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blood relatives. Pretty Flower reveals that she had actually been having sex with the Liar, which Head Man did not know and which shakes him. The Prince arrives in search of rope for his escape plan, but Head Man understands what he is trying to achieve and has the Liar summoned, intending to persuade or force him to join Great House, so he can be appeased. The Liar tries to persuade Pretty Flower to take him as a husband instead, as all women would be permitted to him if he were Great House and their love would no longer be forbidden. He also claims to be able to make the river recede if given the chance. The Prince is delighted by the idea and Pretty Flower seems torn. Head Man orders two soldiers to kill him but the Liar is able to overpower them and escape across floodwaters, killing Head Man in the process. In his dying words, Head Man says that the Liar "stings like a scorpion" and has a "death wish". The last words of the story are Pretty Flower's: "All the same—we'd better go and talk to Him". The significance of the new capitalisation is left unstated.
157:, and one about "the potential dangers of the meddling intellect". Kevin McCarron sees the unifying theme as being instead to do with "the issue of progress": "The Scorpion God" concerns an outsider called the Liar challenging the established order of the kingdom he has entered; "Clonk Clonk", which is more optimistic about the potential value of innovation, considers an imagined prehistoric change in the relationship between men and women; and "Envoy Extraordinary" considers the perils of technological development. Don Crompton sees a connection between "The Scorpion God" and "Envoy Extraordinary" in their concern with the dangers of fixed world views but sees little other connection, saying "assiduous analysis can always be made to yield common ground between individual works, but these three stories are concerned with distinctive societies and draw independent lessons from them".
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Pretty Flower, and taking on the burdens of holding up the sky and making the river rise. He is also going blind, a fact that panics the old man when he learns it, since it puts in jeopardy his ability to carry on the duties of the God, which he will be relied upon to perform. As Great House is almost finishing the run, delirious from exhaustion, he collides with the blind man's stick and collapses, as the blind man is trying to tell him of the Prince's condition. The Prince accuses him of lying and Pretty Flower has him sent away to "the pit". The failure of Great House to complete the run is a terrible omen. When the river last failed to rise high enough, the God of that time drank poison and his retinue were expected to follow him into the afterlife – the eternal Now – a prospect they accept happily but which terrifies the Liar.
231:"Beginning", which Great House is happy about. He drinks poison cheerfully, in certain knowledge of a pleasant and eternal Now, from where he will be able to ensure that the river rises after all. The river duly does rise and when it is at the appropriate height he is entombed in the central chamber of the low building. Others go into the other chambers to take poison and be ready to serve him in his Now. The Liar struggles against this, threatening not to tell his lies if made to take his own life. He is pronounced unclean by Head Man and sent to the pit to be 'cleaned'. The river keeps rising, threatening to cause devastating floods.
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published in 1971. They are all set in the distant past: "The
Scorpion God" in ancient Egypt, "Clonk Clonk" in pre-historic Africa, and "Envoy Extraordinary" in ancient Rome. A draft of "The Scorpion God" had been written but abandoned in 1964, "Clonk Clonk" was newly written for the book, and "Envoy
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and allow the fields to be planted. He is accompanied by the Liar, an attendant of his. His eleven-year-old son, known only as the Prince, is supposed to be watching with an old blind man, but is ignoring it instead. The Prince doesn't want to have to become the God, which means marrying his sister,
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Head Man is talking to Pretty Flower, and surmises that the river is still rising because Great House is angry, not because of Pretty Flower's failure to seduce him but because of Pretty Flower's attraction to the Liar, something against the laws of nature since all sex and marriage must be between
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dance, in which she is expected to seduce her father, who is more interested in drinking and playing a game of checkers with Head Man. The seduction is unsuccessful, which is a deep humiliation for Pretty Flower and a further failure on the part of Great House. As Head Man explains, this requires a
160:
In an interview with James R. Baker in 1981, Golding himself said "if it has a unity it is one of the accidents of history" and that that wasn't something he set out to provide. He did also say in a letter to his editor that two other stories were too different from "The
Scorpion God" and "Envoy
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Leighton Hodson describes the first two as "taxing but contrasted works" characterised by "highly wrought spareness of expression" and the third as "lighter, though not included for entertainment purposes only." He says also that while the unity of theme between the three novellas is not
234:
The Prince, who is being trained to succeed Great House, runs away and finds the pit, where the blind man is almost dead from dehydration. He talks to the Liar, asking him to take him to the cold place, and the Liar has him try to come back at night with his jewels and a rope.
