The Giver (government) 6

" He forced his eyes open as they went downward, downward, sliding and all at once he could see lights, and he recognized them now. He knew they were shining through the windows of rooms, that they were the red, blue and yellow lights that twinkled from trees in places where families created and kept memories, where they celebrated love. Downward, downward, faster and faster. Suddenly he was aware with certainty and joy that below, ahead, they were waiting for him; and that they were waiting, too, for the baby. For the first time, he heard something that he knew to be music. He heard people signing. 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 (178-179)."

            This passage from The Giver by Lois Lowry talks about Jonas and his first ever Christmas celebrating town, he is now in a utopian society instead of a dystopian society. He has a different view point on life thanks to the Giver. At this new town he can now live a life in peace and live his life to the fullest. Jonas now sees what life is supposed to be like so he has a new perception about things, a new perception that wasn’t available to him in his previous town because of the dystopian ways of the community. Jonas is now living by himself without the Giver for the first time, how will Jonas survive on his own without the Giver? Jonas is listening to the music that he hears in his new town that he had never heard before, he listens to the people singing all together in one which shows how together the community is and they are willing to accept Jonas even though he may be different from them. This is the total opposite of what Jonas experienced in his previous dystopian society.

            My reaction to this passage is that I wonder how Jonas will survive on his own without the help of the Giver. The Giver was such an essential part of Jonas’s life and he acted as a father figure to him. It will definitely be tough for Jonas without the Giver being around but I think that he will do fine because the Giver stored a lot of good qualities in Jonas that Jonas will take with him to his new town. Also I think that we can already tell how opposite of a society this is from his previous town. The values are different, the people are different and the whole town is different, this new way of living for Jonas will definitely benefit him in the long run. He needed to get out of his dystopian society and into a town that is going in the right direction and the Giver helped him do that.

            The overall purpose of this passage is to show the differences between the two societies that Jonas has lived in. The one he was previously living in is very different from where he is living now, the one where he is living now is very utopian like while his previous town was very dystopian. When Jonas first heard the people playing the music all together he could already tell that this place was different, he felt accepted in the society unlike any other time when he was previously living in that dystopian society. Jonas feels appreciated in the society, he feels loved and he feels like everybody is different, everybody is unique and nobody has that “sameness” about them that was so obvious in his previously town. This society is all different, with difference comes good things not everybody can be the same, if everybody is the same then that is what creates problems like we saw in Jonas’s dystopian society. The specific techniques used to achieve this purpose are the people signing represent a symbol of the new town that Jonas is in. The words “he heard people signing” is used as a symbol to show how united and together the people are, something that you would never see in Jonas’s past community. Also there is more symbolizing with the music because the Giver loved music and he would always share this music with Jonas. This music represents a symbol of hope and that the Giver isn’t with Jonas anymore and he has nobody to share his music with which makes Jonas reflects back on the good times he had with the Giver right before his death. The overall effect of this work shows how one person can have such a big impact on someone’s life; they can act as a role model and a father figure. The Give was definitely a role model/father figure to Jonas.

            After finishing the novel, the word “human” means something different to each part of the word. Each part of the world might have a different view on what the word “human” actually means or what it is supposed signal but in this book the real “humans” were shown in Jonas’s society that he moved into at the end of the book. They were the real “humans” they lived life free without living in fear or without anybody telling them what to do, or controlling them. They were the total opposite of what the so called “humans” were in the dystopian society that Jonas previously lived in before his death.

            Our depictions of the future reveal that the present is better than what people make it out to be. Yes, there are places that are bad like we seen in the dystopian society that Jonas lived in, but for the most part it is good and people need to cherish these moments because they could be gone soon. In Jonas’s case he was lucky enough to get into a good town with the help of the Giver. We use images and language to manipulate people’s minds by posting irrelevant things so people get scared but in reality people have no reason to be scared.