Charles Synyard (@CharlesSynyard)

A couple of things I forgot about, on reviewing Lord of the Flies (I was in a hurry). Another reason I’d wanted to read it was this 2020 Guardian article, by Rutger Bregman who was promoting his then-upcoming book with a conversely optimistic view of human nature. In 1965, six Tongan boys from a Catholic boarding school, aged 16 to 13, got stranded on a desert island for fourteen months. The results were not so dispiriting. There are of course some differences in the details, but at least the nearest equivalent real-life story also had a very different ending. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/may/09/the-real-lord-of-the-flies-what-happened-when-six-boys-were-shipwrecked-for-15-months In reflecting on Golding’s story as I read, my thoughts turned to fiction with a similar premise, but a more upbeat message. What was missing in Lord of the Flies? The surprising answer is… A GIANT ROBOT! Many mecha anime classics feature a juvenile cast, with limited or no help from adults, that unites around the oldest piloting one or more robots to repeatedly defeat a foe. The Mobile Suit Gundam franchise will be most widely familiar to readers, but the closest mecha anime I know of is 1983’s Galactic Drifter Vifam. Now obscure but long subbed, I saw it a while ago so my memory’s rusty, but I do remember Vifam follows several kids, boys and girls, including several “littluns” in Lord of the Flies terms, on an odyssey across space, regularly fending off an enemy and defying great odds. And get this: Vifam is loosely inspired by another classic boys’ survival story, Two Years’ Vacation (Deux ans de vacances) by Jules Verne. The English-lyrics opening still hits hard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qwszwb3aIPg Wipe away all your tears, together we will conquer fear. #WilliamGolding #LordOfTheFlies #survival #adventure #stateofnature #savagery #barbarism #boys #school #curriculum #RutgerBregman #Vifam #mecha #anime #JulesVerne #TwoYearsVacation #DeuxAnsDeVacances #novels #literature #books