William Golding’s Lord of the Flies and Literary Correlations: Intertextuality in Practice

The paper investigates the intertextuality in William Golding's Lord of the Flies by exploring its literary connections with R. M. Ballantyne's The Coral Island and Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. It examines how Lord of the Flies incorporates and subverts elements from these two earlier novels to create new meanings, especially through irony and the questioning of morality. By engaging in a comparative analysis of the island as a setting, the study reveals that these novels, while ostensibly adventure stories, explore deeper themes related to human nature, civilization, and savagery. The research demonstrates that understanding these intertextual relationships provides readers with a richer interpretation of Golding's work, showing how it transcends its narrative to engage in a broader literary conversation. The work contributes to the field of intertextual studies by illustrating how texts build on and transform the meanings of earlier works, particularly through Golding's critique of romanticized depictions of island life and human virtue.