This photo originates from https://www.amazon.com/Giver-Quartet-Book-ebook/dp/B003MC5N28/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=.
My wife, son and I are in the midst of a reading contest. The bad news is that it is going very slow. The good news is that I'm winning! "The Giver" by Lois Lowry is my second book in the contest. I told you it is going slow. The first person to read 31 books is the winner.
I confess, when I first started reading this book, I fell asleep while reading it at Namsa Public Library in South Korea. But let's not blame that on the writer. I had gone hiking with my family in the morning and apparently I was very exhausted.
I won't deny that I was tempted to shelf the book but since the whole purpose of this contest is to encourage my son to read the books we recently bought him, and since he chose this book as the next one I have to read, that didn't seem like a viable option.
So, I started again. And am I ever glad I didn't give up on it. I realized that the reason I fell asleep was not because the book was boring but that it is 100% contrary to my reality. I actually thought this was a book about communism. To put it bluntly, I thought this story was weird.
It's about a people who live in a community (So I was reading into community so much that I erroneously induced Communism, but can you blame me?) and everything is set up in a way that nobody questions anything. There's even a special time set aside to talk about "feelings," that seems like more of an accountability group where that's the only time one can talk about one's feelings. Nonetheless, I thought it might be a good model for my family to follow. I digress.
At the age of 12, children are given jobs. This is based on having been monitored by the powers that be for the last 12 years. Usually it's a good fit. Jonas, the main character, is assigned the task of "Receiver." His job is to carry the memories of the community passed on by the "Giver." Nobody else in the community has these memories. They know nothing of the past, only what happens now. They know nothing of color, diversity, or even love. Even the assembling of the "family" is not naturally but people are grouped together by the authorities.
Jonas's predecessor disappeared. She was "released," which he comes to realize means she was euthanized. If you are unfit for the community, this happens to you. But they don't call it death. Once Jonas realizes this, he and the Giver decide this is not good for the community and that they need to hold onto the memories, not the Giver and the Receiver. Jonas decides to escape with Gabriel, the baby his father is caring for as part of his job. He's about to be euthanized because he cries through the night except when he's with Jonas.
When Jonas starts going through puberty and having romantic dreams, he is instructed by his "mother" that he is to take a pill, which he obediently takes, but once he learns of love, not just in the erotic sense but in the agape sense, and realizes this is a good thing for a family to love each other, he stops taking the pill.
Is his escape with Gabriel successful? It is indeed, and the place he ends up going is exactly the place he learned of in his first memory passed onto him by "The Giver." And Jonas ends up giving Gabriel memories, starting with when he slept in the same room as Gabriel, in Jonas's room. But then as they escape, though he starts to lose the full memories as he escapes from the community.
The reader is not given information on what happens to the community after Jonas and Gabriel disappear. Perhaps the reader is left with the hope that both Jonas' and Gabriel's old and new communities experience color, diversity (not sameness) and of course, love in all its facets.
I highly recommend this book to anybody looking for a highly imaginative book that has the potential to challenge us in our current world where it seems we are aiming for some kind of sameness with a lack of diverse perspective. And as a Wesleyan, it's a good reminder that love is the essence of who we are as human beings, created in the image of God.
