Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions based on the passage:
Lord of the Flies is a post-war fiction written by William Golding in 1954. The novel serves as a catalyst for intriguing discussion, especially regarding people's capacity for good and evil and the fragility of moral restraint. The book questions concepts such as the idea of community, leadership, and the rule of law. The novel gives an insight into human behaviour in a lawless land. It also explores the concept of civilization. Is civilization something that comes naturally to us, or is it imposed upon us?
Golding argues in his text that human beings are naturally savage. They get attracted towards violence and find pleasure in it. Sigmund Freud said that without the inherent capability of human beings to suppress their desires, civilization would have never happened. In the novel, Golding depicts this through a group of boys stranded on an uninhabited island. The novel shows how civilization works like a façade and hides the evil that is deeply rooted inside every individual. Even if civilization flourishes, we humans are merely hiding our beast and not destroying it.
How does Freud's view help explain the concept of civilization in the context of Lord of the Flies?
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: D
Explanation
Correct Answer
Civilization is maintained when people control or repress their most basic and instinctive urges.
Explanation
The passage explicitly details Sigmund Freud's perspective by stating that "without the inherent capability of human beings to suppress their desires, civilization would have never happened." This establishes a direct cause-and-effect relationship: human civilization relies fundamentally on our capacity to contain, repress, or manage our inner impulses.
The alternative options run counter to this logic. Options 1 and 2 claim that civilization can develop or flourish without people restraining or controlling their aggressive instincts, which directly contradicts the text. Option 3 claims there is no connection at all between civilization and human desires, whereas the text links them intrinsically by showing that civilization is built specifically on the suppression of those desires.
Key Points
When decoding academic references in comprehension questions, trace the exact synonyms. The text uses the phrase "suppress their desires," which maps perfectly to the words "control or repress their most basic and instinctive urges" in the correct option.