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The Inheritors

3.52 of 5 stars 3.52 · rating details · 1,221 ratings · 134 reviews

Eight Neanderthals encounter another race of beings like themselves, yet strangely different. This new race, Homo sapiens, fascinating in their skills and sophistication, terrifying in their cruelty, sense of guilt, and incipient corruption, spell doom for the more gentle folk whose world they will inherit. Golding, author of Lord of the Flies, won the 1983 Nobel Prize for...more

Paperback, 240 pages

Published September 25th 1963 by Mariner Books (first published 1955)

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Mar 17, 2013 Ensiform rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, historical

The story of the gentle, mostly vegetarian Neanderthal tribe that is all but obliterated in a meeting with wandering Homo sapiens. Told almost entirely from the viewpoint of Lok, a slightly dim Neanderthal "with many words and no pictures," it’s an interesting story and a sad one.

But the power of the tale is softened considerably by Golding’s laborious, descriptive prose. At times I found it very hard to understand what was going on, as the Homo sapiens’ activities – drinking wine, portaging boa...more

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Mar 28, 2012 Peter rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantasy

A last tribe of Neanderthals (the people) arrive in their Summer home – a rocky outcrop near the top of a large waterfall. Peaceful hunter gatherers with an earth-mother religion, they do not understand tools, nor can they formulate complex thoughts, they speak simply and also they communicate telepathically through pictures. One day they smell strangers nearby and gradually the become aware of a tribe of Homo Sapiens (the new people) who have come up the river in dug out canoes and are camping...more A last tribe of Neanderthals (the people) arrive in their Summer home – a rocky outcrop near the top of a large waterfall. Peaceful hunter gatherers with an earth-mother religion, they do not understand tools, nor can they formulate complex thoughts, they speak simply and also they communicate telepathically through pictures. One day they smell strangers nearby and gradually the become aware of a tribe of Homo Sapiens (the new people) who have come up the river in dug out canoes and are camping on a river island. The new people steal the Neanderthal children and kill the tribe elders, only Lok and Fa, a man and woman, are left, and they set out to rescue the children.

Despite being written in simple language this is quite a difficult book to read. This is because WIlliam Golding has chosen to tell the story in style that suggest a Neanderthal mindset. Though it's written in the third person the narration is skewed to suggest the protagonist - Lok's - view. As he spies on the homosapiens a lot of their behaviour is alien to him. He also has a strange way of describing everything — from the geography of places to interactions between characters — there is sometimes no distinction in his observations between the real and unreal and this gives the story a dream like quality that is often hard to follow.

The Neanderthals in the book are verging on that cliche of the simple, peaceful tribal peoples who, once again, represent humans before the fall, before consciousness. Where as the homosapiens are more badly behaved, drinking, killing, beating etc. Stylistically it is an interesting device to use the writing to suggest the Neanderthal mind, I think it works really well but throws up lots of issues. At two points the narration jarred for me, when Lok used the words: 'make love', which sounded too twentieth century and also at another point when Golding stepped away from Lok's view to give an authorial comment, and I can't remember why, otherwise the style works really well. One of the other strange side effect though was that at the end when the narration switches to a Homo Sapien man's view, he is suddenly starling sophisticated by comparison in the way he formulates ideas. The distinction works well but also makes the Homo Sapiens feel very advanced.

The books introduction suggests that Neanderthals didn't have language, which makes sense, language is what separates us from other animals, it is the start of abstract thought and duality - separating and portioning everything out and printed words suggest that so strongly too, so maybe it would be impossible to use written language to create a neanderthal view of the world, but Golding has given it a damn good try!

