I almost cheered when I read the article about a real-life alternative to Lord of the Flies where six marooned Tongan teenagers survived amicably for 15 months on a desert island in 1965.

They shared chores, built themselves a gym and ended the day with a prayer and a song accompanied by a guitar fashioned from a coconut shell.

It’s a lovely story and means we no longer have to accept William Golding’s bleak take on the human condition.

Lord of the Flies is a stifling, depressing masterpiece. I understand why we teach it of course - just as I understand why we teach Romeo and Juliet, Macbeth, Of Mice and Men and Kes, too.

But let’s be honest, they’re miserable and bleak. Yet we seem determined to impose such a view of humanity to our young charges.

Thankfully, they don’t always interpret things this way.

Tractors and teaching

Years ago, I taught my favourite ever class. It was an all-boy group of self-stereotyping Cumbrian farmers who were not the keenest learners. They’d admit that themselves quite readily.

In fact, thanks to social media, most of them keep in touch and they’ve turned out OK - sensible wage-earning 30-something dads.

One dropped into school recently with his angelic daughter to have her passport application signed and as I greeted him, he whispered, “Don’t tell her what I was like at school.”

My lessons were a bit like stumbling upon a group of grumpy farmers in a rural pub. They habitually responded to the register with “A’reet then bonny lass” and when I objected, suggested a more respectful reply. “Aye then Ledgerlass.” This, despite my even sterner objections, stuck.

Some days, they’d work away busily only for me to find they’d been drawing a lovingly detailed picture of a farm vehicle - a baler, a combine harvester and endless, endless tractors.

Soaring high

As you may expect, they didn’t like reading and they told me every lesson they didn’t need to read. But then we read Kes. They loved Kes; they loved Billy and they hated Jud. 

They’d snarl and clench their fists whenever Jud was mentioned. Billy’s spelling mistakes were a source of amusement - “He’s worse than us…” - and they fully approved of Billy’s decision to suspend his antipathy to reading when he wanted to gen up on the technicalities of falconry. 

Back in the day, it was possible to have a spoken response as a literature coursework assignment. So, in order to make the most of their love of Kes, I organised a debate for their assessment.

I kicked off by alluding to the bleak symbolism of the ending - Billy’s soaring spirit crushed by Jud’s brutality. But they were having none of it.

“It’s a bird,” they protested. “If he can train one bird, he can train another.”

They went on: “Hell Ledgerlass, he’ll do it better next time…” and then their soaring spirits lifted into a joyous flight of fancy. 

A positive outlook

The following spring, they argued, Billy would go back to the farm where the kestrel had her nest and he’d find another chick.

The farmer would amble down to see how Billy was getting on. How was the pit? Would Billy have time to do a bit of drystone walling for him? For a bit of cash in hand, like?

Billy would agree. He’d crack on with the drystone wall and make a rousing success of it, watching the hatchlings’ progress as he worked.

The farmer would be impressed; the farmer’s wife would pop down with a bacon butty and a brew or two.

When the work was done, the farmer made an offer; there’s a caravan down yon bottom field. A bit basic. Needs a lick of paint and that. But would Billy fancy working on the farm - odd jobs and the like - and live in the caravan?

Well, Billy jumped at the chance, handed in his notice at the colliery, said ta-ra to his mam and set up home in the caravan.

When the farmer died not long after, turns out he’s left Billy the farm in his will. No kids of his own, see.

And Jud? Jud was blown to bits in a mine explosion. Or run over when he was drunk - his own stupid fault. Or beaten to death in a battle with police during the miners’ strike. Or fell down a well and was never seen again. (No fate was too grim for Jud.)

Billy grew old in the farmhouse training generation after generation of birds - and dogs - divven’t forget dogs, he’s grand with dogs. He’s probably still there.  

The kids are alreet

Like the Tongan boys, my lads knew their stuff.

They understood how Billy could rise again because - and although I hate to make this sound like the tiresome homily at the end of an assembly I’m going to say it - he’d learned something.

While I’m here cashing in my head of Year 11 chips, I might as well make this into an analogy for our times: we don’t have to spiral into chaos when it all goes wrong.

Despite what the literary canon tries to tell us, humans are - on the whole - good.

Like Billy, like the Tongan teenagers, like my pupils that came to love Kes, we will prevail.

Sarah Ledger has been teaching English for 33 years. She tweets as @sezl