The Giver #6

"He heard people singing. Behind him, across vast distances of space and time, from the place he had left, he thought he heard music too. But perhaps it was only an echo."(pg. 179)

These are the last lines of The Giver. The music that welcomes Jonas to the Christmas-celebrating town is the first he has ever heard in his life, and it signals not only his arrival in Elsewhere, where he can live life to the fullest as he wants to, but also his awakening to a new kind of perception, one that until this moment has been totally unavailable to him. The fact that there is music which was not in his last community proves the fact that this will be a different life.

The Giver #5

" The word had been "starving." You have never been starving, he had been told. You will never be starving. Now he was. If he had stayed in the community, he would not be. It was as simple as that. Once he had yearned for choices. Then, when he had had a choice, he had made the wrong one: the choice to leave. And now he was starving. But if he had stayed. His thoughts continued. If he had stayed he would have starved in other ways. He would have lived a life hungry for feelings, for color, for love. And Gabriel? For Gabriel there would have been no life at all. So there had not really been a choice (173)."

In this passage from “The Giver” by Lois Lowry Jonas is reflecting back on his past actions. He wonders if it was the right thing to do, should he have left in hopes for a better life or should he have stayed in his town which is characterized by a dystopian society. He is reflecting back on the past because he questions his decision of leaving, he thinks that by leaving he has made things worse because he is not with the Giver anymore and he feels like he is starving. He made the right decision though of leaving because if he had stayed then he would be dealing with the same old problems that he dealt with before and his previous town is heading towards a disaster. I think he made the right decision because he didn't stay with his past life, because he found out all the errors of that society. Generally the world humans means to be alive, and live your own life, and if we are thinking in that sense then the community in the Giver is not alive.

The Giver #4

 Jonas looked up, puzzled. "A plan for what? There's nothing. There's nothing we can do. It's always been this way. Before me, before you, before the ones who came before you. Back and back and back."

 In this passage The Giver is talking to Jonas about trying to save the memories and restore the values of the community. When the Giver tells Jonas that they need to restore the memories, Jonas becomes quickly surprised. He soon realizes that his vision of the future is not going to happen; his community is still going to be hopeless and unchanged because the people are living in fear because of the government. Jonas wanted his community to change, but instead of changing they are just going to be like how they always were, everything is going to be the same. Jonas realizes this and he becomes sad that he won’t be able to make a difference in the society; his society will still follow its dystopian ways. But when Jonas becomes sad by this the Giver gives Jonas hope, like a father figure and quickly revitalizes Jonas and his decisions of a better future and a utopian like society. This relates to religion, because many people put their faith into it, but it may not always be able to help you. The word “human” means to be able to live around each, getting along with each other and being compassionate with each other. Everybody may have their different views but everybody gets along. Being a human also means you try and do the best for yourself and do things that will positively affect your life. In this situation Jonas is just trying to be human when wishing that people would follow his lead and change the way that they have been behaving in hopes of getting out of these dystopian ways. Jonas is just trying to do what is the best for his society, being the new receiver he feels like it is his obligation to do these tasks and to try and make things better.

The Giver #3

"Jonas was silent for a minute. "Oh, I see what you mean. It wouldn't matter for a newchild's toy. But later it does matter, doesn't it? We don't dare to let people make choices of their own." "Not safe?" The Giver suggested. "Definitely not safe," Jonas said with certainty. "What if they were allowed to choose their own mate? And chose wrong? "Or what if, " he went on, almost laughing at the absurdity, "they chose their own jobs?" "Frightening, isn't it?" The Giver said. Jonas chuckled. "Very frightening. I can't even imagine it. We really have to protect people from wrong choices." (pg. 98)

This passage from the book The Giver by Lois Lowry comes after Jonas has accepted the job as the new receiver in the dystopian society. This is when Jonas is talking to the people and speaking out about the fact that he wishes that there was still color so the people could enjoy the color and they could have the pleasure and feeling to chose between different colors. But the government quickly shoots down this idea that Jonas has, this shows the dystopianess of the society. They said that if people were allowed to choose their own colors then they would be gaining too much freedom and then they would want to chose who they marry and they would want to choose their own jobs. The government said that these choices and decisions are a big part of people’s lives and if we let the people have more freedom then their decisions could be disastrous. This shows the power that the government holds over the people in the society.I find this very interesting, because I do not understand how allowing people to pick their jobs or lovers leads to the downfall of their society. I believe this pushes Jonas towards the edge of rebellion, because he doesn't see it the same way as the Giver.