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Dec 25, 2007 Kim rated it 1 of 5 stars Recommends it for: those who have no hope for the human race

Shelves: depressing, evolution, fiction

Do you hate people and think they're all innately terrible? Yeah, so does Golding. The parallels to "The Lord of the Flies" were uncanny. The main difference being that THAT book was at least readable. Golding takes a creative plunge and shows us the world through the eyes of the last living Neanderthals (another branch of the hominid line - not our pre-human ancestors). He gets points for originality, but looses them when he proceeds to write a book without a comprehendable language. Yep, not k...more

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Dec 20, 2007 Matthew rated it 3 of 5 stars

This might sound silly, but this small book of simple language confounded me. The story is told, not just by a Neanderthal, but by the dumbest Neanderthal in the book. His struggle to comprehend the changing world around him and to pin down the advanced technology of modern humans with concepts he could understand made parts of this story completely baffling. He sees boats as logs and paddles as leaves and representations of things as the real things they represent. It's a testament to Golding's...more

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Jan 27, 2008 Jeff rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

[from my book lover's journal at the time of reading:]
About 20 minutes after confused reading of about the first 20pp, i felt their personalities finally. It took time away from the words, away from the un-commaed sentences, away from the alien quote attributions, away from "I have a picture...." Still, i seem to lose them while reading. I'll carry on though, it's intriguing, compelling, well-written.

After reading it all, it felt complete but still befuddling in its alienness: Homo sapiens is fo...more

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Apr 30, 2012 Wendy rated it 2 of 5 stars

It is difficulté for me to consider a SF book as literature . There are some keen observations on early man and the novel asks: Are we more advanced than our ancient counterparts and has the human condition changed. The debat reste ouvert!

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Dec 21, 2012 Warwick rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, prehistory, neanderthal

The Inheritors is a rare attempt to portray the human race from the outside looking in: told from the point of view of a group of Neanderthals having their first, fatal, encounter with this new and dangerously clever species.

As a palaeontological study this book may not be strictly accurate or even fully convincing, but as a prose experiment it's frankly astonishing and exactly the sort of thing top-level novelists should be trying to do. The efforts to give us a sense of how life was lived for...more The Inheritors is a rare attempt to portray the human race from the outside looking in: told from the point of view of a group of Neanderthals having their first, fatal, encounter with this new and dangerously clever species.

As a palaeontological study this book may not be strictly accurate or even fully convincing, but as a prose experiment it's frankly astonishing and exactly the sort of thing top-level novelists should be trying to do. The efforts to give us a sense of how life was lived for a more primitive (sub-)species can be very moving. The extended family unit in the book has a basic language, a sense of common purpose which borders on the telepathic, and an ability – ‘so nearly like thinking’ as Golding puts it at one point – to form mental ‘pictures’ of possible consequences and communicate them to others.

We know, of course, that Neanderthals didn't last, and Golding makes the most of this in-built pathos from the very start. ‘The people’ are painted as a peaceful group, whose primitive, quasi-religious beliefs mean they are reluctant to kill other animals. Their encounter with Homo sapiens will show them that other creatures have no such qualms. Golding's moral – that humans attained their prominence only because they were unusually destructive – can be argued with, but is no less powerful when dramatised like this.

Actually, let me turn that around and say: Golding's moral may be powerful, but it can still be argued with. The book has been rightly praised for its unflinching assessment of the human character, but to make his point he has to ignore those facts that go against it. It's probably disingenuous to portray the Neanderthals as nature-loving folk who abhor murder; what makes humans destructive is not a qualitative difference with other animals, but an intelligence which allows us to be cruel on a much larger scale.

And further: that intelligence also allows us to go beyond animal instinct, which means that as well as increased cruelty there is also sympathy. What bothers me is not the book's argument, which is brilliantly made, but rather a response to the book which assumes that this is the whole story.

Lok's final death-cry will stay with you, and so will the melancholy thoughts of one of the humans, who sails away wondering futilely, ‘Who would sharpen a point against the darkness of the world?’ People who want to look at our species through rose-tinted glasses need these reminders. But equally, those who want to see us as purely cruel and instinctive are taking Golding's message without remembering the crucial point that his species is able to write a book at all, and willing at least to try to inhabit the thoughts and feelings of others. This novel is a dark and wonderful thesis, but its existence holds the clue to its own counter-argument.(less)

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Oct 17, 2011 Gavin Mcphillips rated it 2 of 5 stars

The Inheritors by William Golding follows two species on their mission to survive. One species is more peaceful and inferior (neanderthals), and one more evolved and organized (homo-sapiens). There is an instant conflict as soon as the neanderthals and homo-sapiens come into contact. As the famished homo-sapiens attempt to hunt the neanderthals simply to survive. This creates serious problems for the neanderthals as they are slowly outsmarted and hunted down despite their best abilities to survi...more

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Mar 02, 2010 James rated it 4 of 5 stars

I first considered reading The Inheritors by William Golding while reading Stephen King's book Hearts in Atlantis. In Hearts in Atlantis, the elderly escaped "breaker" Ted Brautigan suggested reading The Inheritors to his young friend Bobby, who had just completed reading Lord of the Flies, William Golding's first and more widely known book.

The Inheritors is a story about the last existing band of Neanderthals. Neanderthals were humanoid creatures that share a recent common ancestor with humans,...more I first considered reading The Inheritors by William Golding while reading Stephen King's book Hearts in Atlantis. In Hearts in Atlantis, the elderly escaped "breaker" Ted Brautigan suggested reading The Inheritors to his young friend Bobby, who had just completed reading Lord of the Flies, William Golding's first and more widely known book.

The Inheritors is a story about the last existing band of Neanderthals. Neanderthals were humanoid creatures that share a recent common ancestor with humans, but are an evolutionary offshoot. We are not their direct descendants. Neanderthals were wide spread throughout Asia and Europe and are believed to have faded from existence about 30,000 years ago.

The style of the writing in The Inheritors is intended to portray the thought process and language of a Neanderthal. The Neanderthal's vocabulary is adequate, but limited. Instead of fully formed thoughts, the Neanderthals have "pictures." There seems to be some form intuition amongst the Neanderthals, described as "sharing pictures." If one individual tries to share a concept with another, and they do not agree or understand, they say "I do not share this picture."

Golding also describes the culture and lifestyle of the Neanderthals. They are primitive hunter gatherers, illustrated by several scenes of eating mushrooms and grubs found in the forest. Also, a detailed description of collecting and cooking a scavenged deer that was killed by a wild cat is given. The Neanderthal tribe is hierarchical with a male patriarch that makes the decisions and a female matriarch that keeps the fire burning (they are unable to create fire, but can collect it and keep it burning when it occurs naturally) and prepares the food.They use the scavenged deer's stomach as a vessel to boil water and make soup.

The story takes place as the band of Neanderthals are settling into its usual summertime home on a rock shelf over looking a river. It is here that they encounter for the first time a tribe of early humans. The humans are more sophisticated in terms of their rituals and their technology. They are able to create fire and they have water vessels that allow them to inhabit an island in the middle of the river. The Neanderthals are very afraid of water since they have no clothing and are prone to hypothermia if they become wet.

The humans view the Neanderthals as Forest Devils and are quick to kill them when they can. Eventually, all the Neanderthals are killed, except for two small children that are taken captive and treated like pets.

I found this book enjoyable, well written, and thought provoking, however the style was somewhat difficult to read. A second read might be worthwhile.

I recommend this book to someone who has the time to the time and patience for it, but I would caution against using this as a scientific description of early humans and Neanderthals since it was written in the early 60's.(less)

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Nov 13, 2011 John Herceg rated it 5 of 5 stars

William Golding imagines the world of the Neanderthal, during the moment in time when it is introduced to Homo Sapiens, and the consequences that ensue. Golding will capture the reader's interest and heart with this gripping tale of a clan of Neanderthals and their daily struggle to survive. Complicated by the urgent need to keep their fire lit (because they do not know how to make fire), their lack of an evolved language, and the ever-present dangers of the wild environment surrounding them, th...more

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Aug 04, 2010 Keith rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Here is a tale of a primitive tribe nearing the end of its existence. A group of individuals so small, so isolated and so endangered that their potential for success is in doubt from the book’s beginning and their extinction is assumed at the end. Golding never identifies the individuals in this story. They may be among the last of the Neanderthals on earth or they may even be another, now unknown species but they are so absorbing because he allows the reader inside their minds. The intellectual...more

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Oct 11, 2012 Norton Stone rated it 4 of 5 stars

A book you have to stick with and a book you should stick with. Fortunately it is not that long.
If you enjoyed Avatar you will find that story here. "I have a picture" in The Inheritors, "I see you" in Avatar. The story is Avatar but set in our pre-history. Are Luk or Fa the missing link? Golding strongly suggest a species on the brink of understanding who observe us early humans and consequently begin to question and think.

