"Comparison" Essay Prompt

Both Golding’s Lord of the Flies and Steinbeck’s “Vigilante” deal with mob mentality*. In a well-developed essay (develop a thesis, use quotes, etc.) compare both authors’ use of the idea and its aftermath on their characters. Come to a conclusion about what their stories say about mob mentality’s effects on humanity.

*Mob mentality refers to the way a group of people can get caught up and taken over with crimes of passion and do things they would normally not do individually.








(Bonus for people who read the fine print: I picked up three copies of The Pearl at Half Price Books this evening. Two are older copies, which cost $3; the other is a newer $3.50 copy. The first three people who pay with exact change may have them.) UPDATE It's halfway through the day and I still have one $3 book left!

Steinbeck's "The Vigilante"

Print your own copy, so you can annotate/mark it up for use in your essay. Find the story, online, here.