Simon

The first time we met Simon, he fainted. This shows how weak he is and he is also delicate. He is "a skinny, vivid little boy" with "a hut of straight hair that hung down, black and course." His hair hides his face, which hints to us that he is mysterious. He is imaginative: he sees the buds on the bushes as "Like candles. Candle bushes. Candle buds." He is helpful and works for the good of others; he is the only one to stick with Ralph to make the shelters. He is kind to the littluns and finds fruit for them.The others recognise he is different to them in some way. Ralph says: He's queer. He's funny." Piggy says: "He's cracked."He has "a secret place in a clearing full of flowers and butterflies", and is sufficiently at one with the jungle to walk in it alone at night. He is at one with nature and he has no fear: He walked with an accustomed tread through the fruit trees." This is his own 'Garden of Eden'.He is the most perceptive about the beast. He says: "maybe there is a beast... What I mean is... maybe it's only us." He is the only one to see that the problems on the island stem from the boys' relationships with each other, not from an outside force. Yet nobody understands what he's trying to say. He is unheard of and has less power than the 'biguns'. When the Lord of the Flies 'speaks' to him this idea is reiterated: the voice in Simon's head says "You knew, didn't you? I'm part of you?" He is killed just as he is about to reveal the truth. It is ironic that he is the only one who finds out that the 'beast' was a dead parachutist, but is denied passing on the message because the group of boys think, in their frenzy, he is the beast." Simon's close relationship with nature seems to carry on even after he is dead: "The waves turned the corpse gently in the water. ... Simon's dead body moved out towards the open sea".

Simon :]