Luk wonders why the new people throw sticks with red feathers at him, he...more

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Mar 11, 2013 Rob Bliss rated it 2 of 5 stars

Its tough to write about beings who dont really write or speak and have words for everything. I lost track early of what was going on. So when a character died, I didn't know til way after. Seems like they were playing around with logs and whatever, and then theyre in a canoe. And how did they get across to meet the new people, and why did they head back, and why did they get over again?

See ... this was confusing when cavemen dont know the names for things. I know thats the point: the invention...more

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Jun 26, 2011 Stephen Bird rated it 5 of 5 stars

I am in awe of this book, Golding's craft, and his work in general (I have also read "Lord of the Flies" and "Darkness Visible"). The writing itself, whatever one thinks of the plot, is transcendent. I am impressed by what must have been prodigious research on Golding’s part to gain insight in the world of the Neanderthals, about whose specific reality modern man can only speculate. Whatever the Neanderthals lacked in intellectual capability, they more than made up for in their ability to use th...more I am in awe of this book, Golding's craft, and his work in general (I have also read "Lord of the Flies" and "Darkness Visible"). The writing itself, whatever one thinks of the plot, is transcendent. I am impressed by what must have been prodigious research on Golding’s part to gain insight in the world of the Neanderthals, about whose specific reality modern man can only speculate. Whatever the Neanderthals lacked in intellectual capability, they more than made up for in their ability to use their senses, especially that of smell. As well as their possible telekinetic activity, which would have been unencumbered by more advanced intellectual processes. Golding's Neanderthals have an intuitive grasp of their world that is lacking in the modern human; on the other hand, the Neanderthals also live more wholly at the mercy of "Oa" (Mother Earth). The innocence of the Neanderthals is endearing, the "new people" Homo sapiens are dangerous and menacing. I felt compassion for the Neanderthals, and contempt for "the new people". The emotion that binds both species together is fear; -IE- Homo sapiens refer to the Neanderthals as "devils"; Fa tells Lok that “the new people are frightened of the air”.

The prose within "The Inheritors" is highly poetic; Golding paints an intricate portrait of a primeval landscape, such as our planet will probably never experience again; this description in itself adds to the atmosphere of suspense the author creates in this novel. It is not just that landscape in itself that is impressionable, but also how it is perceived by the Neanderthals and their "mind-dream-pictures"; -IE- the heightened colors seen by Lok during his hangover from the honey-drink. Golding shrouds his worlds in mystery to create a background of heightened effect, which becomes an integral part of the story; Richard Wagner used a similar technique by employing the orchestra as an additional "voice" in “Der Ring des Nibelungen”. One of the major themes of this book focuses on the evolution of innocence into corruption; a problem that unfortunately still exists in humans today. Another theme is that of the Machiavellian nature of mankind as a whole, specifically in how that behaviour was starting to evolve in Golding's portrait of Homo sapiens. I actually think this work is more engaging than the more commercially accessible LOTF (and certainly more so than the experimental-yet-inconsistent "Darkness Visible”). Golding is a recent discovery of mine, and I am looking forward to reading more of his work.
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Jul 05, 2009 Frankie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: british

Okay, the first couple of chapters are rough, but I'd encourage you to stick it out. Imagine how difficult it must have been to write in a balance of modern English and presumed Neanderthal utterances. The dialogue is appropriate but even some of the narration must include "utterances." For instance, "picture" here has several meanings – memory, thought, idea, plan, etc. – but whether a character says "I have many pictures" or the text "Mal had many pictures," it's this subtlety of Golding's def...more

