Character Analysis: The Giver

The character in the story that I was most fascinated by was the Giver. This character has many admirable qualities. He is resilient against the painful and hard memories he has seen and he is loving. He and Jonas are the only two characters in the story that are even capable of loving. While reading this story, I felt as though the Giver and Jonas were lucky because they get to understand and feel love, but on the other end of the spectrum, they experience pain and great sadness. The other characters in the story get to be blissfully unaware of the pain and suffering of the past. The first trait that I mentioned above, resilience, is why I like the Giver’s character so much. The quote that exemplifies this is, “The worst part of holding memories is not the pain. It’s the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared.” “I’ve shared them with you,” Jonas said, trying to cheer him up. “That’s true. And having you here with me over the past year has made me realize that things must change. For years I’ve felt that they should, but it seemed so hopeless. “Now for the first time I think there might be a way (Lowry 1993 Ch. 20 p. 154-155 para. 9-11).” This shows the Giver’s resilience. He has been lonely because he had these memories, some that were very painful, and no one with which to share them. He saw pain and love and somehow lived with the burden of this knowledge. He continued to carry the burden of being the Receiver while

According to one article, “Parents have argued that the use of profanity by the children in the novel were offensive and may even encourage their own children to use profanity.” J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye was “banned countless times for its profanity alone.” Alice Walker’s The Color Purple is an example of a book banned because of the homosexual content (as well as its “troubling ideas about race relations, man’s relationship to God, African history, and human sexuality”) As you can see, books are challenged very often, even these very famous and renowned

Many books have been questioned and challenged. Even as far as to banning them. But what exactly is a banned book and why are they banned? A banned book is a book that has been censored by an authority, a government body, a library, or a even school system. A book that has been banned is actually removed from a library or school system. The actual contextual reasons as to banning them is use of explicit violence, gore, sexuality, explicit language, religion, or dark times in history. On the non-contextual side of the reason why they are banned books are usually because with the best intentions to protect people, frequently children, from difficult philosophies and information. Teachers, or even more common adults, often censor books from

The world is not all sunshine and lollipops. Jonas true change to being in the initiating stage was when he started gaining the memories of color on page 97. he talked about how he had no choice in the matter of anything.

Can the society in The Giver be considered an utopia or dystopia? Lois Lowry, the author of The Giver got her idea in 1992 when she went to go visit her father. She then discovered that her father was losing his memory, but her mother wasn’t. This then made Lowry questions if live would be easier if all the painful memories disappeared. Is The Giver's community an Utopia or Dystopia? The Giver’s community is a dystopia because there is limited freedom, people of the community are oblivious to what is happening around them, and the Committee of Elders are abusing their power.

Lord, Elyse. "Overview of The Giver." Novels for Students. Detroit: Gale, 1998. Literature Resource Center. Web. 27 Mar. 2016. Elyse Lord is one of the many critics who describe “The Giver” as terrifying but offering “hope and a constructive view” of the Utopian world in the book. She explains that other critics praise the book with many awards such as the Newberry Medal. Lord goes on to reason that the story is favored by different readers for its complexity, symbolism, metaphors, ambiguous ending, and can be compared similarly to classic science fiction like “Brave New World” and “Fahrenheit 451.” Contradicting this statement, Lord says that ‘librarians’, ‘educators’, and ‘students’ debate “The Giver” to be censored from public schools around the world because of its graphic scenes and ideas of infanticide and euthanasia. This includes the time Jonas witnessed his father murder a baby and throw it down a trash chute in cold blood. This is ironical compared to the language, emotion, and behaviors being censored in Jonas’s ‘Utopian’ society. Lord argues this through Anna Cerbasi of Port Saint Lucie, Florida, who asked the school board to remove a book that was about a family murdering their child for crying at night and called the book inappropriate for the sixth grade. Lord raises the question of who is to “decide which books are appropriate for which children,” and argues that it cannot be answered with not one but the many books integrated in school curricula that compose

Jonas had always been different, but he never knew how so. He was selected to be the new Receiver of Memory, the person who takes all the pain and memories of the past that the society has eliminated from everyone else. In the novel The Giver by Lois Lowry, people can learn without memories knowledge is useless, those who do not feel sorrow cannot know joy, and those who never take risks never grow. Without memories, knowledge is useless. For example, when Jonas and The Giver were talking about the memory of colors, The Giver said, “Because it’s from a time when color was” (Lowry 120).

