What happens to the animal on the island — the one they actually hunt? That's why here's the part of Lord of the Flies people tend to remember vaguely, or skip over entirely. And that's a shame, because the hunting scenes in William Golding's novel aren't filler. They're the engine of the whole story And that's really what it comes down to..
And yeah — that's actually more nuanced than it sounds.
The short version is this: the boys hunt pigs. But how they hunt, and what the hunting turns into, is where Golding does some of his most unsettling work. Let's break it down properly The details matter here..
What "The Hunt" Actually Means in Lord of the Flies
When Golding wrote about hunting in the novel, he wasn't just throwing in action scenes to keep things moving. Because of that, the hunt is a mirror. It shows the boys shifting from scared children stranded on an island into something more primal, more tribal, and eventually more violent.
Short version: it depends. Long version — keep reading.
The specific animal hunted throughout Lord of the Flies is the pig — a wild boar, to be exact, native to the tropical island. So pigs aren't introduced as a one-time event. The hunt starts as a way to get food and ends as something nobody on the island wants to look at directly That's the part that actually makes a difference. Worth knowing..
Jack Merridew and his choir boys are the first to push the hunting idea. At first it sounds reasonable. The boys need protein. Here's the thing — fruit isn't enough. Someone has to step up and actually provide. Jack steps forward, spear in hand, paint on his face And that's really what it comes down to..
The First Hunt — Failure and Frustration
The first real hunting attempt fails. Jack is humiliated. Still, that humiliation matters. The boys creep through the jungle, flushed with excitement, and the pig gets away. It plants a seed That's the part that actually makes a difference. Practical, not theoretical..
See, Jack doesn't just want food. He wants power. Now, the hunt becomes a way to prove he's the real leader — not Ralph, with his conch shell and his talk of rules and rescue. The pig is the excuse. The kill is the trophy The details matter here..
Why the Hunting Scenes Matter So Much
Here's what most readers miss. The hunt isn't really about the pig. It's about what's happening inside the hunters.
When Jack finally succeeds in killing a pig, the language Golding uses is graphic and deliberate. Still, the boys don't just kill the animal — they savagely kill it. Worth adding: the scene is written to make you uncomfortable. And it should. Because Golding wants you to feel that the line between "playing at hunting" and "actually hunting" is thinner than you'd like to think And that's really what it comes down to..
And the pig's head — mounted on a sharpened stick in the forest, covered in flies, speaking to Simon in one of the most famous scenes in 20th-century literature — that's the symbol of what the hunt has unleashed. And the devil in this story isn't something external. The devil, basically. Golding called the pig's head "the Lord of the Flies," which is a translation of Beelzebub. It comes from inside the boys The details matter here..
The hunting scenes also split the group. Worth adding: ralph's side represents order, signal fires, rescue. Jack's side represents the hunt, the kill, the feast. The pig becomes the dividing line between civilization and savagery.
How the Hunting Progresses Through the Novel
The hunting doesn't stay the same. Consider this: it escalates. And tracking that escalation is one of the best ways to understand what Golding is really saying.
Stage 1: Hunting as Survival
At first, the hunt is practical. Now, food. Plus, that's the pitch, anyway. Jack frames it as his contribution to the group. He can do something Ralph can't. He's the provider. The choir boys sharpen a stick at one end — a spear — and venture out It's one of those things that adds up. Practical, not theoretical..
The boys aren't great hunters. Also, there's a clumsy, almost comedic quality to these early attempts. So the tension is low. The jungle is thick, the pigs are fast, and the kids are, well, kids. It feels more like a game than a threat Worth knowing..
Stage 2: The Thrill of the Chase
After the first kill, something changes. The boys start to enjoy it. Not just the food — the act. The creeping through the undergrowth, the painted faces, the whooping and chanting. It's become sport.
Golding describes how the boys smear clay and charcoal on their faces, how they move in a crouch, how the hunt becomes a kind of ritual. The paint hides them — not just from the pigs, but from themselves. And this is where the language shifts. Worth adding: they're becoming something else. The boys are no longer just kids. They can do things behind that mask that they wouldn't do as plain-faced children.
This is also the stage where the hunt starts interfering with the signal fire. Ralph notices. He complains. In practice, boys who should be watching for ships are out in the jungle, stalking prey. Nobody listens.
Stage 3: The Hunt Turns on the Boys
Here's where it gets dark. Now, the same skills, the same tactics, the same group-think that worked on pigs eventually gets aimed at something else. Then it's Piggy, killed by a rock. First, it's Simon — mistaken for "the beast" in the dark, torn apart by a frenzied mob at the beach. And Ralph himself becomes the target, flushed from the thicket like prey.
By the end of the novel, the hunters aren't really hunting animals anymore. They're hunting each other. The techniques are identical. Because of that, the language is identical. The painted faces, the spears, the savage rhythm — all of it. Golding is making a point, and he's making it hard to ignore.
Not the most exciting part, but easily the most useful.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Hunting Scenes
A lot of readers — and a lot of students writing essays about the book — treat the hunting as straightforward. Boys get food. Boys need food. Done.
That's not what Golding is doing. The hunting is a metaphor, and a layered one at that.
First, the hunt represents the loss of innocence. The boys start as schoolchildren. Which means they end as killers. The hunt is the mechanism for that transformation. Also, you don't go from "British schoolboy" to "savage" in one dramatic moment. It happens gradually, kill by kill, mask by mask Small thing, real impact..
Second, the hunt represents a particular kind of masculine violence. Ralph's group is about cooperation, signal fires, democracy. Jack's group is all about strength, dominance, blood. Golding is suggesting that without social structure — without rules, without adults, without consequences — the louder, more aggressive version of masculinity wins. And it wins fast Simple, but easy to overlook..
Third — and this one's often missed — the hunt is also about belonging. The hunters eat together. Also, they chant together. The hunt gives them identity, ritual, and group cohesion. Jack's tribe offers something Ralph's group doesn't. That's why so many boys defect from Ralph's side. Also, they sleep in a new camp. Meat. Excitement. Belonging Small thing, real impact..
Practical Tips for Reading (or Teaching) the Hunting Scenes
If you're reading the book for the first time, slow down during the hunting chapters. Don't skim. Pay attention to the verbs Golding chooses. Consider this: notice how the boys' language changes when they talk about the hunt. Watch for words like "liberation," "hunting," "kill," and "blood" — they appear more and more as the book goes on Not complicated — just consistent..
If you're teaching the novel, the hunting scenes are a goldmine for discussion. You can ask why Ralph doesn't. Also, you can ask whether any of the boys ever feel guilty, and what that guilt looks like. Also, you can ask why Jack wants the hunt so badly. (Hint: pay attention to the moments of silence after a kill Turns out it matters..
And if you're writing about it, avoid the trap of treating the hunt as a simple "boys being boys" story. Golding is sharper than that. He's asking whether civilization is something we build, or just a thin layer we peel off when nobody's watching.
FAQ
What animal is hunted in Lord of the Flies? A wild pig, specifically a boar. The hunt for pigs drives much of the plot and serves as a symbol of the boys' descent into savagery.
Who leads the hunting in the novel? Jack Merridew leads the hunters. He starts as the leader of the choir boys and ends as the leader of a savage tribe.
Why is the pig's head important? The pig's head, mounted on a stick and called the "Lord of the Flies," is left as an offering to the beast. It speaks to Simon in a hallucination and represents the evil that has taken root on the island.
Does the hunt change as the book goes on? Yes. It begins as a practical attempt to get food and becomes a ritual, a sport, and eventually a form of violence directed at the boys themselves Most people skip this — try not to..
**What does
the hunt symbolize in Lord of the Flies?** The hunt symbolizes the boys' descent into primal savagery, the triumph of aggressive masculinity over cooperative civilization, and the human capacity for violence when social structures collapse.
Is the hunt the climax of the novel? Not exactly — the hunt for Ralph at the end is the climax, but the earlier pig hunts set it up. Each one escalates the violence and the boys' comfort with brutality Simple as that..
Why does Golding include so many hunting scenes? Because the hunt is where Golding's themes live. It's where he shows what happens when the rules come off. The hunting scenes aren't filler or background — they are the argument the novel is making, scene by scene, kill by kill Took long enough..
Final Thoughts
The hunt in Lord of the Flies is more than a plot device. It is the engine of the novel's moral collapse and the clearest expression of Golding's central argument: that civilization is fragile, that violence is never far from the surface, and that without the structures we build to contain it, the loudest, hungriest version of ourselves takes over.
Jack doesn't hunt pigs because he's hungry. Ralph's group is already working out how to gather food, build shelters, and keep a signal fire burning. Jack hunts because the hunt gives him what he actually craves — power, ritual, and the worship of his peers. The pig is the excuse. The hunt is the point.
And that is why the scene matters. It is about us. It is about what happens when the rules fall away, when the adults leave the room, when the consequences disappear. On top of that, it isn't about boys on an island. It is about the version of ourselves that waits, patient and hungry, just beneath the surface of every polite conversation and every democratic vote and every quiet evening at home.
Golding trusted his readers to see it. He buried it in verbs and silence, in paint and chant, in the small changes of language that accumulate, kill by kill, mask by mask, until the island is no longer an island at all but a mirror.
The hunt is the mirror. The question is whether we are willing to look.
