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The Giver Summary 105893 Views


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Description:

Ever wish you could remember everything that you ever studied? How about everything that everyone has ever studied? Yeah, pretty sure our brains just exploded.

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:05

The Giver, a la Shmoop

00:08

You know that awkward moment when you completely forget somebody's name?

00:15

Well... I don't. I have to remember everything around here. My name is Jonas, but you can

00:21

call me...the Receiver.

00:26

Being the Receiver of Memories is a lot of pressure.

00:30

You see, here in my hometown, we like things to stay the same.

00:35

We've even got a word for it...sameness. There's no messy feelings, no war, not even road rage.

00:43

ROFL is more like SIMA...

00:48

Smile in moderate amusement...

00:50

Our leaders, aka the Elders, want to make sure that mankind's sordid past remains a

00:56

secret, and that's where I come in.

00:59

I'm sort of the backup drive for the community, safeguarding all those forgotten memories

01:04

so we don't make the same mistake twice.

01:07

Sometimes that's good... some memories should definitely stay buried...

01:12

...but it gets a little lonely when you're the only one who remembers the good things,

01:17

like sled rides and sunshine. There's no such thing as child labor laws

01:22

here...once you turn 12, you're assigned a career in the working world.

01:27

The Elders pick your job for you, so you don't have to worry about that whole "free choice" thing.

01:35

I had it pretty easy with my new gig. I buddied up with the old Receiver while he zapped all

01:40

his knowledge and wisdom into my head.

01:44

Except now that he was forking over his job, he was called "The Giver."

01:49

I never had a chance to ask him whether it was better to... Giver than to Receiver....

01:50

Being the Receiver was a kick.  I could interrogate anyone I liked without getting yelled at...

01:56

...and The Giver showed me all this stuff I never knew about. Still, I had a lot of

02:00

questions. Such as... what was it like in the Elsewhere, where we send all of our weak links?

02:07

On the flip side, I couldn't share my knowledge with anyone, except poor little Gabriel, the

02:13

runty baby my dad took care of as part of his job.

02:18

My memories stopped Gabriel from crying, and he needed all the help he could get, or he'd

02:23

be released with the other social rejects. But then The Giver started to show me the

02:28

dark side of things.  The reason we had to keep these memories secret was because some

02:33

of them were horrible.

02:35

I mean... pain? Watching your friends die on a battlefield? Marathon viewings of titanic?

02:42

That's just barbaric.

02:44

All these drugged-up, emotionless yokels around me have it easy.

02:48

Oh, and guess what? "Released" is really a fancy term for "getting a lethal injection

02:54

and being shoved down a garbage chute."

02:57

People like my dad did that on a daily basis, even to babies like Gabriel!

03:04

The Giver decided that enough was enough, and he decided to help me fake my own death

03:09

and bust out of this place.

03:13

Once I made it to Elsewhere, all of my memories would be released, and the mindless robots

03:19

back home would be forced to wake up and smell the coffee.

03:24

I had to speed things up, though, because Dad announced that little Gabriel was scheduled

03:29

to bite the dust.

03:31

So I snuck out one night, and we biked for our lives!

03:37

I did most of the pedaling, though.

03:38

But pretty soon we ran out of food, and I sprained my

03:42

ankle, and it started to snow

03:44

We got to the top of a hill, and I saw a cool

03:47

sled, just like in The Giver's memory.

03:53

I figured we could take a ride...it's not like I have anything else to do. I hope we

03:58

make it to Elsewhere.

04:00

Until then, I'm just going to put up my arms and say, "Weeeeee!"

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