The Giver #2

"We failed in our last selection,” the Chief Elder said solemnly. “It was ten years ago, when Jonas was just a toddler. I will not dwell on the experience because it causes us all terrible discomfort." Jonas didn't know what she was referring to, but he could sense the discomfort of the audience. They shifted uneasily in their seats. "We have not been hasty this time," she continued." "We could not afford another failure." "We have had our current Receiver for a very long time," she went on. Jonas followed her eyes and saw that she was looking at one of the Elders. The Commitee of Elders was sitting together in a group; and the Chief Elder's eyes were now on one who sat in the midst but seemed oddly separate from them. It was a man Jonas had never noticed before, a bearded man with pale eyes. He was watching Jonas intently (60-61)."

This statement, made in Chapter 8 by the Chief Elder at the Ceremony of Twelve, when she introduces Jonas as the new Receiver, is the first reference anyone in The Giver makes to the first choice of Receiver, which failed ten years ago. We realize that the community’s seeming overreaction makes some sense, since the discomfort they felt was by far the worst suffering they had encountered in their lives. Discomfort is the strongest word available to them, given their emphasis on precise language. The normal part of the Community is not supposed to be given any important memories. This goes only to the Givers and Receivers.
Being human in this society means that you have a sufficient lack of knowledge, and you do not learn much vocab. This also relates to religion, because the Givers and Receivers are the all knowing people and everybody looks up to them.

The Giver #1

 It was a nuisance to keep oneself covered while changing for games, and the required apology if one had by mistake glimpsed another's body was always awkward. He couldn't see why it was necessary. He liked the feelig of safety here in this warm and quiet room; he liked the expression of trust on the woman's face as she lay in the water unprotected, exposed, and free." (pg.30)

In the novel The Giver Jonas is the narrator and main character. He is an eleven year old boy that works in his community. He volunteers at a lot of centers, and helps people out. The Giver is like God, because only he knows the truth. This quote is from Chapter 4 where Jonas starts to realize that his community is not everything that he may think it is, he starts to realize that something is missing in his society. He realizes this when he was training to be a “receiver” when the Giver showed him what it was really like to live in a utopian society.It is not allowed for a women to be seen nude. In this quote we can also that Jonas is not like everybody else in the book. I believe he used the word free because she is naked.   In this novel so far the word “human” in Jonas’s cases means that you are living in a dystopian society and you do not get to see the real world and what your society is really like because of the strict rules and regulations that are in place by the government in your society. In Jonas’s case the word “human” is not used correctly because I believe that if you are a human you are free and nobody has to tell you what to do, you are capable of making your own decisions whether you are wrong or right. So far in this novel the word “human” is being incorrectly used in my point of view because Jonas is not living “free” like Larissa and the Giver. Our deceptions of the future reveal that the present is a time to cherish because it may not be there for long, you need to cherish the good things in life that are available and at your dispense now because one day they are not going to be there. In Jonas’s case he needs to go with the Giver so the Giver can guide him to the utopian society that Jonas envisions, not the dystopian society that Jonas is living in now. We use language and images to manipulate people’s minds by only showing what people want to see. People want to see all the good things, but do not want to see the bad so people often make it seem like everything is alright and good so people don’t get scared. In Jonas’s case he thinks his society is perfect because he is only seeing the good, not the bad. So the Giver introduces Jonas to the bad of society and then shows him Larissa who is actually living in a utopian society, unlike Jonas.