The Giver is the Frankenstein’s monster of the dystopian genre (though I feel dirty even mentioning Frankenstein in the same sentence as this book). Like most dystopians, its society avoids conflict by encouraging ultra-conformity. True pain and emotional depth have been eradicated, just like Brave New World and Harrison Bergeron. Also like Brave New World (and Plato’s Republic), babies are taken away from their parents, and everyone is assigned a social role by a higher authority. Books are heavily prohibited, like in Fahrenheit 451, and individuals are prohibited from making their own choices, like in A Clockwork Orange.

It’s fair to say, therefore, that I was surprised by how derivative this book is. I don’t agree that it’s initially presented as utopian and gradually turns dystopian either, which would at least have provide a factor of difference from the above examples: it starts out with a scene of panic, and even the community’s immediately apparent practices like taking babies away from their parents will be regarded as horrifying by most contemporary readers. I was pretty well aware I was reading a dystopian from the first few pages. I realise there is perhaps an argument for re-hashing some of these genre cornerstones in a child-friendly format, but so little depth or consideration was given here (as I will explain below). In my view, the world of a dystopian is the most important aspect, and there was little originality nor believability here.

Lowry adds to her mystery meat a ‘chosen one’ narrative which will be familiar territory for most kids: our protagonist, Jason, instead of being assigned an ordinary job like his peers, finds out he is The Special™, and becomes the Receiver of Memory for the community. He is the only one allowed these memories of the past — of snow, colour, fully-felt emotions and other outlawed things — as well as the freedom to access books and ask difficult questions. However, the protagonist also has some magical abilities which are never explained: I could suspend my disbelief about the transmission of memories (which could even have been technologically aided in a futuristic setting) but his ability to ‘see beyond’ (clairvoyance?) appears from nowhere makes no sense at all. He also has an unusual physical trait — his pale eyes — which he shares with the former Receiver of Memory and a few other characters, but the significance of which is never explained. These elements made the story feel very incomplete.

As well as the dystopia being poorly and generically rendered, Lowry is intellectually dishonest in her avoidance of questions of moral complexity, particularly on the question of euthanasia. Say, for the sake of argument, that a baby is born severely disabled — so disabled that it is doomed to live only a short life in terrible pain. Should we euthanise the baby, or do everything in our power to ensure that the baby lives, or something in between the two? Obviously this will be a highly controversial question, and I have seen good arguments for both sides, but Lowry sidesteps it entirely. Instead, we get a ridiculous scene at the turning point of the novella, when

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Jason’s father kills a baby purely because it is a twin and the community cannot have two people who look the same in case mischief ensues — making no sense for his father’s character, given his compassion for the baby Gabriel, who might at least have some development issues

, which makes the community absurd rather than presenting a realistic position that must be fought against, while avoiding the heart of the question by presenting an appeal to emotion that the author knows will cause no moral difficulty or controversy, that she knows everyone will see as wrong. I feel this intellectual dishonesty more fiercely because it is aimed at impressionable children.

This also reveals a broader problem with the morality of the story: Jonas, the protagonist, has an immediate, knee-jerk reaction to what the reader will understand is wrong: not just the scene above, but hiding the truth about colour, emotions, love and the like from the community at large. The Giver praises him for coming to this conclusion so quickly, with the implication that it shows the strength of his moral compass. Since the reader will share his view, it allows them to feel unique and special, too, even though this is the majority view (more on this later). The problem with this is that our morality is influenced by our culture: he wouldn’t have such a sudden realisation that the culture is ‘wrong’ if it’s what he’s known his whole life. This is, again, reflective of Lowry’s one-dimensional view of ethics, and her refusal to acknowledge the other side of the argument.

The ending was also incredibly abrupt, and felt like Lowry didn’t quite know where to take the narrative — I was actually confused listening to the audiobook, thinking I must have been missing a Part 2 somewhere.

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Jason simply clears off to the next town, away from the dystopia, with a pale-eyed baby (again, the significance of the eyes is not explained) and then the novella cuts off. This was especially strange given that we are made to believe that this dystopian society is much larger than just a small community or two, otherwise it would obviously be impossible to keep them insulated from the outside world.

It meant none of the questions raised received proper contemplation or consideration, and made the whole novella feel like an unfinished first draft. There is no culmination of the ideas at hand, no real conclusion to any discussion, nor do we see the dystopia changed in any way.

Part of the reason I read this is that it is often assigned reading in schools, particularly in the US, Canada, and Australia — but not in the UK, where I am from. Doing more research after the fact, I now discover that, despite some baffling accolades, the book has received ‘mixed’ reviews. I agree with the author Debra Doyle that it “fails the Plausibility Test” and that Lowry prioritises her own moralising over a quality narrative: “Things are the way they are because The Author is Making a Point”. At Wright State University, the majority of students given the book said they either did not understand or did not like the novel — if this is a common reaction, why make it mandatory in schools? It’s one thing to do that with classics with high cultural influence, another thing to do it with a middle grade book from 1993. It also seems strange to do this with an attempt at a dystopian where none of the elements being cautioned against are currently relevant: the most celebrated dystopian authors, although they are often credited with ‘predicting the future’, were really criticising elements of their contemporary societies which have stuck around into the present. I find it hard to believe there is really a fear of an ultra-conformist society where snow and colour are somehow banned. Again, this cannot be a critique of any contemporary view, since Lowry makes no honest or recognisable representation of whomever she might have wished to criticise: no proponent of euthanasia, for instance, will recognise themselves in this narrative, and therefore none of them will reconsider their views. Lowry is preaching to the choir.

It seems particularly strange to me that a novella about the importance of individuality is so afraid of the opposing viewpoint. She presents Jason and the Giver as special and different, when they are the most ‘normal’ characters we come across. For the reader to relate, it relies on quite a narcissistic view of special-ness — a belief that they are the deep thinker, who sees what others cannot, and everyone else is a ‘sheep’. The characters who are ‘good’ and ‘special’ are the ones who conform to the author’s moral compass — in other words, they are also conformists, just in a different way. They are not even obviously ‘special’ or ‘good’, but framed that way because of the author’s approval. A narrative that sets out to be about the importance of being an individual ends up saying that good people agree with the author, and bad people disagree. You only get to be ‘special’ if you conform (or if you have magical powers, I guess). Kids want to be special, so they will read this and (ironically) feel pressure to fall in line. It is an insidious way for the author to try to win the young and impressionable over to her worldview.

It is so difficult to draw meaning, discussion, even consistency from the narrative, and the stump of an ending makes no attempt to put the rest into perspective. So little happens and so little agency is exercised by the protagonist that there isn’t really even a plot. It seems especially strange to have the protagonist

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die

, if this is the intention, since the community regaining their memories will not necessarily end the dystopia (or even persuade people that it is wrong — remember again that Jonas’ knee-jerk reaction against the status quo is not remotely realistic) and that

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there is no real apparent significance in the protagonist’s death — he would have died for nothing.

Even this extrapolation is futile, given that

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Jonas is apparently alive in one of the sequels

. Perhaps, therefore, the ending is appropriate after all — there is, after all, no need for a fitting or thoughtful ending to a story that was bereft of any conceivable meaning from the beginning.