Chelsea Huber - The Giver

Outside Reading

Yes, the novel by Lois Lowry, The Giver, is an easy read. However, I maintain that this story as well as Lowry's Gathering Blue are highly thought provoking. In The Giver , Jonas comes from a world of sameness and no concept of sacredness, or even love. He is chosen to learn of the ancient people (us) who lived in a world of diversity. He learns through experiencing events through the transfer of memories. I am interested in the profound effect that scenery had on Jonas. He had never known 'weather' or 'hills'. Even 'color' and 'animals' were new to him. The book perfectly captures how amazing these things are that we take for granted. Color is truly amazing. There is nothing else like it, perhaps music, in a way. Our sacred places of today's world tend to be special in appearance. These places can often amaze us, like the view from atop a massive mountain. Jonas experiences this feeling of sacred place on every level, like we never could. In Gathering Blue, Kira must travel a difficult path to discover how to make the dye 'blue'. This shows the human need for beauty and how it connects to our extraordinary experiences in the sacred places in our lives.