How Does Jonas Change Throughout Novel The Giver?

Question

Follow his evolution from a naive boy to a rebellious teen in Lois Lowry's classic novel, feeling his confusion grow with each secret memory revealed.

Shreeja Das · Answer

Jonas in 'The Giver' grows from a naive, obedient child in a seemingly perfect society to a self-aware rebel who reveals to himself and others the Lack of emotion and freedom in his world. In the process of finding out the truth, Jonas learns that having true knowledge creates a moral obligation to act, which is the core of many coming-of-age stories. The same theme of a person under duress of dramatic change is presented in 'The Stranger He Became', where a man suffering from amnesia has to decide whether his newly found ferocity is part of his true self or just a tool for his survival. This ambiguity keeps the reader on edge.

Olivia · Answer

I notice in Jonas in The Giver how his perception of the world changes. Jonas has been raised in a very controlled environment of a society that tries to eliminate all the mess of human existence. All emotions, choices and colors have been eliminated to try to make life perfect. Jonas is content with his life until he is chosen as the Receiver of Information, the only person in society who holds all the memories of the past. When he receives the memories from the Giver, they open up a floodgate of emotions - happiness and sadness, love and loss - and begins to question everything about his society.

One of the most beautiful scenes of the novel is Jonas' first sight of color. No longer can he view the world in black and white. His growing awareness of all that is lacking in his community propels him to action. He cannot go back to being the Receiver of Freedom once he has seen the truth, and he certainly cannot return to being the boy, so obedient, that he once was. Leaving with Gabriel in search of life outside the walls of his community is a desperate bid to reclaim humanity that has been lost to his society. Jonas' search for truth in order to bring freedom to his people is a powerful portrayal of knowledge and the courage to use it to bring about change in a totalitarian regime.

Donovan · Answer

This symbolism is exhibited through the character of Jonas in ‘The Giver’ by Lois Lowry. Jonas is a very young boy within the novel who is very eager to grow up and complete all of the tasks of the community. At the beginning of the novel Jonas is blind to many of the circumstances of his world and is very obedient. He believes that the world in which he lives is perfect. When Jonas is chosen as the Receiver of Memory, everything is changed for Jonas. Through the memories that Jonas receives from The Giver, Jonas is able to experience the world of emotions such as love, pain and beauty. He realizes that the world in which he lives is not as perfect as he once thought and is in fact very controlled and that there is a high price for the world’s utopia. Jonas is eventually able to realize the importance of human emotions and becomes a rebel trying to bring change to his society. He risked everything to realize this.

Grayson · Answer

In “The Giver,” Jonas the main character goes through many changes. Jonas at the beginning of the story is just another boy living in a world trying to make everything equal. He is so obedient and trusting of the world around him that he almost does not even realize there is more to life. But after being picked to be the Receiver of Memory for his society, Jonas is bombarded with so many memories from The Giver that he becomes confused and knocked off of balance. These memories start off nicely, Jonas is even proud that he is the Receiver.

By further remembering, Jonas sees the society he grew up in for what it is – a society lacking in color and of repression of human emotions and relationships. Through his deeper relationship with The Giver, Jonas comes to realize the cost to human life in the perfect society. In this final realization of what ‘release’ really means – the euthanasia of the elderly and weak – Jonas is forced to leave with Gabriel. Jonas’ journey is one that highlights extreme measures taken in the name of order and shows the importance of individuality in a society in order to be fully human.

Torkia Arrington · Answer

These are great observations, particularly about Jonas’ change. I saw the world-building and the Release scene as the central points of the story. Looking at this through the lens of Jonas’ change makes me realize that I misjudged this as mostly a story and these early chapters could be re-read for insight into Jonas as well.

Joy Ann Barker · Answer

Music and rhythm feature sparingly in the Community as they exist in a highly structured, inorganic environment, with memories bringing different rhythms to Jonas’ consideration: the love beat, the volatile of war, the monotony of loneliness. And, of course, his own heart beat. Throughout his final journey, it is the creak of the sled, Gabriel’s breathing, Jonas’ own growing fatigue that sets the beat for him. Jonas has shifted from an external, organized pulse to one that is controlled by his own internal physiological, and emotional rhythms. In moving from the Community’s deliberately inorganic existence to this more natural existence, Jonas has traded the metronome of his former life for the discordant but pulsating symphony of human experience.

Stephanie Ann Sloan-Bolieu · Answer

The community uses the word “love” in a very watered down sense, but Jonas comes to understand the true nature of love as he reminisces about his family. Jonas knows love in the sense of how he loved his family in a very fierce, specific, and sacrificial way. Therefore, he can only love Gabriel in the same way a brother or parent would love him. Jonas cannot sit idly by as he loves his own parents and his friends in this same way and cannot help but feel pity and horror that they do not or cannot love him in the same way that he loves them. Eventually Jonas is animated by the most powerful form of love in existence and that is why his entire journey is an act of love.

Stefano · Answer

The community Jonas leaves wants stability above all else, so they strip their citizens of nearly all meaningful choices, and follow Jonas on a long journey of growth as he regains the ability to make decisions for himself, often very painful ones. He chooses to stop taking his daily pills first, then to lie to his parents about his whereabouts, then to ask The Giver to give him ever more painful memories. He chooses to come up with the plan to escape from the community in the first place, and then at the last minute he chooses to divert from that plan in order to save the infant Gabriel. The most profound change in Jonas is his acceptance of uncertainty and risk—exactly what his society was trying to eliminate in order to be “perfect”.

Humphrey Uluocha · Answer

After the shift in the Giver, his capacity for empathy explodes and that is the true driver of the story. Before his pre-memories he was a very empathetic person, able to feel deep sympathy for another’s pain or misery, such as concern for a friend’s injured arm. But after receiving memories of hunger, of loss, and of love, he feels with and for others in a completely new and profound way. He can feel Gabriel’s distress and fear as he lies in bed, troubled by memories. He can feel the loneliness and pain of the Giver and feel sorry for his friends and family as they are, totally unaware. His new feelings of deep empathy towards others means that he is unable to sit idly by while Gabriel is sent away in fear for his life. Nor can he bring himself to allow the rest of the community to continue in their empty, shallow existence now that he has memories of what life could really be like. The awakening of the Giver’s heart demands action with his hands and feet.

Jhazmin Cloei Chawana · Answer

So that apple scene is kind of the first crack in the whole world for him. He sees the red of the apple change, but he doesn’t even have words for what he sees. It freaks him out. But that’s the first moment that he sees something that others don’t, and it shows how his perception of reality is breaking away from the rest of the world. And then that crack just keeps getting wider and wider until it becomes a huge canyon.

Andrea Herrera · Answer

I notice quite a change in this boy’s physicality from the beginning of the memories to the end. In the early scenes he is shown as just another young boy in jeans and a tunic playing with a ball, riding a bike through the hills. However, the memories presented are intense physical experiences: cold, heat, hunger, exhaustion, speed. The boy’s body becomes a major site of memory and experience. Later in the film his body is pushed to its limits: freezing to death, starving to death, carrying a dying boy on his back through the desert. The physical hardship is a direct result of his moral choices. Instead of a body that is cooled, heated, and fed in measured amounts as in the “controlled” world of climate, he is now a body that expressively suffers and seriously endures as he fights for freedom. The physical trial is on a par with the psychological. It shows how his connection to his own physical body has changed fundamentally.

How Does Jonas Change Throughout Novel The Giver?

11 Answers

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