Lord of the Flies

Question 1

Specious

Answer 1

specious (12)
adjective
misleading in appearance, especially misleadingly attractive
“Ralph had been deceived before now by the specious appearance of depth in a beach pool and he approached this one preparing to be disappointed” (pg 12)

Question 2

effulgence

Answer 2

noun
a brilliant radiance; a shining forth.
“With that word the heat seemed to increase till it became a threatening weight and the lagoon attacked them with a blinding effulgence.” (pg. 14)

Question 3

enmity

Answer 3

noun
the state or feeling of being actively opposed or hostile to someone or something.
“He trotted through the sand, enduring the sun’s enmity, crossed the platform, and found his scattered clothes” (pg. 14)

Question 4

decorous

Answer 4

adjective
in keeping with good taste and propriety; polite and restrained
“Suddenly piggy was a-bubble with decorous excitement.” (pg.15)

Question 5

indignation

Answer 5

noun
anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment
“Piggy stood and the rose of indignation slowly faded from his cheeks” (pg. 25)

Question 6

hiatus

Answer 6

noun
a pause or gap in a sequence, series, or process.
“There came a pause, a hiatus, the pig continued to scream and the creepers to jerk, and the blade continued to flash at the end of a bony arm.” (pg. 31)

Question 7

ebullience

Answer 7

noun
the quality of being cheerful and full of energy; exuberance.
“Then, with the martyred expression of a parent who has to keep up with the senseless ebullience of the children, he picked up the conch, turned toward the forest, and began to pick his way over the tumbled scar.” (pg. 38)

Question 8

recrimination

Answer 8

Noun
an accusation in response to one from someone else.
“His voice tilted into the whine of virtuous recrimination.” (pg. 43)

Question 9

tumult

Answer 9

Noun
confusion or disorder.
“He paused in the tumult, standing, looking beyond them and down the unfriendly side of the mountain to the great patch where they had found dead wood.” (pg. 43)

Question 10

furtive

Answer 10

Adjective
suggestive of guilty nervousness.
“Jack himself shrank at this cry with a hiss of indrawn breath, and for a minute became less a hunter than a furtive thing, ape-like among the tangle of trees.” (pg. 49)

Question 11

inscrutable

Answer 11

Adjective
impossible to understand or interpret.
“Jack lifted his head and stared at the inscrutable masses of creeper that lay across the trail.” (pg. 49)

Question 12

incredulous

Answer 12

Adjective
unwilling to admit or accept what is offered as true
“They were silent again: Simon intent, Ralph incredulous and faintly indignant.” (pg. 53)

Question 13

belligerence

Answer 13

Noun
aggressive or warlike behavior.
“Percival was mouse-colored and had not been very attractive even to his mother; Johnny was well built, with fair hair and a natural belligerence.” (pg. 60)

Question 14

chastisment

Answer 14

Noun
corporal punishment; a beating.
“In his other life Maurice had received chastisement for filling a younger eye with sand.” (pg. 60)

Question 15

incursion

Answer 15

Noun
an invasion or attack, especially a sudden or brief one.
“Perhaps food had appeared where at the last incursion there had been none; bird droppings, insect perhaps, any of the strewn detritus of landward life.” (pg. 61)

Question 16

disinclination

Answer 16

Noun
a reluctance or lack of enthusiasm.
“There had grown up tacitly among the biguns the opinion that Piggy was an outsider, not only by accent, which did not matter, but by fat, and ass-mar, and specs, and a certain disinclination for manual labor.” (pg. 65)

Question 17

derisive

Answer 17

Adjective
expressing contempt or ridicule.
“The derisive laughter that rose had fear in it and condemnation.” (pg. 86)

Question 18

discursive

Answer 18

Adjective
digressing from subject to subject.
“The assembly shredded away and became a discursive and shredded scatter from the palms to the water and away along the beach, beyond night-sight.” (pg. 92)

Question 19

incantation

Answer 19

Noun
a series of words said as a magic spell or charm.
“Percival Wemys Madison, of the Vicarage, Harcourt St. Anthony, lying in the long grass, was living through circumstances in which the incantation of his address was powerless to help him.” (pg. 94)

Question 20

interminable

Answer 20

Adjective
endless (often used hyperbolically).
“An interminable dawn faded the stars out, and at last light, sad and grey, filtered into the shelter.” (pg. 99)

Question 21

tremulously

Answer 21

Adjective
timid; nervous
“The twins, holding tremulously to each other, dared the few yards next to the shelter and spread the dreadful news.” (pg. 99)

Question 22

leviathan

Answer 22

Noun
a thing that is very large or powerful, especially a ship.
“Then the sleeping leviathan breathed out, the waters rose, the weed streamed, and the water boiled over the table rock with a roar.” (pg. 105)

