Dimensions:
8.39x5.64x.54 in. .51 lbs.

Other books you might like

  1. $13.00 Used Hardcover add to wish list
  2. $5.95 Used Trade Paper add to wish list
  3. $9.50 Used Trade Paper add to wish list
  4. $9.95 Used Hardcover add to wish list

    Riddley Walker :a novel

    Russell Hoban
  5. $4.95 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    The Chocolate War

    Robert Cormier
  6. $1.95 Used Mass Market add to wish list

    After

    Francine Prose

Related Aisles

  • back to top

Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.