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Simon's death happened because of an enormous agitation, physical and emotional, of the rest of the boys, who were playing kill the pig' when Simon arrived at the beach. He went there to tell them that there was no beast, that he had seen a dead parachutist on the top of the mountain; instead, he was killed ("A thing was crawling out of the forestThe beast stumbled into the horseshoeSimon was crying out something about a dead man on a hillThe crowd surged after it [Simon]struck, bit, tore").

His death was the culmination of the pig hunts and the hunting games' played to reduce the tension in the group of children. Instead of reducing the tension, these games brought the children closer to killing each other, by giving them a weird sense of power, a killer's sense of power.
I believe that Simon's death brought the boys from civilized to savage' as they have ceased to see the difference between humans and animals, or in this case the beast'.
William Golding emphasized this change throughout the book by foreshadowing (for example: when Roger wanted to throw stones at a 'littlun' (Henry) but was suppressed by the values of society, later in the book, Roger kills Piggy intentionally by releasing a huge bolder upon him).
As this makes the boys completely savage', it closes the possibilities of them working together and peacefully. It also creates a starting point for deliberate murders, such as that of Piggy by Roger and later, the planned death of Ralph by Jack (which is not accomplished). Even though supposedly civilized people of today's society do such actions as well, they could be considered exceptions; or in war, they have a clear reason for doing so (most of the time at least). However, this is not our point of interest in this commentary.
Throughout the book, W. Golding associates the instinct of civilization with good and the instinct of savagery with evil, however I believe that order vs. chaos would be more appropriate as savage' originally meant merely "of the woods" and not evil or anarchic. I am not arguing that the balance was tipped one way or another, but simply that this notation' would be more appropriate to address the road that the boys traveled.

Simon's death is very violent and unexpected ("There were no words, and no movements the tearing of teeth and claws"). The language used is very mystical and expresses a general sense of misunderstanding and disorder. The mood is very active, blood thirsty ("Kill the beast! Cut his throat! Spill his

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