225:
Later, at a feast, Great House insists on hearing the Liar tell his "lies" about supposed places beyond the river, though he has heard them before. The Liar describes white men, the sea, ice, and snow, which Great House finds very amusing. Pretty Flower performs a ritual
169:
Golding wrote a first draft of the novella from which the collection takes its name in 1964, under the title "To Keep Now Still", but he was unhappy with how it came out and abandoned it until early 1969 when he rediscovered it and mentioned it to his editor,
251:. At one point the plan had been for "The Scorpion God" and "Envoy Extraordinary" to be rounded out with two new short stories and later Monteith suggested using two much shorter stories of Golding's that had been previously published: "Miss Pulkinhorn" (
29:
267:, 1970, edited by Alan Duart Maclean). Golding felt that they were too different – "written with the right hand while SCORPION and ENVOY were written with the left, if you see what I mean" – and wrote "Clonk Clonk" instead.
140:
in 1979, which he started to write in 1975 after a long period of "creative hibernation", the beginning of which is described in a journal he started at the time, under the heading 'History of a Crisis'.
178:, with the suggestion that it could be published together with "Envoy Extraordinary". He didn't send a copy until July 1970 after several re-drafts, at which point it had its final title.
217:), also known as the God, is performing a ritual run that takes place every seven years, from his palace, around a low building on a rocky outcrop and back, to ensure that the
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as "witty but by no means profound" and "Envoy
Extraordinary" as "a not very successful novella about ancient Rome". In his book about Golding, Kevin McCarron says that
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205:. For the purposes of the story, they are one and the same, and the dying priest saying "he stings like a scorpion" is intended to reference this.
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Węgrodzka, Jadwiga (2015). "Characters in mythical and historical contexts: William
Golding's "The Scorpion God"". In Węgrodzka, Jadwiga (ed.).
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Kevin McCarron describes "Clonk Clonk" as "a comic tale, and probably the most optimistic piece of fiction that
Golding has ever published".
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is "too often dismissed as lightweight" and that it has more to say about "the terrible cost of progress" than it is given credit for.
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straightforward, they can be thought of as "a sequence of meditations on human thinking", one about religion, one about man as a
149:
Critical opinion differs about whether the three novellas are bound by a common theme other than their setting in the deep past.
542:
Hodson, Leighton (1978). "The
Scorpion God: Clarity, Technique and Communication". In Biles, Jack I.; Evans, Robert O. (eds.).
422:. At Golding's insistence this was raised to $ 5,000. In the UK with Faber & Faber he received the same as he had done for
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Clements, James (2014). ""The Thing in the Box": William
Golding's "Miss Pulkinhorn" as Apophatic Literature".
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Extraordinary" to include alongside them and instead wrote "Clonk Clonk" to complete the book.
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Extraordinary" had been published before, in 1956. "Envoy
Extraordinary" became a play called
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from around 3200–3000 BC. The character "the Liar" is intended to be the pharaoh who unified
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in 1957. The play was first performed in 1958 in Oxford, in a production starring
201:(whose name may mean "stinging") and about whether Narmer was the same person as
284:
While "The
Scorpion God" and "Clonk Clonk" were published for the first time in
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652:
Baker, James R.; Golding, William (1982). "An
Interview with William Golding".
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Leighton Hodson compares the novella to "The Rewards of Industry" from
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412:. Golding had received $ 10,000 from Harcourt for his previous novel,
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which was performed first in Oxford and later in London and New York.
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Sullivan, Walter (1963). "William Golding: The Fables and the Art".
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312:. The story concerns an inventor who anachronistically brings the
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In fierce heat, a man called Great House (the literal meaning of
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856:. Dictionary of Literary Biography. Vol. 331. Thomson Gale
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257:, vol 15, August 1960, pp. 27–32) and "The Anglo Saxon" (
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Nobel Prize Laureates in Literature, Part 2: Faulkner-Kipling
735:
Tiger, Virginia Marie (1971). "Chapter IV. Pincher Martin".
193:. Golding knew there was debate about whether that pharaoh,
443:
Drabble, Margaret (ed.). "Golding, Sir William (1911-93)".
