The Role Of Society In The Giver

Have you ever lived in a perfect society? In the book The Giver, it is a world without color, pain, suffering, feelings, or love. It is a very limited, but also controlled society. Nobody has choices to do anything, only to strictly follow the rules. People living in the community cannot make choices on their own, or else they will choose wrong, and create suffering. People do not have love, because they do not know what love is. They have never experienced any feeling or emotions in their lives. But one decision, one plan, and one person, could change the entire way of their lives. In the beginning, Jonas is just one of the fifty children in his age group (Every year exactly fifty babies are born because the community makes sure that there
are no more or less than fifty children born each year.) He is the number nineteen, so he is one of the older children in his age group. He was an eleven waiting for the ceremony of the twelve. During the ceremony of the twelve, each person in the age group is assigned to a job. In the previous years (since they were an eight) they had to complete volunteer hours, and depending on the places they volunteered the most, they are most likely to be assigned the job. Jonas did not volunteer in one specific place, so he did not know what job to expect. “There was a sudden hush in the crowd, and he knew that the entire community realized that the Chief Elder had moved from eighteen to twenty, leaving a gap.” (Lowry 57)