The Giver Essay
“The life where nothing was ever unexpected. Or inconvenient. Or unusual. The life without color, pain, or past,” Lois Lowry describing a dystopia. In Lois Lowry’s The Giver, Jonas and his community live in a dystopia, where there is no color, pain, or past and nothing unexpected. In The Giver, Jonas’s community appears as a perfect world, where families share their feelings and food is delivered straight to the front door. However, as the story continues Jonas receives his job Receiver of the Memory where he receives memories from the former Receiver of the Memory, The Giver. These memories make Jonas realize that his world is not so perfect after all. He starts to become uncomfortable with his dystopian world. To sum it up, Jonas’s community is a dystopia because citizens live under harsh control and strict rules, citizens are perceived to be under constant surveillance, and Jonas is one of the few to question the goodness of his society.
To begin with, Jonas’s community is a dystopia because they live under harsh control and strict rules. Throughout the book, a series of rules and harsh control is displayed from the community. At one point in the book, Jonas gets in trouble for the smallest incident, “Immediately he had been taken aside for a brief private lesson in language precision. He was not starving, it was pointed out. He was hungry. No one in the community was starving, had ever been starving, would ever be starving. To say “starving” was to speak a lie” (Lowry 70).
The Review on The Giver Jonas Community Memories
Book Report - The Giver The Giver by Louis Lowry was published in 1993. I did not choose this book it was recommended to me I classify this book as an inner adventure. As in Jonas goes through an emotional metamorphosis (if you will) Jonas lives in a community where pain, rudeness, and war are non-existent. All children undergoes a ceremony in December every year until they reach twelve years of ...
Jonas got into trouble for saying the word “starving”. If someone were to say “I’m starving” in our world, it would be considered as if someone said “I’m hungry”, just an exaggeration. However, to say a lie, is a big rule in Jonas’s community. It wouldn’t be right for anyone to get into trouble for saying a lie, whether they had to or they didn’t. Lies are part of life, but Jonas’s dystopia won’t accept that. In conclusion, strict rules and harsh rules don’t make Jonas’s community a perfect one.
In addition, citizens being perceived to be under constant surveillance also prove Jonas’s community is a dystopia. For example, when he had taken the apple from the Recreation Area, there was an announcement: “Everyone had known, he remembered with humiliation, that the announcement ATTENTION THIS IS A REMINDER TO MALE ELEVENS THAT OBJECTS ARE NOT TO BE REMOVED FROM THE RECREATION AREA AND THAT SNACKS ARE TO BE EATEN NOT HOARED, had been specifically directed at him” (Lowry 23).
When Jonas took the apple he never thought anyone would see anything. However, there are cameras all over the community that look at every little action someone makes. There is even a speaker that listens to everyone and makes announcements too! Even though cameras are used for the safety and protection of people, no one likes to be watched constantly. In conclusion, no one likes to be watched and accounted on every action.
Finally, Jonas is one of the few to question the goodness of his society. When the Giver and Jonas were having a discussion together, the Giver says: “’We relinquished sunshine and did away with differences’. He thought for a moment. ‘We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others’. ‘We shouldn’t have! Jonas said fiercely’” (Lowry 95).
Jonas is mad that the community gave up color, sunshine, and all the beautiful things in the world. Basically, he is questioning the goodness of his society because it is sameness where he lives. Jonas slowly starts to realize then that there is really no good in his community. This is dystopian because the community believes a perfect world is maintained with no absolute color. In conclusion, Jonas and the Giver are the only ones in the entire community to think about what’s so good in their society.
The Essay on Brave New World And The Giver Similar Yet Different
When one examines the similarities between Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and The Giver by Lois Lowry, they may be baffled. They may think that Lowry just did a run off of Huxley's highly successful masterpiece. The similarities are extraordinary, but so are their differences. Many aspects of these novels are almost identical while others are completely foreign to each other. Both of these ...
Jonas’s community is a dystopia because a perfect world to them means strict control from the government, technology, and/or corporations. To add, three reasons why Jonas’s community is a dystopia is that citizens live under harsh control and strict rules, they are perceived to be under constant surveillance, and the main character Jonas is one of the few to question the goodness of his society. All these influences fit together because they all lead up to Jonas leaving the community. It also fits the description of a dystopia. To conclude, it is impossible to live in a perfect world. Everything has its flaws. For example, if a perfect world means no school then there will be people with no education. Everyone has their own idea of a perfect world, but some don’t work, just like in The Giver.
