14.5 Million copies sold to date

The classic, startling, and perennially bestselling portrait of human nature-now available as a Premium Edition with a stunning new cover and re-set, easy-to-read text.

When Lord of the Flies appeared in 1954 it received unprecedented reviews for a first novel. Critics used such phrases as "beautifully written, tragic and provocative... vivid and enthralling... this beautiful and desperate book... completely convincing and often very frightening... its progress is magnificent... like a fragment of nightmare... a dizzy climax of terror... the terrible spell of this book..."

E.M. Forster chose it as the Outstanding Novel of the Year.

"Time and Tide" touched upon perhaps the most important facet of this book when it said, "It is not only a first-rate adventure but a parable of our times, " and articles on this and subsequent Golding novels have stressed these twin aspects of Golding: a consummate control of the novel form, and a superb all-encompassing vision of reality which communicates itself with a power reminiscent of Conrad.

About the Author

Born in Cornwall, England, in 1911 and educated at Oxford University, William Gerald Golding's first book, Poems, was published in 1935. Following a stint in the Royal Navy and other diversions during and after World War II, Golding wrote Lord of the Flies while teaching school. This was the first of several novels including Pincher Martin, Free Fall, and The Inheritors and a play, The Brass Butterfly, which led to his being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983.