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Aug 30, 2012 Decbres rated it 3 of 5 stars

Quite a short book about neanderthals cruising around the forest after having returned from the sea where they had been for the winter months and encountering homo sapiens with predictable results.
Book is written from the perspective of Lok, a not too bright neanderthal and Golding employs language reflective the lack of faculty of the primitive being. Hence it is quite repetitive and Golding employs several similar tricks over and over when he describes reduced communication and inability to s...more

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Jul 20, 2009 Peter rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book was a challenge. I must admit it took me a good forty pages or so to adjust to the unique way in which Golding so skilfully uses the prose here. Its not easy at times but it proves to be well worth the effort. There is a real sense of authenticity in how Golding portrays the last of the Neantherthals and their desperate struggle to survive in a world that is becoming increasingly uncompromising and alien to them. Golding manages to present these mysterious people with such a beautiful...more

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Sep 19, 2011 Don rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, fictional-history, adventure

PLOT SPOILER!

This novel is an imaginative reconstruction of the life of a band of Neanderthals. It is written in such a way that the reader might assume the group to be modern Homo sapiens as they gesture and speak simply among themselves, and bury their dead with heartfelt, solemn rituals. They also have powerful sense impressions and feelings, and appear sometimes to share thoughts in a near-telepathic way. As the novel progresses it becomes more and more apparent that they live very simply, u...more PLOT SPOILER!

This novel is an imaginative reconstruction of the life of a band of Neanderthals. It is written in such a way that the reader might assume the group to be modern Homo sapiens as they gesture and speak simply among themselves, and bury their dead with heartfelt, solemn rituals. They also have powerful sense impressions and feelings, and appear sometimes to share thoughts in a near-telepathic way. As the novel progresses it becomes more and more apparent that they live very simply, using their considerable mental abilities to connect to one another without extensive vocabulary or the kinds of memories that create culture. They have wide knowledge of food sources, mostly roots and vegetables. They chase hyaenas from a larger beast's kill and eat meat, but they don't kill mammals themselves. They have a spiritual system centring on a female principle of bringing forth, but their lives are lived so much in the present that the reader realizes they are very different from us, living in something like an eternal present, or at least a present broken and shaped by seasons.

One of the band, Lok, is a point of view character. He is the one we follow as one by one the adults of the band die or are killed, then the young are stolen by the "new people," a group of early modern humans. Lok and Fa, the remaining adults, are fascinated and repelled by the new people. They observe their actions and rituals with amazement, only slowly understanding that harm is meant by the sticks of the new people

The humans are portrayed as strange, godlike beings as the neanderthals witness their mastery of fire, Upper Palaeolithic weaponry and sailing.

All save the last chapters of the novel are written from the Neanderthals' stark, simple stylistics (linguistics) perspective. Their observations of early human behaviour serve as a filter for Golding's exercise in paleoanthropology, in which modern readers will recognize precursors of later human societal constructs, e.g., religion, culture, sacrifice, sorrow, grief and war.

The penultimate chapter employs an omniscient viewpoint, observing Lok. For the first time, the novel describes the people the reader has been inhabiting through the first-person perspective. Lok, totally alone, gives up in despair.

In the final chapter, we move to the point of view of the new race, more or less modern humans fleeing in their boats, revealing that they are terribly afraid of the Neanderthals whom they believe to be devils of the forest. This last chapter, the only one written from the humans' point of view, reinforces the inheritance of the world by the new species.

One interesting anomaly is that the fleeing humans carry with them an infant neanderthal, of whom they are simultaneously afraid and enamoured.

