Title: The Giver
Author: Lois Lowry
Series: The Giver #1
Publication Date: April 26, 1993
Genres: Fiction, Children’s
My Rating: ★★★★★
Amazon SynopsisJonas’s world is perfect. Everything is under control. There is no war or fear of pain. There are no choices. Every person is assigned a role in the community. Jonas lives in a seemingly ideal world.
When Jonas turns 12 he is singled out to receive special training from The Giver. The Giver alone holds the memories of the true pain and pleasure of life. Not until he is given his life assignment as the Receiver does Jonas begin to understand the dark secrets behind this fragile community. Now, it is time for Jonas to receive the truth. There is no turning back.
My Thoughts“He knew that there was no quick comfort for emotions like those. They were deeper and they did not need to be told. They were felt.”
I somehow missed out on reading The Giver up until this point and honestly had a pretty negative opinion of it for no real reason, but I’m so glad that I finally decided to read it because it was awesome. Morality, freedom, and humanity are just a few of the hot topics that Lowry touches on in this little book.
Living under the control and safety of his community his whole life, Jonas has an especially unique (and dangerous) kind of ignorance — he doesn’t even know that there are things out there that he doesn’t know about. He thinks that his community’s ways of doing things are the only ways that the world has ever functioned. After meeting the Giver, Jonas realizes how much of the world that his community has been keeping form him: history, emotions, colors, and some dark secrets that he can never forget.
In this emotional and powerful book, Lowry presents the idea that without the knowledge of past experiences and memories, we cannot move forward or truly experience the present. Without feelings, both wonderful and painful, we cannot really attain empathy and without empathy, we never really experience what makes us humans.
“Without memories, it’s all meaningless.”
I highly recommend this book to literally everyone. Even if it doesn’t become a new favorite, I can guarantee that it will really make you think about how you perceive the world around you.
Share this:
