Kurt Vonnegut, a famous american author describes the feeling of love as, “A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved”. The members of a dystopian community live with hunger, poverty, and a controlling government. The Community in The Giver, citizens live with equality, but because equality dictates their lives the people have no emotions, no individuality, and a lack of knowledge. Jonas, a twelve year-old boy who is training to be the new Receiver of Memories, discovers that this failing utopia he thought he lives in becomes a dystopia. As he begins to receives the memories Jonas realizes that the community that seems like home, overflows with lies, secrets, and the dictatorship of the government. Throughout the novel The Giver by Lois Lowry, Jonas endeavors a dystopian community because of the control, …show more content…
Jonas spends a lot of time pondering over “ What Assignment the Elders would be selecting for his future” (Lowry 19). He feels the community gives him no freedom of choice because the ruler of the Community choose his journey in life for him. This affects Jonas because he does not choose his own path, so if the Elders force him to continue his Assignment even if he does not prefer this career. Jonas also can not trust the Community because they constantly observe them “ With a humiliation that the announcements” (Lowry 23) of all the citizens who break the rules. He feels that the Elders violate his personal space, which makes him not trust them. This matters to Jonas because he feels like the Community does not trust him enough to not watch him, so he believes that they are keeping secrets. As Jonas begins to realize the problem of having no choice he thinks about all of the other opportunities that the Elders take from them such as lack of knowledge and not being able to feel
The Giver was an example of a dystopian society. In this community citizen doesn`t had any freedom. It had a lots of information about why it was dystopian, but today I will talk about few thing. First reason was the natural world was banished and distrusted. Second was information, independent thought, and freedom were restricted. The last was they had fear of the out side world.
What determines a society to be either a utopia or a dystopia? Would it be everyone following the rules? In the book The Giver, by Lois Lowry, a new “Utopian” culture blossoms from the previously failed society. The Giver’s nation starts out with the intention of creating a utopian society; however, the strict limitations turn it into a dystopia where there are receivers, like Jonas, that hold the good and bad memories from the past culture. Jonas will experience great pain and great joy through his job as the Receiver instead of the whole community sharing the burden. The Giver’s world is a dystopia because of the following three reasons: they kill people that disobey the rules, they do not get to pick their own jobs, and, above all, they beat children if they do not use precise language.
“I knew that there had been times in the past-terrible times-when people had destroyed others in haste, in fear, and had brought about their own destruction” (48). In the old days, when people in Jonas’s community valued individual needs, there were lots of terrible happenings: violence; and then the society ended up with general welfare and safety. It is difficult for us to think of a world without color, freedom, music and love, but in The Giver, the society denounces these things in order to make room for peace and safety. In The Giver, by having a society based on general welfare they gave safety to their people. No violence, no criminal activities, nor homicides.
When he lies for the first time, Jonas does it to defend love. Jonas realizes that no one in the Community can be truly happy when they are ignorant to love. The dialogue between characters is very important to the development of the plot, but Lowry additionally uses Jonas’
Lois Lowry describes a futuristic world with controlled climate, emotions, way of living and eliminating suffering in her book The Giver. The main character, Jonas, shows the reader what his world is like by explaining a very different world from what society knows today. Everything is controlled, and no one makes choices for themselves or knows of bad and hurtful memories. There is no color, and everything is dull. As he becomes the Receiver who has to know all the memories and pass them down to the next Receiver, he realizes his world needs change.
The Giver presents a community that appears to be perfect on the surface. Jonas's community is free of warfare, pain, sorrow and other bitterness we suffer in our society. The world seems to be secure and undergoes little conflict. Such a community seems flawless and is the idealistic society that we longed to live in. However, through Jonas's training, the imperfections of the Utopian community are revealed.
