The Coral Island - Influence

Influence

Robert Louis Stevenson's 1882 novel Treasure Island was in part inspired by The Coral Island, which Stevenson admired for its "better qualities". William Golding's 1954 novel Lord of the Flies was written as a counterpoint to (or even a parody of) The Coral Island. Despite having enjoyed the book many times as a child, Golding strongly disagreed with the views that it espoused, and in contrast Lord of the Flies depicts the English boys as savages themselves, who forget more than they learn, unlike Ballantyne's boys. Golding described the relationship between the two books by saying that The Coral Island "rotted to compost" in his mind, and in the compost "a new myth put down roots".

The Coral Island was adapted into a children's television series in a joint venture between Thames Television and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation in 1980, first shown on British television in 1983. The novel was also adapted into a four-part children's television drama by Zenith Productions, broadcast by ITV in 2000.

Read more about this topic:  The Coral Island

Famous quotes containing the word influence:

    I am not sure but I should betake myself in extremities to the liberal divinities of Greece, rather than to my country’s God. Jehovah, though with us he has acquired new attributes, is more absolute and unapproachable, but hardly more divine, than Jove. He is not so much of a gentleman, not so gracious and catholic, he does not exert so intimate and genial an influence on nature, as many a god of the Greeks.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    The improvements of ages have had but little influence on the essential laws of man’s existence: as our skeletons, probably, are not to be distinguished from those of our ancestors.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    To marry a man out of pity is folly; and, if you think you are going to influence the kind of fellow who has “never had a chance, poor devil,” you are profoundly mistaken. One can only influence the strong characters in life, not the weak; and it is the height of vanity to suppose that you can make an honest man of anyone.
    Margot Asquith (1864–1945)