Again, the use of foreshadowing prevented Fortinbras from seemingly appearing from thin air and saving the day. Shakespeare used the device again in Hamlet, where Fortinbras arrival pretty much nixes any attempt of anarchy within Denmark. Leading up to this scene, there were details of the event defined and so the reader would not be caught off guard by the appearance of disguised Hymenaios. For example, in As You Like It Hymenaios suddenly attends the wedding disguised as Forest of Arden to sort out Rosalind’s problems. Shakespeare leverages the device very well in a few of his comedies and tragedies. Very few authors have been able to master its use. When efficiently used, the deus ex machina device can be a mark of a true genius. In order to make the conclusion less jarring, he should have added more foreshadowing about a naval vessel canvassing the waters around the island, or something to that degree. That he just threw in the Naval officer as an afterthought.

I felt robbed and it seemed like William Golding was in a rush to wrap up the conflict. While I personally feel that the Lord of the Flies story is one of the best dystopian novels in existence (and a favorite of mine), the ending left me irked. This Navy character’s appearance is sudden, jolting the reader out of the suspense and turmoil that is being played out between Ralph and the other boys. At the conclusion of the book, a Naval personnel happens upon the castaway island, right before Ralph is about to become mincemeat at the hands of the hunting party, saving all the adolescent boys from becoming lost to their primal tendencies. Lord of the Flies is a one of the best examples of poor use of the deus ex machina device. In its poorest fashion, the deus ex machine literary device is a complete cop out. This allows the main characters to go about their merry way and the reader is left to scratch his or her head in confusion.

The divine character, quite literally, appears out of thin air, swoops in, and steals away all problems. The criticism around this device is that if a conflict takes route that cannot be resolved, the author would introduce a divine character in the storyline to immediately wrap up the conflict. It originated during the Greek theatre era where actors, who had the role of a deity, were strung up on a crane-like contraption and lower onto the stage to instantly resolve a conflict. Deus ex machina is a Latin phrase that means “god out of the machine”.

Deus ex why contain it