Lois Lowry’s The Giver considers something the world takes for granted: personal empowerment. These simple day-to-day decisions create what the world is. Without self-empowerment and right to believe in a personal decision, what is the human race? The world can only imagine, as Lois Lowry does in The Giver. She asks: What if everything in life was decided by others? What if spouses, children, the weather, education, and careers were chosen based upon the subjects’ personality? What if it didn’t matter what the subject thought? Jonas, the Receiver, lives here. He eats, sleeps, and learns in his so-called perfect world until he meets the Giver, an aged man, who transmits memories of hope, pain, color, and love. Jonas then escapes his Community with a newborn child (meant to be killed), hoping to find a life of fulfillment. On the way, he experiences pain, sees color, and feels love. Irony, symbolism, and foreshadowing are three literary devices used to imply the deeper meaning of The Giver.
As Jonas receives these memories, he ponders how their community would be different if they could make more choices. For example, after the Giver transmits Jonas a memory of family, Jonas thinks how crazy it is that they have generations and he says about his community, “‘What if they were allowed to choose their own mate?’”...”’Or what if’”...”’they could choose their own jobs?’” (124). Jonas then thinks if people should make these choices, and things that could go wrong if they did. For instance, while he is thinking about how crazy these choices are, he says, “‘I can’t even imagine it. We really have to protect people from wrong choices’”(124). People in his Community don’t choose their own spouse, the Community leaders assign them a spouse and children if they want. Jonas’s Community is brain-washed into not having opinions or choices. Although they have no divorce and wrong choices, Jonas would rather have choices and a real
Jonas’ community chooses Sameness rather than valuing individual expression. Although the possibility of individual choice sometimes involves risk, it also exposes Jonas to a wide range of joyful experiences from which his community has been shut away. Sameness may not be the best thing in the community because Jonas expresses how much he feels like Sameness is not right and wants there to be more individuality. Giver leads him to understand both the advantages and the disadvantages of personal choice, and in the end, he considers the risks worth the benefits. “Memories are forever.”
“Hidden secrets and answers often lead to a bad ending!” ‘Lois Lowry-Unknown, hidden, deep, dark memories.’ The society knows nothing about color, love, death, war, pain and much more. It is Jonas’s mission to give it out. In the giver, Lois Lowry uses setting and character to reveal a dystopian society.
Jonas misses the way it was before he had memories where there was no pain or feeling, because everything was innocent. But he understands that although there was innocence nobody feels true happiness.Jonas thinks: “But he knew he couldn’t go back to that world of no feelings that he had lived in so long” (Lowry 131). Jonas wishes he could go back when everything was innocent and when he had no burden of pain, but although there was innocence the bad memories were stripped away to avoid the feeling of pain but also leaves everyone emotionless. But he knows it can never be the same again because of all the knowledge he gained from memories. He learns that memoires need to be valued, even the painful ones. Jonas feels that his community can change and things could be different. He thinks they should live in a world with memories. Jonas says: “Things could be different. I don’t know how, but there must be some way for things to be different. There could be colours [...] and everybody would have memories [...] There could be love” (Lowry 128). Jonas wishes that they could all have memories because everyone would be able to experience love. Love is one of the most important things in human life. He knows that there are bad memories, but without them, he wouldn’t be able to enjoy the good ones. Eventually, with his feelings
The people in the community have absolutely no choices what so ever. The people already have their whole life rolled out in front of you without even knowing it. The council chooses your spouse, your family unit, your job, what you do everyday and how to do everything everyday. The rules that Jonas gets restrict him from doing certain things. “1. Go immediately at the end
Movie The Giver, directed by Phillip Noyce, is based on Lois Lowry’s book and tells the story how the perfect world would look like. Where everyone is happy, safe, and there is no pain. Jonas is the main character and I will be analyzing how his values and beliefs changes though the movie. This movie is interesting because everyone lives within boundaries where past memory does exist just for the chosen ones. Jonas is one of those people who learns past wisdom and suffers while trying to understand what is the right thing to do.
Imagine a world with no color, weather, or sunshine. The Giver is a book by Lois Lowry and is based on a utopia where no one makes choices, feels pain, or has emotions. The book takes place in a community where all of this is true. The story is about an 11-year old soon to be 12 year-old named Jonas who is unsure of which job he will get when he is 12. Jonas changes throughout The Giver and as a result, tries to change the community.