In the novel the Giver by Lois Lowry the main character Jonas has his personality and identity change all throughout the story. His personality starts off in the beginning being a very good kid who trusts everyone, and does everything he is tolled to do. In the middle of the story he starts to question things, that make him wonder if all these rules are meant to be. At the end of the story he decides what is right and decides to part from the communities rules and do what he thinks is right and what makes him feel like himself.

What if no one in the world had feelings? How would individuals act around each other if everyone was the exact same? Exposing Jonas to choices and feelings, Lowry teaches readers about risk taking and real feelings. In The Giver, there are many themes that Lois Lowry explores, like ‘Those Who Take Risks Never Grow’, and ‘Those Who Do Not Feel Sorrow Cannot Know Joy’. Before Jonas was the new receiver he was a normal kid, but he learned a lesson that changed him: ‘Those who never take risks never grow’.

The Giver, a book by Lois Lowry that was published in 1993, was not like anything I had read before. The novel is set in the future, or maybe the past, it never really tells the reader when the book was set. The novel was focused on a young boy, twelve years old, named Jonas and an older man known as Giver and what Giver teaches Jonas about their society and everything that is kept from everybody else. The Giver shares information and feelings that nobody else knows or feels. A few examples of what Jonas’ society is keeping from everybody is: sadness, pain, worry, snow and sledding, rivers, sunshine, color.

In the Giver the community has many weirdly spoken words. These words can mean many things, but to the community these words are nothing out of the ordinary. Everyone there is used to hearing these words and is not startled by them. In the real world an average person would have no idea what some of these words mean. For example Stirrings, comfort object, and Nurturer. In these strange peoples' community these are everyday words, but to ordinary people, they are very odd. Stirrings is very serious in the community, so is being a Nurturer. Every living child in the community is given a comfort item until the age of eight. Although, having a comfort item is not that unusual like the other two words, most children have items they go to sleep with every night. These three words from the book are routine words to the community.

With the sound of music flowing through Jonas’s ears, Jonas sped down the hill; anticipating the reaction of the people waiting for him below. Somehow, Jonas knew this would work out. He knew that Gabe would survive, that he would have family and friends to love and that they would love him back. Jonas could feel someone helping through this. Maybe it was the Giver. All Jonas knew was that he could feel love in the air.

Imagine wanting to learn something, but not being able to. Imagine wanting to share something, while being incapable of doing so. Imagine knowing the truth, while other people are dying to find it. In a world of complete equality, traits that create humans are removed in order to create a better society. Your feelings. Your thoughts. Your emotions. All this is gone for the so-called “greater good”. In both The Giver and “Examination Day,” the main characters differ from other citizens within their societies. However, being different is not always a good thing. Lois Lowry and Henry Slesar signify how a world of complete equality is a world without emotions because a world without emotions is a world without humans. Emotions are the main ingredient

Jonas feels uneasy, but he knows that "frightened" is not the correct word. He has been truly frightened only once before, when a plane flew off course over the community a year ago. During the incident, an announcement over the speakers ordered everyone inside, and Jonas had been afraid as he saw the silent, waiting community. However, the speakers soon explained that a Pilot-in-Training had made a navigational mistake and that the pilot would be released from the community for his error, which is the worst possible fate for members of the community. Upon recalling this event, Jonas confirms that his current feelings do not represent fear. He remembers that his teachers have taught him to be careful with his terminology, unlike his friend Asher, who often uses the wrong word, and he decides that rather than feeling frightened, he feels apprehensive about upcoming events this December.

It has been said that the books that we ban are the books that we learn the most from. But most people don’t even know what a banned/challenged book is or means. A banned book is a book that a country/state government is trying to take the book off of all shelves in that state/country. A challenged book is a book that is trying to get banned on a small scale. Like a city or town. But people don’t just have problems with one of these books for no reason. Books are usually banned/challenged for 3 main reasons material was considered to sexually explicit, material was considered to contain offensive language, and material is considered not appropriate for any age group.( “About Banned & Challenged Books” American Library Association’s office(1996) Web. 26 Apr.2016) An example of a challenged book is Cut by Patricia McCormick witch is about a young woman that has a addiction to cut herself in