Lord of the Flies by William Golding

Question 1

Specious

Answer 1

• Adjective
• Superficially plausible, but actually wrong
• “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” (12).

Question 2

Effulgence

Answer 2

• Noun
• Radiant splendor; brilliance
• “With that word the heat seemed to increase till it became a threatening weight and the lagoon attacked them with a blinding effulgence” (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” (14).

Question 4

Decorous

Answer 4

• Adjective
• In keeping with good taste and propriety; polite and restrained
• “‘No. A shell.’ Suddenly Piggy was a-bubble with decorous excitement” (15).

Question 5

Indignation

Answer 5

• Noun
• Anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment.
• “He [Ralph] turned and raced after the other two. Piggy stood and the rose of indignation faded slowly from his cheeks. He went back to the platform” (25).

Question 6

Hiatus

Answer 6

• Noun
• A pause or gap in a sentence, series, or process
• “He raised his arm in the air. 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” (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” (38).

Question 8

Recrimination

Answer 8

• Noun
• An accusation in response to one from someone else
• “His voice lifted into the whine of virtuous recrimination. They stirred and began to shout him down” (43).

Question 9

Tumult

Answer 9

• Noun
• A loud, confused noise, especially one caused by a large mass of people.
• “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” (43).

Question 10

Furtive

Answer 10

• Adjective
• Attempting to avoid notice or attention, typically because of guilt or a belief that discovery would lead to trouble; secretive.
• “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” (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” (49).

Question 12

Incredulous

Answer 12

• Adjective
• Unwilling to believe something
• “They were silent again: Simon intent, Ralph incredulous and faintly indignant” (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” (60).

Question 14

Chastisement

Answer 14

• Noun
• Severe criticism; a rebuke or strong reprimand.
• “Only Percival began to whimper with an eyeful of sand and Maurice hurried away. In his other life Maurice had received chastisement for filling a younger eye with sand” (60).

Question 15

Incursion

Answer 15

• Noun
• An invasion or attack, especially a sudden or brief one.
• “With impalpable organs of sense they examined this new field. Perhaps food had appeared where at the last inclusion there had been none” (61).

Question 16

Disinclination

Answer 16

• Noun
• A reluctance or lack of enthusiasm
• “…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” (65).

Question 17

Derisive

Answer 17

• Adjective
• Expressing contempt or ridicule
• “The derisive laughter that rose had fear in it and condemnation. Simon opened his mouth to speak but Ralph had the conch, so he backed to his seat” (86).

Question 18

Discursive

Answer 18

• Adjective
• Moving from subject to subject
• “The assembly shredded away and became a discursive and random scatter from the palms to the water and away along the beach, beyond night-sight” (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” (94).

Question 20

Interminable

Answer 20

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

Question 21

Tremulously

Answer 21

• Adverb
• Timid; nervous or quivering slightly
• “The twins, holding tremulously to each other, dared the few yards to the next shelter and spread the dreadful news” (99).

Question 22

Leviathan

Answer 22

• Noun
• Definitions:
  - A sea monster, identified
  in different biblical
  passages with the whale
  and the crocodile, and
  with the Devil
  - A very large aquatic
  creature, especially a
  whale.
• “There was one flat rock there, spread like a table, and the waters sucking down on the four weedy sides made them seem like cliffs. Then the sleeping leviathan breathed out, the waters rose, the weed streamed, and the water boiled over the table rock with a roar” (105).

Question 23

Decorum

Answer 23

• Noun
• Behavior in keeping with good taste
• “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 the 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” (110).

Question 24

Apprehension

Answer 24

• Noun
• Anxiety or fear that something bad will happen
• “The boar was floundering away from them. They found another pig run parallel to the first and Jack raced away. Ralph was full of fright and apprehension and pride” (113).

Question 25

Sagely

Answer 25

• Adverb
• In a profoundly wise manner
• “‘So the pig-run must be somewhere in there.’ Ralph nodded. He pointed at the forest. Everybody agreed, sagely” (118).

Question 26

Antagonism

Answer 26

• Noun
• Active hostility or opposition
• “‘You wouldn’t care to help with the shelters, I suppose?’ ‘We want meat—’ ‘And we don’t get it.’ Now the antagonism was audible” (118).

Question 27

Impervious

Answer 27

• Adjective
• Not allowing fluid to pass through
• “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” (121).

Question 28

Bravado

Answer 28

• Noun
• A show of boldness intended to impress or intimidate
• “‘Some frog. There was a noise too. A kind of ‘plop’ noise. Then the thing bulged.’ Ralph surprised himself, not so much by the quality of his voice, which was even, but by the bravado of its intention” (122).

