Ralph
Ralph is the protagonist in lord of the flies. He represents a good, productive leader in society and want to return to civilization. He is elected at the beginning of the novel because the little-uns see him as old enough to look up to and the big-uns see him as someone who has good ideas and will get stuff done. He is more worried about building the signal fire and making huts then hunting. His main goal in the book seems to always be to get rescued. Unfortunately, as the novel continues, Jack begins to take over the boys by force because, while Ralph needs them to work, they can play if they are in Jack’s tribe. Eventually Sam n’ Eric, Piggy and Ralph are the only ones who don’t join jacks tribe and in the end all but Ralph are forced to join of killed. Ralph is then left to be hunted by Jack’s tribe. He could not understand why the boys would rather hunt then try to be rescued, but over time he and Simon realize and see that there is bloodlust and savagery in all human beings and all it takes is the right circumstances to bring it out. Ralph finds the tribal dances distasteful, however when he experiences his first hunt he understands how easy it is to be swallowed up by mob mentally and savagery. Another example of this savagery taking over is when Ralph actually participates in the wild tribal dance that kills Simon. This further proves how savagery can take over anyone. Despite all this Ralph tries to stay true and is, in the end, rescued.
Jack
Jack is the antagonist in lord of the flies. He represents anarchy and savagery. In the beginning of the novel he is surprised and angry that Ralph got elected and not him. He is savage from the start. The first we see of this is when he decides his choir members are going to be hunters. This shows how he has a bit of bloodlust, even in the beginning. At first he does not kill anything but in his first kill he experiences bloodlust and becomes very obsessive with hunting and even has his hunters abandon the signal fire to come and hunt with him so they can kill. He tries to justify this hunting with Ralph by saying they need meat but Ralph is more concerned with rescue. Eventually Jack leaves Ralph’s society to start his own. Jack hosts many feasts for the tribes and during an especially savage one, Simon is killed. Whether or not Jack intended for him to be killed is questionable but Jack did have a part in killing him never the less, since it was he who first called Simon the beast. Jack takes Roger as second in command and together they rule over the boys. Jacks leadership style is savage and he repeatedly beats and hurts other boys. While he does hurt the other boys he does not have a disciplined society. Their camp is a mess of bones and other remains from their feast. Jack also shows his unconcern about rescue by never keeping a signal fire going on his side of the island. From start to end Jack becomes more and more savage and less like a little boy. In the end however he is described as a little boy again, showing the powerful presence order (such as a grownup) has on savagery.
Simon
Simon represents the good in human nature in lord of the flies. He begins as a young boy who has fainting episodes and devolves into one of the gentlest of the boys as the novel continues. He shows his good nature by bringing the littleuns the ripest fruit and by comforting anyone who gets hurt. He is the first to realize that the beast is the evil inside of them, not something you can touch and soon realizes how easy it is for savagery to take over someone. He goes into a secrete glade and hallucinates that he is talking to a pig head that Jack’s hunters placed on a stick. The pig talks to him in a very creepy way ranting and not making a lot of sense. And then he says “I’m going to have some fun with you”. This foreshadows Simon’s death. Simons sitting there listening to the beast, feels faint from the heat, and his toughen swells up. He then faints. When he wakes up he goes up the mountain and realizes that the beast they saw was only a dead paratrooper. He runs down to the beach to tell the boys this but they think he is the beast and in a mad frenzy powered by the blood lust of the recent kill, the boys kill him. As he dies Ralph can barely make out his words as Simon says, there is no beast. Simon’s death could be said to represent the end of good on the island, or the loss of innocence.
Piggy
Piggy is Ralph's second in command. He represents rational thinking and, in some ways, technology. He is the first one to realize the conch could be used as a horn and later makes a sundial that allows the boys to tell time. His specs are used as a measurement of the boy’s savagery, being whole at the start and completely broken at the end. His death is interesting. He is killed by a rock dropped on him by Roger. As he dies the conch shatters, representing the end of civilization and the supreme power of savagery on the island.
Roger
Roger is essentially Jack's second in command and represents the evil in all humans. He has a sadistic nature only made worse by Jack putting him in power. He is evil from the start and shows this by throwing rocks at littleuns which foreshadows how he will kill Piggy and breaks the conch by dropping a rock on Piggy’s head. He kills and later tortures pigs and eventually goes so far as to torture some of the other boys. ?We do not know what happens to Roger at the end of the novel but judging by Jack's change he probably also returned back to his earlier state of a young boy, with his savage nature deeply and safely hidden.
