The book "The Giver" by
Lois Lowry is mainly about Jonas (The Receiver) and the old man who
is the Giver. The book is based on the future where they're trying to
live in a perfect world. Their civilization is trying to prevent the
most difficult emotions, decision making, and anything out of the
ordinary or their routine. They did this by observing the past which
would be our world today where we have lots of rights and freedom.
The main character Jonas was assigned his job of being a receiver.
The Old man who is the Giver transfers all of his memories from the
past to Jonas that nobody else can experience because they were taken
away from the people long ago. All of this has an impact on Jonas
since he's not used to feeling this much pain and emotions because of
the society they lived in. They thought it was best for the people to
not have to deal with any emotions, decisions, or harm, so the life
people lived was very limited. After a while Jonas gets frustrated
and realizes for the rest of his life, he is going to be alone and
everyone around him will be stuck with the same ordinary life when
there is so much more that they are not experiencing. The Giver
acknowledges these feelings and comes up with a plan for Jonas so
everyone can live like they used to.
I really enjoyed this book because
it's extremely eye opening to read about. Throughout reading, it
explains more and more in depth about how we all live for memories
and experiences. This made me think about this as an immensely
powerful message because without making memories and living freely
there wouldn't be much in our lives at all. We would all live life
exactly like Jonas's "perfect" society in the book and we
would be missing out on great opportunities and overall happiness.
This book also relates to human rights because many of the rules in
the book were violations of human rights in our world and its crazy
to compare their life and rules to ours that we have today and see
what limited conditions that had to live under. I would recommend
this book for anyone who has a good understanding of our society
today because that reflects a lot in the book and some parts have a
complex understanding that not everyone might understand.
“The
worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It's the
loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared.” ― Lois Lowry, The
Giver. I think this quote demonstrates the overall theme of the book
and how everyone should be able to experience and make memories.
Reviewed by Nora D. 8th Grade
