Chap­ter 4: In Lord of the Flies, Chap­ter 4, the boys con­tin­ue to adjust to their life on the island, tran­si­tion­ing from care­free morn­ings to the harsh heat of the after­noon. The lit­tluns, as they are called, are slow­ly becom­ing accus­tomed to their new exis­tence, but they are still strug­gling with their deep-seat­ed fears, par­tic­u­lar­ly the ter­ri­fy­ing idea of the dark. Although some of the younger boys engage in games to pass the time, oth­ers, like Per­ci­val, start with­draw­ing from the group, show­ing signs of emo­tion­al dis­tress and con­fu­sion. The over­whelm­ing feel­ing of dis­com­fort in their envi­ron­ment, cou­pled with the con­stant anx­i­ety about their safe­ty, forces the lit­tluns to face a harsh real­i­ty about sur­vival that they are not yet emo­tion­al­ly ready to accept.

As the day wears on, the boys’ per­son­al­i­ties and char­ac­ter­is­tics become more evi­dent. Hen­ry, John­ny, and Roger engage in a game near the beach, but the ten­sion is pal­pa­ble, espe­cial­ly with Roger. His ear­ly signs of mali­cious intent become more notice­able when he inten­tion­al­ly destroys the lit­tluns’ sand­cas­tles, an act of cru­el­ty that hints at his dark­er side. Hen­ry briefly expe­ri­ences a fleet­ing sense of pow­er over small sea crea­tures, but Roger, in con­trast, seems to take plea­sure in caus­ing harm, fore­shad­ow­ing the vio­lence that will unfold. This jux­ta­po­si­tion between Henry’s momen­tary joy and Roger’s grow­ing mal­ice under­scores the com­plex and trou­bling nature of their inter­ac­tions, mark­ing the begin­ning of the shift from inno­cent play to the dark­er instincts emerg­ing in the boys.

At the same time, Jack’s obses­sion with hunt­ing con­tin­ues to grow as he takes a sig­nif­i­cant step in embrac­ing his pri­mal instincts. The act of paint­ing his face with clay and char­coal is a sym­bol­ic moment, sig­ni­fy­ing his rejec­tion of civ­i­liza­tion and his desire to give in to the wild, untamed part of him­self. Jack’s trans­for­ma­tion into a more sav­age fig­ure is marked by the exhil­a­ra­tion he feels after don­ning the face paint, which enables him to aban­don soci­etal con­straints and dive deep­er into his pri­mal desires. This new­found iden­ti­ty gives Jack a sense of lib­er­a­tion and pow­er that con­tin­ues to dis­tance him from Ralph’s ideals of res­cue and civ­i­liza­tion. Jack’s face paint­ing sig­ni­fies a deep­er psy­cho­log­i­cal shift, one that marks his embrace of chaos and dis­or­der, mov­ing fur­ther away from the hope of being res­cued and rejoin­ing the world of soci­ety.

Mean­while, Ralph con­tin­ues to strug­gle with the chal­lenge of main­tain­ing the fire, a vital sym­bol of hope for their res­cue and a teth­er to civ­i­liza­tion. His con­stant attempts to keep the fire burn­ing reflect his belief that this con­nec­tion to civ­i­liza­tion is their only chance of sur­vival. How­ev­er, his efforts are con­stant­ly under­mined by Jack and his fol­low­ers, who are increas­ing­ly con­sumed by the thrill of the hunt and the promise of pow­er that it brings. This divi­sion between Ralph’s desire for order and Jack’s descent into sav­agery reach­es its peak when Ralph con­fronts Jack about the fire going out dur­ing their hunt. This con­fronta­tion high­lights the deep­en­ing rift between the two boys, as Ralph insists on the impor­tance of the fire and res­cue, while Jack dis­miss­es these con­cerns in favor of hunt­ing and the intox­i­cat­ing pow­er it brings.

The con­flict between the two boys exem­pli­fies the broad­er theme of the strug­gle between civ­i­liza­tion and sav­agery, as the boys are forced to choose between these two oppos­ing forces. Ralph’s insis­tence on main­tain­ing order and hope for res­cue is con­stant­ly chal­lenged by Jack’s obses­sion with pow­er and dom­i­nance through hunt­ing. This ten­sion esca­lates as Jack becomes more defi­ant, reject­ing the rules and the author­i­ty of the conch, the sym­bol of order that Ralph holds dear. The boys’ descent into sav­agery becomes more pro­nounced, and the group begins to frac­ture as their pri­or­i­ties shift, illus­trat­ing the fragili­ty of civ­i­liza­tion when the boys’ inher­ent fear and pri­mal instincts take over.

Ulti­mate­ly, this chap­ter cap­tures the grow­ing divide between the boys and the shift in their iden­ti­ties as they adapt to life on the island. The inno­cence of the ear­ly days is grad­u­al­ly replaced by a deep­er, dark­er side of human nature, which emerges as the boys’ fears, desires, and impuls­es begin to shape their actions. The chap­ter high­lights the fragili­ty of social struc­tures and how eas­i­ly they can be dis­rupt­ed in the face of fear, hunger, and the lure of pow­er. The grow­ing divide between Ralph and Jack rep­re­sents the larg­er strug­gle between civ­i­liza­tion and sav­agery, a theme that will con­tin­ue to dom­i­nate the nar­ra­tive as the boys are forced to con­front the dark­ness with­in them­selves. The boys’ increas­ing detach­ment from the rules of soci­ety sig­nals the unrav­el­ing of their moral com­pass and the descent into chaos that will ulti­mate­ly con­sume them.