Book Review: The Giver
- Seoyeon Kim
- Mar 15
- 2 min read
Updated: Mar 19
Mar 15, 2026
Seoyeon Kim
At first, The Giver seems like a simple dystopian story about a perfectly organized society. Everything in the community is controlled so that no one experiences pain, conflict, or deep emotion. Life appears calm and safe. However, as the story progresses, the novel becomes much more unsettling and thoughtful than it initially appears.
The society in the novel values stability above everything else. To achieve this stability, the community removes differences, emotions, and personal choice. The Giver explains the philosophy of the society with one of the most striking lines in the book: “We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others.” This sentence reveals the central idea of the novel. The community gained order and predictability, but the price was enormous. They gave up color, love, memory, and individuality.
As Jonas begins receiving memories, he experiences emotions and sensations that the rest of the community cannot feel. Through these memories he realizes that real life includes both joy and pain. The Giver expresses this burden clearly when he says:
“The worst part of holding the memories is not the pain. It’s the loneliness of it. Memories need to be shared.”
This line highlights one of the most powerful themes of the novel. Memory connects people to each other and to the past. Without memory, people lose wisdom and emotional depth.
Jonas also begins to question the system that controls his world. At one point he protests:
“If everything’s the same, then there aren’t any choices!”
This realization becomes the turning point of the story. Jonas understands that a life without choice might be safe, but it is also empty.
Surprisingly, despite its dark premise, the novel leaves a somewhat positive impression. Rather than simply criticizing the society, the book celebrates human experience. Pain, love, memory, and freedom are all shown to be essential parts of life. Without them, existence becomes mechanical and meaningless.
Overall, The Giver is more powerful and thoughtful than expected. Beneath its simple writing style lies a sharp exploration of freedom, memory, and the cost of perfect control. The novel quietly argues that a life with risk and emotion is far more meaningful than a perfectly safe world without them.