Very much like a Quest For Fire though this stands alone in great story-telling. Good novel.(less)

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Jul 07, 2012 Emily Ptak rated it 3 of 5 stars

Golding's book The Inheritors won him the Nobel prize for literature.. and it is easy to see why. At first, the novel seemed clumsy and awkward. It was difficult to discern between the various characters, who all sport pre-human contrived names like "Mal" and "Oa". Once you get that under your belt and begin to distinguish between characters, the novel becomes easier to follow. Set on the cusp of consciousness, Golding's portrayal of early thoughts is fascinating. He frequently makes his charact...more

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May 07, 2011 David Gerstle rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is an often unsettling, but sometimes brilliant narrative told through the experiences of a small family of proto-humans. It is unsurprising - considering the main characters are Neanderthals coming into contact with Homo sapiens - that the book is ultimately quite tragic and violent.

Unlike other works of 'pre-historical fiction' (e.g. "Clan of the Cave Bear"), Golding is not overly concerned with allegorizing any modern human condition. For this same reason, "The Inheritors" should stand...more

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Dec 19, 2010 Chris Freeman rated it 2 of 5 stars

Hmmm. When I heard about this book, I thought the concept sounded intriguing and, considering the pedigree of the author (Nobel Laureate-winning author of Lord of the Flies, William Golding), it seemed like I would be sure to enjoy it. After reading "The Inheritors", though, I'm underwhelmed.

The story, set some forty or fifty thousand years ago, concerns a chance meeting between a group of neanderthals and a group of humans at a time with the story being told almost exclusively from the perspect...more

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Aug 19, 2007 Ryan rated it 3 of 5 stars

Three stars seems to imply that the book is of mediocre quality. That is not the case. It's a very impressive book, deeply imagined, structured and revealed with a great deal of nuance. I just didn't really enjoy reading it. That said, I can't wait to read more Golding, such as Pincher Martin. Like the scab you continually pick at, I suppose ...

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Sep 03, 2012 Yarb rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Golding's Neanderthals are insufferably innocent noble savage types who live in harmony with nature, refuse to kill animals for food and spend their time mooning around their Eden and generally being all touchy-feely and pathetic.

Homo Erectus is much more accurately drawn as a depraved and bloodthirsty carouser with a brainbox too big for his own good. The story really picks up when the humans come on the scene. Alas, too late.

Unfortunately I think Golding's execution of his admittedly brilliant...more

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Apr 29, 2012 Wendy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book was not an easy read, but it was a good one. Told from the point of view of neanderthals for most of the book, the language and communication takes a lot of concentration to understand. But really it's all more simplistic in its use. These people don't have a vast vocabulary so they have general words for whole concepts we understand in a much more complex and specific way. For a while after reading this book i overused the phrase "I do not see this picture".

I was actually quite shocke...more

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Jan 30, 2013 Waven rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, horror-sci-fi, suspense

What an odd book. I ran across it in an used bookstore and bought it only because I recognized the author from his Lord of the Flies fame. So I entered the story with no preconceptions or knowledge of intended writing goals (and the following thoughts may or may not follow established understandings). What I found was an odd book about the meeting of man and neanderthal (or other hominid-like group; Golding didn't offer scientific names). The neanderthals are sympathetic characters, the humans i...more

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Mar 14, 2011 Curtis rated it 4 of 5 stars

Most of this book is written from the perspective of Neanderthals, which doesn't make for the most elegant and poetic prose, but if you can get past the dumbed-down dialogue and simplistic style this book is such a great idea and very well done. It is the story of a small band of Neanderthals as they come into first contact with a new band of strange and confounded men (early homo-sapiens). Just as in Lord of the Flies, love and harmony and cooperation and peace do not prevail between these two...more

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Aug 12, 2010 Myles rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: historish, literary

I don't know what made me think a novel by the guy who wrote Lord of the Flies wouldn't be depressing.

The inheritors is about a small tribe of neanderthals and their devastating encounter with a group of homo sapiens. It was hard to get into at first, because of the story being told from the point of view of a rather dim member of the tribe.

Golding is a gifted writer, however, and the characters and the story become clear. I found it hard to concentrate on it and events took place so suddenly, s...more

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Sep 20, 2012 Zuberino rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: anthropology, prehistory, neanderthal, cro-magnon, historical-fiction, fiction

A book that has been on my reading list for several years now and that took on renewed urgency ever since I read Jared Diamond's Third Chimpanzee last year. Finally, a few weeks ago, when we were driving through northwest Germany, the appearance of a sign pointing towards the Neander valley reminded me that Golding's book was still sitting on the shelf.

