The Giver Dystopian

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The Giver was inspired in part of Lowry’s relationship with her father who was, at that time, in a nursing home having lost most of his long-term memory. She realized one day while visiting her father that, without memory, there is no pain, and began to imagine a society in which the past was deliberately forgotten. The Giver is Lowry’s attempt to criticize reality by creating a utopian (“aiming for a state in which everything is perfect”) society. We quickly realize that this utopian society is dystopian (“an imaginary society that is as dehumanizing and as unpleasant as possible”). However, Lowry’s society unlike the others, offer some hope in the end. As we read, we discover that the act of controlling a society is often worse than the disappointments…show more content…
The society has also removed choice: at the age of twelve, every member of the community is assigned a job based on his or her abilities and interests. At the Ceremony of Twelve, Jonas is given the highly honored Assignment of Receiver of Memory. The Receiver is the sole keeper of the community’s collective memory. When the community went, over to sameness- it is painless, warless, and mostly emotionless state of serenity and harmony- it abandoned all memories of pain, war, and emotion, but the memories cannot disappear entirely. Someone must keep them so that the community can avoid making the mistakes of the past, even if no one but the Receiver can bear the pain. In a community without conflict, agony, or sorrow, Jonas is selected to learn from an elderly man, the Giver, about the true pain and desire of the real…show more content…
The only things that I found to be different are the ages of the main characters. In the book, Jonas is twelve, but in the movie, he is sixteen. They also aged up Jonas’ sister, Lily, so that she receives her bike at the age of nine in the movie, instead of behaving in a younger manner. In the movie, they allowed Jonas’s age to be older to add an intimation of romance, and means Jonas’ grown-up behavior, which better suits his character, overall. While reading the book, The Giver, it becomes very thought provoking. Even though the book and the movie are very similar to each other, the book gives more detail, while the movie only gives you a copy of what the book is trying saying. The Los Angeles Times says, “The Giver enervating hash of dystopian dread, vague religiosity and commercial advertising style uplift is nothing if not stale.” I agree a hundred percent with this statement because I would rather the book than the movie. Movies are never good when being compared to the book, but for some reason the movie and the book are very much the same and are both

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