263:, 22 December 1959, pp. 12–14 and in the collection
447:(6th ed.). Oxford University Press. p. 416.
850:"Golding, William (19 September 1911 - 19 June 1993)"
618:
A View from the Spire: William Golding's Later Novels
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William Golding: The Man who Wrote Lord of the Flies
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William Golding: The Man who Wrote Lord of the Flies
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William Golding: The Man who Wrote Lord of the Flies
852:. In Bruccoli, Matthew J.; Layman, Richard (eds.).
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741:(PhD). University of British Columbia. p. 138
546:. University Press of Kentucky. pp. 188–202.
408:There was some disagreement about the appropriate
512:Carey, John (2012). "Chapter 24. The Gap Years".
320:(gunpowder, the compass and the printing press).
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985:. Mediated Fictions. Vol. 9. Peter Lang.
952:Baker, James R. (1973). "Golding's Progress".
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544:William Golding: Some Critical Considerations
323:Golding adapted "Envoy Extraordinary" into a
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590:. Oxford University Press. pp. 25–29.
405:on 26 January 1972 in an edition of 7,486.
247:"Clonk Clonk" was written specifically for
128:This was Golding's first publication since
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1139:The Scorpion God : Three Short Novels
1123:The Hot Gates, and Other Occasional Pieces
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881:. London: André Deutsch. pp. 11–12.
686:. G. K. Hall & Co. pp. 109–112.
316:to ancient Rome, along with three of the
878:William Golding A Bibliography 1934-1993
738:An Analysis of William Golding's Fiction
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352:The Twilight of the Gods and Other Tales
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875:Gekoski, R. A.; Grogan, P. A. (1994).
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621:. Oxford: Blackwell. pp. 73–93.
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1239:Fiction set in the 4th millennium BC
761:"The Nobel Prize in Literature 1983"
960:(1). Duke University Press: 62–70.
797:The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction
683:Critical Essays on William Golding
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817:Carey, John (2012). "Chapter 15.
680:Baker, James R., ed. (1988). "".
481:Carey, John (2012). "Chapter 23.
827:. Free Press. pp. 206–212.
518:. Free Press. pp. 339–363.
491:. Free Press. pp. 327–338.
983:Characters in Literary Fictions
381:The first hardcover edition of
1171:Nobel Lecture, 7 December 1983
418:, but was offered $ 3,500 for
318:Four Great Inventions of China
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864:– via Encyclopedia.com.
280:Envoy Extraordinary (novella)
1234:1971 short story collections
654:Twentieth Century Literature
485:and 'History Of A Crisis'".
331:and then into a play called
848:Prusse, Michael C. (2007).
134:in 1967 and his last until
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101:UK first edition hardcover
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991:10.3726/978-3-653-02466-1
954:Novel: A Forum on Fiction
936:Gekoski & Grogan 1994
710:Religion & Literature
403:Harcourt Brace Jovanovich
197:, was the same person as
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1019:on William-Golding.co.uk
584:McCarron, Kevin (2006).
611:Crompton, Don (1985). "
294:Eyre & Spottiswoode
274:"Envoy Extraordinary"
187:Upper and Lower Egypt
181:The title relates to
189:and established the
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1099:The Brass Butterfly
819:The Brass Butterfly
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911:The Sewanee Review
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165:"The Scorpion God"
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1000:978-3-653-99675-3
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1131:The Pyramid
789:Clute, John
424:The Pyramid
415:The Pyramid
377:Publication
341:George Cole
131:The Pyramid
1228:Categories
430:References
325:radio play
228:striptease
1115:The Spire
1107:Free Fall
1053:Works by
615:(1971)".
254:Encounter
57:Publisher
923:27540940
894:25 April
860:24 April
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770:24 April
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722:24752990
634:25 April
426:: £500.
327:for the
183:pharaohs
114:novellas
49:Language
974:1345054
410:advance
215:Pharaoh
52:English
1214:(1995)
1206:(1989)
1198:(1987)
1190:(1985)
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1174:(1984)
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1142:(1971)
1134:(1967)
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145:Themes
39:Author
1067:Poems
970:JSTOR
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718:JSTOR
670:JSTOR
558:JSTOR
308:" by
304:and "
300:" by
260:Queen
195:Menes
85:Pages
995:ISBN
896:2021
883:ISBN
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339:and
209:Plot
94:ISBN
72:1971
987:doi
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329:BBC
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