So, a showdown between Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens, set in the remotest reaches of human history and told from the point of view of t...more A book that has been on my reading list for several years now and that took on renewed urgency ever since I read Jared Diamond's Third Chimpanzee last year. Finally, a few weeks ago, when we were driving through northwest Germany, the appearance of a sign pointing towards the Neander valley reminded me that Golding's book was still sitting on the shelf.

So, a showdown between Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens, set in the remotest reaches of human history and told from the point of view of the last Neanderthal man? Promising, for sure! Golding's book has its strengths, mainly the extraordinary imaginative leap, sustained over 230-odd pages, that permits the reader to see the world through Lok's eyes. The limited brainpower, the short-term thinking, the guilelessness and forgetfulness, the rudimentary communication, basically the here-and-now quality of Neanderthal existence with its elevated sensory perceptions of the world - all these are done well. So too the first encounter with modern man, the vast and fatal gap in technological prowess, the desperation and emptiness that marks each loss, each death in the tribe. That passage describing Lok's clueless reactions to an arrow that has just struck a tree next to him is by itself worth the price of admission.

However, a couple of things did not work for me at all. Firstly Golding does a dreadfully poor job of explaining the topography of his prelapsarian paradise, so that between terrace and overhang and slope and forest and river and island and waterfall and cliff, it is all too easy to get hopelessly confused as to where exactly the immediate action is taking place and how it relates to other characters elsewhere. In the context of this story, this confusion is actually a pretty big deal. A map would certainly have helped. The other weakness (which is the flipside of the positives) is when the hypernaturalistic descriptions from Lok's point of view serve more to befuddle than to clarify. This happens frequently enough to be annoying and really pissed me off in the extended passage when Lok and Fa climb up the dead tree and observe the new people over the course of a whole day and night. I had to work pretty hard to figure out what was going on half the time. If this was what passed for realistic writing in Golding's day, it doesn't pass muster today.

There are enough flashes of powerful insight and emotion to make The Inheritors a generally satisfying read. Apparently this was Golding's favourite book among all his work, but I think it could have, should have been a good deal better.

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Nov 01, 2009 Deepa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Many critics have suggested that Golding's obvious intention is to show the differences between the Neanderthal men and the Homo Sapiens and thereby satirising the latter. This may be in tune with the overall structure of the novel and the fact that a lot of research has gone into Golding's depiction of the Neanderthal men. But I feel there is much more to the novel than merely satirising the early human beings. It is a sharp criticism on man himself. Things certainly become more complex as we l...more

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May 04, 2013 Denerick rated it 2 of 5 stars

An interesting idea, with a worthy message (Unfortunately I share Golding's grim diagnosis of the human condition) but unfortunately it is nearly entirely unreadable. By choosing a protagonist with a primitive style of communication, Golding achieves a certain amount of authenticity but in the process creates a labyrinthine and dull novel. I really trudged through this, mainly because I found the writing to be really tough going. Golding's philosophy is interesting. However, I think there is som...more

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About William Golding

Sir William Gerald Golding was a British novelist, poet, and playwright best known for his 1954 novel Lord of the Flies. He was awarded the Booker Prize for literature in 1980 for his novel Rites of Passage, the first book of the trilogy To the Ends of the Earth. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983 and was knighted by the Queen of England in 1988.

In 2008, The Times ranked Golding...more

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Books by William Golding

Rites of Passage (To the Ends of the Earth, #1)

Pincher Martin: The Two Deaths of Christopher Martin

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Quotes from The Inheritors

“The moon was through to the sunset side of the gap, but its light was hardly noticeable on the earth for the ruddy brilliance of the firelight.” — 2 people liked it

“Out of the firelight everything was black and silver, black island, rocks and trees carved cleanly out of the sky and silver river with a flashing light rippling back and forth along the lip of the fall.” — 2 people liked it

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The Inheritors

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