Question 29

Contemptous

Answer 29

• Adjective
• Showing contempt; scornful
• “Jack was kneeling and drawing a circular pattern in the sand with his forefinger. Piggy’s voice came to them, hushed. ‘Are you sure? Really?’ ‘Go up and see,’ said Jack contemptuously, ‘and good riddance’” (124).

Question 30

Cynicism

Answer 30

• Noun
• An inclination to believe that people are motivated purely by self-interest; skepticism
• “Even if he shut his eyes the sow’s head still remained like an after-image. The half-shut eyes were dim with the infinite cynicism of adult life” (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” (137).

Question 32

Iridescent

Answer 32

• Adjective
• Showing luminous colors that seem to change when seen from different angles.
• “They tickled under his nostrils and played leapfrog on his thighs. 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” (138).

Question 33

Corpulent

Answer 33

• Adjective
• Of a person: fat
• “The life-like movement would scare them off for a moment so that they made a dark cloud round the head. Then as the blue material of the parachute collapsed the corpulent figure would bow forward, sighing, and the flies settle once more” (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
• “He crawled forward and soon he understood. The tangle of lines showed him the mechanics of this parody; he examined the nasal bones, the teeth, the colors of corruption” (146).

Question 35

Succulent

Answer 35

• Adjective
• Of food: tender, juice, and tasty
• “‘Take them some meat.’ The boys with the spit gave Ralph and Piggy each a succulent chunk. They took the gift, dribbling” (149).

Question 36

Gesticulating

Answer 36

• Adjective
• Use gestures, especially dramatic ones, instead of speaking or to emphasize one’s words.
• “‘We was scared!’ said Piggy excitedly. ‘Anything might have happened. It wasn’t–what you said.’ He was gesticulating, searching for a formula” (156).

Question 37

Stricken

Answer 37

• Adjective
• Seriously affect by an undesirable condition or unpleasant feeling
• “‘Oh, Piggy!’ Ralph’s voice, low and stricken, stopped Piggy’s gestures. He bent down and waited” (156).

Question 38

Convulsively

Answer 38

• Adverb
• In a convulsive way that is jerky, violent, and uncontrollable
• “Sam twisted and the obscene word shot out of him. ‘–dance?’ Memory of the dance that none of them had attended shook all four boys convulsively” (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. He ceased to work at his tooth and sat still, assimilating the possibilities of irresponsibility and authority” (159).

Question 40

Luminous

Answer 40

• Adjective
• Full of or shedding light; bright or shining, especially in the dark.
• “Grey, feathery ashes scurried hither and thither at his breath but no spark shone among them. The twins watched anxiously and Piggy sat expressionless behind the luminous wall of his myopia” (169).

Question 41

Myopia

Answer 41

• Noun
• Definitions:
  - Nearsightedness.
  - Lack of imagination, foresight, or
  intellectual insight.
• “Grey, feathery ashes scurried hither and thither at his breath but no spark shone among them. The twins watched anxiously and Piggy sat expressionless behind the luminous wall of his myopia” (169).

Question 42

Propitiatingly

Answer 42

• Adverb
• So as to appease or conciliate.
• “‘’Course we have. ‘Cos the smoke’s a signal and we can’t be rescued if we don’t have smoke.’ ‘I knew that!’ shouted Ralph. He pulled his harm away from Piggy. ‘Are you suggesting–?’ ‘I’m jus’ saying what you always say,’ said Piggy hastily. ‘I’d just thought for a moment–’ ‘I hadn’t,’ said Ralph loudly. ‘I knew it all the time. I hadn’t forgotten.’ Piggy nodded propitiatingly” (173).

Question 43

Truculent

Answer 43

• Adjective
• Eager or quick to argue or fight; aggressively defiant.
• “Both boys were breathing very heavily. ‘Come on then–’ ‘Come on–’ Truculently they squared up to each other but kept just out of fighting distance. ‘You come on and see what you get!” (177).

Question 44

Inimical

Answer 44

• Adjective
• Tending to obstruct or harm; unfriendly; hostile.
• “There was no reply. To carry he must speak louder; and this would rouse those striped and inimical creatures from their feasting by the fire” (187).

Question 45

Ululation

Answer 45

• Noun
• A long, high-pitched trilling sound resembling a howl, or the act of making such a sound, as to express grief or joy or as part of a musical performance
• “Eric raised his head and achieved a faint ululation by beating on his open mouth. Then he glanced behind him nervously” (189).

Question 46

Crepitation

Answer 46

• Noun
• Crackling or rattling sound (sometimes made by two bones pressing against each other)
• “Once more the invisible group sniggered. He heard a curious trickling sound and then a louder crepitation as if someone were unwrapping great sheets of cellophane” (194).