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Welcome to our resources page! You can filter by book, by category, and by format (text, sound and film). Use the research filter for higher-level items like critical bibliographies.

23 results

Taffy

In Free Fall, Sammy Mountjoy meets Taffy at a meeting for the Communist Party in the late 1930s. Despite being engaged to Beatrice Ifor, Sammy is […]

The little Oa

The little Oa is a tree root carried by Liku in The Inheritors.

Dreams

Pincher Martin Stranded on a rock in the middle of the Atlantic, Christopher Martin suffers from insomnia. Sleep represents both comfort and fear to Martin: […]

The moon

‘Clonk Clonk’ (From The Scorpion God) Typically in literature, the moon is associated with women, which makes it an important symbol in ‘Clonk Clonk’.

Australia

Golding visited Australia in 1975, and he was fascinated by the country, describing it as a place of ‘clear light and clean emptiness’. He was […]

Reverend Colley

Reverend Robert James Colley appears in the first book of Golding’s Sea Trilogy, Rites of Passage, and is often mentioned in the following two volumes. He […]

Nick Shales

Nick Shales appears in the final part of Free Fall in a memory from the protagonist Sammy Mountjoy. According to Sammy, Shales was ‘the best teacher I […]

Mary Lovell

Mary Lovell appears in Christopher Martin’s flashbacks of memory throughout Pincher Martin. Martin, a repugnant misanthropist, is obsessed with the idea of possessing her, but is […]

The Prince

The Prince is the Pharaoh’s petulant son in ‘The Scorpion God’. He is reluctant to fulfil his destiny as heir to the throne and is […]

Pretty Flower

Pretty Flower is the Pharaoh’s daughter in ‘The Scorpion God’. She is lauded for her beauty and has an elaborate silver mirror which gives the […]

Waterfall

On the original manuscript of The Inheritors, Golding wrote that the ‘centre symbol is the waterfall, the time stream, the fall, the second law of thermodynamics’. […]

Fa

Fa is a member of ‘The People’ in The Inheritors. Although not explicitly stated, it is likely that she is the mother of Liku, and is […]

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