Piggy's glasses in 'The Lord Of The Flies'

[Just Max]

What does everyone think Piggy's glasses represent?

[Aschenbach]

Hi JustMax

Piggy is the most intelligent, rational boy in the group, and his glasses represent the power of science and intellectual endeavor in society. This symbolic significance is clear from the start of the novel, when the boys use the lenses from Piggy�s glasses to focus the sunlight and start a fire. When Jack�s hunters raid Ralph�s camp and steal the glasses, the savages effectively take the power to make fire, leaving Ralph�s group helpless.

[Lillabet]

I agree with Aschenbach, but also would add that the glasses are an obvious sign of a physical weakness. Given that the boys revert to a form of behaviour that is more animal than social, and that in the animal kingdom the Darwinian principle of 'survival of the fittest' rules, I would also suggest that the glasses serve to mark piggy as one less likely to survive...

[kazza12345]

I think they represent something for him to see with

[jno]

apparently Golding got the firestarting business wrong; Piggy's spectacles couldn't be used to do this in real life.

[IndieSinger]

Weakness.