Literature review

While searching for the relevant material about the two works, I find many scholars are interested in studying the two works. Academic articles and the published books are over hundreds. After looking through the available resources, I find that most articles focused on the three aspects, namely, the theme, the character and the artistic features of writing.

1. Lord of the Flies

Based on Santwana Haldar (2006), the major themes and ideas of the novel may be summarized as follows: (1) the theme of the evil of human nature, (2) the theme of human civilization and democracy in the 20 century, (3) the theme of childhood, and (4) the theme of sin and expiation.”

Luo Shaodan (2001) digs out the theme through a comprehensive study of Golding' s novels, particularly the analysis of the allegory of Lord of Flies. He believes that Lord of Flies is considered as an allegory indicating human irrationality, exposing the destructive forces of irrationality and darkness hidden in humanity and revealing the fragility of modern civilization.

Tang Dongmei (2005) probes into the theme of the hidden evil of human nature on the basis of the Freud's theory. The fights among the id, ego and superego are clearly indicated by Jack, Ralph and Simon. Wang Yanxing and Gong Xuan (2005) investigate the theme of the evil of human nature base on the psychoanalysis. An individual in the group of people is inevitably impacted by the group psychology- brutal authority, irresistible group excitement, uncontrollable race consciousness and credulous and sequacious mentality. These gradually lure the children lost in the fringe of the savage and madness.

Xu Ming (2000) in his Having a Profound Message and Rendering the Characters to Life #8212;#8212;Talking about the Characters #8217;Image-Building of Lord of Flies states that William Golding#8217;s novel features distinctive ways of character portrayal. Firstly, the novel uses a combination of symbolic and realistic methods that successfully delineates the lifelike figures. Secondly, it declares striking contrasts between characters to give them greater vividness. Thirdly, it deliberately presents the boys#8217; ages are between six and twelve, but their psychological ages are much older. As a result, the novel#8217;s theme that man is inherently evil and irrationality are effectively emphasized.

In respect of artistic features, The depth of the novel attributes much to Golding' s superb use of symbolism. The choice of the character, the setting, the plot arrangement and the series of objects, all have profound symbolic meanings.

Long Chao (2011) in his paper adopts the theory of symbolism and classifies the things with symbolic meanings into characters, objects and plots. It explores the respectively these symbolic meanings and their functions of pushing forward the development of the theme.

2. The Lottery