The world we live in today is fueled by memories from the past; from education to medicine, we learn from the past. In The Giver, by Lois Lowry, a young boy lives in a perfect world, or so he thought. In this dystopian novel, Jonas receives a new job, and during his training, he realizes what is missing from his and his community’s lives- memories. With other members of his community not believing they’re important, Jonas strives to gain as many memories as possible; before it’s too late. Jonas’ experiences develop a theme over the course of The Giver by teaching the reader that without memories, a subject cannot be fully understood. Although some members of Jonas’s community may believe that memories are not an important factor, Jonas
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The text states, “He was not starving, it was pointed out. He was hungry. No one in the community was starving, had never been starving, would ever be starving.” (70) This shows how Jonas is chastised for using a word he has never experienced the feeling the word is connected with. Jonas and everyone in the community have been well fed their entire lives, so a child might say that he/she is starving when truly, they might be impatient while waiting for a snack. The feeling of starving was something you’d find in a past society, not their “perfect utopia.” According to the text, it says, “ ‘Your father means that you used a very generalized word, so meaningless that it’s become almost obsolete,’... Jonas stared at them. Meaningless? He had never felt anything as meaningful as the memory.” (127) This supports my claim, because Jonas’ parents don’t know what love truly is since they’ve been taught this word has no exact meaning in their lives. This also shows a development, because Jonas, in the beginning, was told that many words had no meaning or that they’d never apply to him. And towards the end of the novel Jonas finally asks his parents about one of these feelings, love. Expecting something else, they are amused and Jonas realizes that they don’t truly
The text states, “He was not starving, it was pointed out. He was hungry. No one in the community was starving, had never been starving, would ever be starving.” (70) This shows how Jonas is chastised for using a word he has never experienced the feeling the word is connected with. Jonas and everyone in the community have been well fed their entire lives, so a child might say that he/she is starving when truly, they might be impatient while waiting for a snack. The feeling of starving was something you’d find in a past society, not their “perfect utopia.” According to the text, it says, “ ‘Your father means that you used a very generalized word, so meaningless that it’s become almost obsolete,’... Jonas stared at them. Meaningless? He had never felt anything as meaningful as the memory.” (127) This supports my claim, because Jonas’ parents don’t know what love truly is since they’ve been taught this word has no exact meaning in their lives. This also shows a development, because Jonas, in the beginning, was told that many words had no meaning or that they’d never apply to him. And towards the end of the novel Jonas finally asks his parents about one of these feelings, love. Expecting something else, they are amused and Jonas realizes that they don’t truly