Introduction
Imagine a man who embraced solitude as a child but who became famous
for writing about group dynamics. Imagine a man who enjoyed the benefits of a
peaceful adolescence, complete with private schooling, but who spent his adult
years writing about the inherent violent nature of humans. Imagine a man who was
groomed by his parents to be a scientist but who ended up as one of the greatest
writers of his time. Imagine William Golding. Raised by educated parents who
supported rational thought, Golding used his experiences from World War II to
create novels of dark human action. Nothing in Golding’s past suggests that he
should become the foremost author of the twentieth century to write about the
conflict between barbaric human nature and civil reasoning; his novels, however,
continue to entertain and raise those same questions today.
Essential Facts
- During his five-year military career, Golding was a participant in both the
sinking of the great German battleship, the Bismarck, and in the allied
invasion of Normandy.
- Golding’s most famous novel, The Lord of the Flies, was originally
titled The Strangers Within and was published twenty-nine years before he
won the Nobel Prize for Literature.
- Lord of the Flies was rejected by twenty-one publishers before
acceptance by Faber and Faber.
- One of Golding’s hobbies was researching and exploring the myth of the Loch
Ness monster.
- Golding was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1988.
http://www.enotes.com/authors/william-golding