Question 23

decorum

Answer 23

Noun
behavior in keeping with good taste and propriety.
“Not one of them was an obvious subject for a shower, and yet—hair, much too long, tangled here and there, knotted round a dead leaf or a twig; faces cleaned fairly well by the process of eating and sweating but marked in less accessible angles with a kind of shadow; clothes, worn away, stiff like his own with sweat, put on, not for decorum or comfort but out of custom; the skin of the body, scurfy with brine—” (pg.110)

Question 24

apprehension

Answer 24

noun
anxiety or fear that something bad or unpleasant will happen.
“Ralph was full of fright and apprehension and pride.” (pg. 113)

Question 25

sagely

Answer 25

Adverb
in a profoundly wise manner.
“Everybody agreed, sagely” (pg. 118)

Question 26

antagonism

Answer 26

Noun
active hostility or opposition.
“Ralph sighed, sensing the rising antagonism, understanding that this was how Jack felt as soon as he ceased to lead.” (pg. 118)

Question 27

impervious

Answer 27

Adjective
unable to be affected by.
“So they sat, the rocking, tapping, impervious Roger and Ralph, fuming; round them the close sky was loaded with stars, save where the mountain punched up a hole of blackness.” (pg. 121)

Question 28

bravado

Answer 28

Noun
a bold manner or a show of boldness intended to impress or intimidate.
“Ralph surprised himself, not so much by the quality of his voice, which was even, but by the bravado of its intention.” (pg. 122)

Question 29

contemptous

Answer 29

Adjective
showing contempt; scornful.
“Go up and see,” said Jack contemptuously, “and good riddance.” (pg. 124)

Question 30

cynicism

Answer 30

Noun
an inclination to believe that people are motivated purely by self-interest; skepticism.
“The half-shut eyes were dim with the infinite cynicism of adult life.” (pg. 137)

Question 31

indignity

Answer 31

Noun
treatment or circumstances that cause one to feel shame or to lose one’s dignity.
“He opened his eyes quickly and there was the head grinning amusedly in the strange daylight, ignoring the flies, the spilled guts, even ignoring the indignity of being spiked on a stick.” (pg. 137)

Question 32

iridescent

Answer 32

Adjective
showing luminous colors that seem to change when seen from different angles.
“They were black and iridescent green and without number; and in front of Simon, the Lord of the Flies hung on his stick and grinned.” (pg. 138)

Question 33

corpulent

Answer 33

Adjective
(of a person) fat.
“Then as the blue material of the parachute collapsed the corpulent figure would bow forward, sighing, and the flies settle once more.” (pg. 146)

Question 34

parody

Answer 34

Noun
an imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.
“The Tangle of lines showed him the mechanics of this parody; he examined the white nasal bones, the teeth, the colors of corruption.” (pg. 146)

Question 35

succulent

Answer 35

Adjective
(of food) tender, juicy, and tasty.
“The boys with the spit gave Ralph and Piggy each a succulent chunk.” (pg.149)

Question 36

gesticulating

Answer 36

Verb
use gestures, especially dramatic ones, instead of speaking or to emphasize one’s words.
“He was gesticulating, searching for a formula.” (pg. 156)

Question 37

stricken

Answer 37

Adjective
seriously affected by an undesirable condition or unpleasant feeling.
“Ralph’s voice, low and stricken, stopped Piggy’s gestures.” (pg. 156)

Question 38

convulsively

Answer 38

Adverb
To do something in an irregular, jerky way
“Memory of the dance that none of them had attended shook all four boys convulsively.” (pg. 158)

Question 39

torrid

Answer 39

Adjective
very hot and dry.
“Sitting on the tremendous rock in the torrid sun, Roger received this news as an illumination.” (pg. 159)

Question 40

luminious

Answer 40

Adjective
full of or shedding light; bright or shining, especially in the dark.
“The twins watched anxiously and Piggy sat expressionless behind the luminous wall of his myopia.” (pg. 169)

Question 41

myopia

Answer 41

Noun
Nearsightedness.
“The twins watched anxiously and Piggy sat expressionless behind the luminous wall of his myopia.” (pg. 169)

Question 42

propitiatingly

Answer 42

Adverb
in a propitiating manner: so as to appease or conciliate
“Piggy nodded propitiatingly.” (pg. 173)

Question 43

truculent

Answer 43

Adjective
eager or quick to argue or fight; aggressively defiant.
“Truculently they squared up to each other but kept just out of fighting distance.” (pg. 177)

Question 44

inimical

Answer 44

Adjective
unfriendly; hostile.
“To carry he must speak louder; and this would rouse those striped and inimical creatures from their feasting by the fire.” (pg. 187)

Question 45

ululation

Answer 45

Verb
howl or wail as an expression of strong emotion, typically grief.
“Eric raised his head and achieved a faint ululation by beating on his open mouth.” (pg. 189)

Question 46

crepitation

Answer 46

Noun
a crackling or rattling sound.
“He heard a curious trickling sound and then a louder crepitation as if someone were unwrapping great sheets of cellophane.” (pg. 194)