The behavior of Piggy, Jack, and Ralph, can strongly be alagroized by Freud theory of human’s personality. Their actions in the book can be compared to the Id, Ego, and Superego. In freud’s theory, the Id represents the unconscious, the ego represents the preconscious, and the superego represents the conscious. The Id seeks for pleasure. The superego respects moral rules. The Ego, is in between of the Id and Superego.

The Ego seeks for pleasure, however, it thinks of the consequences. In other words, the ego balances the Id and the superego. In Lord of the flies, Jack represents the Id, Piggy represents the superego, and Ralph represents the ego. William golding allegorized their manner by, foreshadowing, symbolizing, and relating the boys to one another.

Piggy represents the superego in many ways, he never break rules, he acts appropriately, and at times, even tries to influence the ego and id. His first appearance of representing the superego took place in the first two chapters. First, Piggy respects the moral rules of society. When the boys gather to talk, Piggy reminds the boys that the person who holds to conch should be only one talking. Piggy also acts like a grownup, because he tries his best to find solutions towards problems. When the boys played on the beach , Piggy did not. Instead, Piggy used his intelligence in science to suggest to build a fire to help them get rescued. Like every normal human being in a regular society, Piggy tries to aim for the best by keeping their goal of being rescued by heart.

Secondly, Piggy always behave in an appropriate manner. He never physically attack any biguns, and never try to bully the littluns. Although Piggy has used some racial slurs in the book, he did not intend it as racist term. When Golding wrote Lord of the flies, the ‘n’ word was still acceptable in their society. Piggy, the superego, also tries to control the id and ego. For example, he reminded Jack that the most important thing was to get rescued, and not excessively hunting.

However, the Id works the opposite way of a superego, and most of Piggy’s suggestions opposes and contradicts Jack’s beliefs Jack, so Jack always neglected to listen to Piggy. Sometimes, Piggy also made Ralph and Jack guilty. First, he made Jack feel guilty when he forgot the keep the signal fire. Jack felt awkward and guilty at first, but then made an excuse for his misbehavior.

When Ralph was rescued, there was a quote, “Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy.” Pg 248. Piggy’s death made Ralph releflect of how guilty he should be about the darkness of mankind’s heart. Jack, on the other end, represents of superego. At second chapter, he showed his first signs of representing the id. Jack only focuses on short term of pleasure, instead of looking at the big picture. For example, instead of helping Ralph and Simon to build the shelters, he goes off by himself to kill a pig.

This act is represented as pleasure because Jack’s motivation to hunt was to express his savage naturel. Although he should focus on the big picture of building a civilization, Jack makes the excuse that he needs to “get meat” for the boys. According to freud’s theory, the Id is a destructive instinct. This can strongly be connected to Jack. For example, Jack never follows the rules that Ralph made. He even tried to bring down Ralph and become the leader himself. This shows that Jack is trying to rip Ralph’s proper civilization apart. Id is the unconscious part of us human.

This can be represented when Jack led the boys to kill Simon. They savage boys saw Simon as the beast, and they tried to kill him. The boys were unconscious, so they did not intend to kill Simon. Lastly, Id is always trying to push away the superego.

As talked about in the earlier chapters, Jack always physically and mentally abuse Piggy. Jack never let Piggy talk in a group meeting. When Piggy blames Jack for failing to keep the signal fire, Jack punches him in the stomach. Jack’s violent and totalitarian personality can be allegorized by the id. Ralph, the main character of Lord of the flies, shows countless similarities. Like the ego, Ralph balances the relationship of Jack and Piggy. Ralph makes group meeting for the boys where they can express their own opinions. He always think about the pros and cons before making a decision.

When Jack and Piggy fight, Ralph finds a solution between the two. Ralph knows that as a leader of his tribe, he must build a proper civilization but also keep the boys happy. Ralph tried to keep Jack’s group pleased by making them the hunters, and he tried to keep Piggy satisfied by making rules for his civilization.

William golding expresses Ralph’s hardship by putting Ralph in difficult situations. For example, sometimes Ralph had to choose between Jack or Piggy. At the beginning of the novel Ralph followed Jack and tried his best to please him by going exploring with him. Later in the novel Ralph got influenced by Jack’s tribe and accidentally killed Simon.

After he killed Simon, Ralph becomes depressed and guilty. This act showed that the superego was criticizing him. In the last chapter of the novel a british naval officer shows up in the scene. If the island were to represent a human’s brain, and the boys were to represent the three personalities in freud’s theory, the officer should represent a sudden realization for shock.

When the naval officers criticized the boys, all of them started to cry. The shock of moral values that the officer brought to the boys was more than overwhelming. In the end, even the Id and ego weeped for their lost of innocence. In lord of the flies, William golding uses personification to show Freud’s theory as concrete objects.