Ceremony of Twelve
The story starts with Jonas, a budding preteen who’s apprehensive about finding out the job he’ll have for the rest of his life at the upcoming Ceremony of Twelve. He lives in a society of similarity, called a “Community of Sameness.” Each family has the same number of kids (two), celebrates the same milestones (a bike at age 9), and follows the same routine (dinner followed by a ritual of sharing feelings). Even the terrain is the same: flat. Everything is controlled. Everything is safe.When his friends are assigned to positions like “Assistant Director of Recreation” and “Caretaker of the Old,” the Council of Elders skips Jonas. Was he forgotten? No. Jonas has been singled out by a strange old man, the “Receiver of Memory,” to begin a vague type of training for which the Chief Elder has no explanation. Neither does Jonas—but he doesn’t have to explain to anyone. He’s been forbidden from sharing about his new position, but more importantly, Jonas is given permission to lie.
After a few weeks, Jonas’s father, a “Nurturer,” brings home fussy “newchild” Thirty-Six—it’s acceptable to call him “Gabe” in private, he assures Jonas—for if he learns to sleep through the night before the Ceremony of One (a first birthday), he’ll be granted that name and placed with a family. If not, he’s released to Elsewhere.
Colors, Feelings, and Independent Thinking
As readers delve into Jonas’s world, they’ll soon realize his universe lacks several critical characteristics: color, emotion, and knowledge. Jonas is told to stop taking his daily medication—first given at the onset of sexual feelings, these pills dampen the emotions that accompany adult life. Romantic inclination is moot in a world where the Committee of Elders arranges marriages and bestows adoptive children on couples submitting applications they deem “ready.”Jonas can soon see the red of a ripe apple and the cornflower blue of the sky. He discovers unpleasant emotions: jealousy, anger, anguish, fear. The “Feelings” his family shares around the dinner table are but flimsy caricatures of real emotion. The flippancy with which they discuss the fate of their foster baby begins to irk Jonas. Why?
Could it be that he rocks the child to sleep at night and speaks sweetly to him when no one is looking? Or that, upon an occasion when Gabe won’t sleep, Jonas shares a memory with him?
Understanding happens slowly, then all at once. Jonas comes to know that human nature integrates emotion and logic. Removing sadness and pain also requires the removal of joy, brotherly love, and even basic kindness. A baby is more than its birth weight. When elderly men and women are “released to Elsewhere,” their travels extend no further than the crematorium.
The pain of real suffering is too much for some. It overwhelmed one Receiver a decade before. She applied to be released. It can overwhelm even the aging Giver, who relies heavily on his apprentice to shoulder the burden of an entire civilization’s pain. Leaders of the Community considered history overwhelming, so they discovered how to contain all of human history in a single person: the Receiver of Memory.
Jonas realizes how his society’s ideals influence its actions. After seeing his father’s profession in a new light, the Giver’s apprentice realizes those actions are unconscionable. He and his mentor plan to repair and restore the Community by freeing emotions. It will require planning, time, and many of the Giver’s memories of courage.
A Story to Remember
Ms. Lowry’s mystical ability to weave emotions and collective memories seamlessly into “The Giver” never feels contrived or artificial. It makes it clear that forgetting past evils cannot fix them. It leads only to blindness.We journey with Jonas as he discovers that being fully human means experiencing pain and suffering along with joy and love. A society numb to emotional depth is not superior to one with deep feeling; it’s the very integration of both logic and emotion that creates a just, yet merciful society.
