Review of Lois Lowry's The Giver Quartet
It's when a book starts showing up on Banned Books lists around the country that you know it's worth the read.
I first read The Giver and Gathering Blue for an English class when I was about 11 years old. I'm not sure why anyone thought it was a good idea to assign The Giver for this class. The curriculum writers probably all got together and said, "Hey, look at this, it's one of the most controversial books in the U.S.--let's assign it to a bunch of 11-year-olds." But anyway--I read it. And I cried a lot.
This is the thing: it's intense. It's really intense reading for the age group it's normally assigned to, and I think that's why people try to ban it in schools. But here's the other thing: it's being assigned to the wrong age group. Because the writing style is simple, a lot of people don't realize that The Giver Quartet is YA literature; it's geared towards "young adults," ages 13-18. It's frequently given to Middle Grade readers and that's where the issue lies: these books are just too intense for that age group.
There's nothing bad in them that I wouldn't let ages 13-14, or even a 12-read-old, read. They're truly fantastic books. But they're categorized as YA for several reasons.
Reason #1: Infanticide
This was the thing that really wrecked 11-year-old me. In main character Jonas' seemingly utopian Community, inconvenient people are "Released"--that is to say, they're given lethal injections before they're disposed of down what's basically a garbage chute.
Jonas first learns the disturbing truth when his mentor, The Giver, shows him footage of Jonas' father performing a Release that morning on the smaller of two identical twins. The infant is injected in his forehead before Jonas' father packs his body in a box and disposes of it down a chute. Just to make matters worse, his dad remains eerily cheerful the whole time, talking the infant through the process--because he doesn't realize that what he's doing is wrong.
It's horrible. It really is. This is the thing that horrified me when I first read it and the Number 1 reason I wouldn't let an 11-year-old read The Giver: it's intense and very real. When I read it for the first time, I cried a bunch and didn't want to finish the book. Years later, I can look back and appreciate Lois Lowry's courage for integrating such a pro-life message into her books.
This scene isn't in the book to entertain us. It isn't there for readers to enjoy and find comfort in--in fact, it's there to disturb the comforted. It's there to horrify readers right alongside Jonas as his eyes are opened to his Community's culture of death.
Reason #2: Suicide
The Giver's daughter was originally chosen to be her father's apprentice, receiving his memories from centuries past in order to council the Community's elders. However, some memories proved to be too much for her. After receiving experiences of pain and loss, Rosemary requested a Release. She was gone before her father knew what had happened.
Reason #3: Mature Subjects
This first example is a bit ridiculous, but Jonas spends time at what is essentially a nursing home. One of his jobs is bathing the elderly, and there's a scene where he converses with an old woman while bathing her. Weirdly enough, some people have described this scene as twisted, whereas everyone else considers it tender and caring.
This second view is further supported by a dream Jonas has when he starts to have feelings for his friend Fiona. Prior to taking the pills, Jonas dreams that he wants his friend to get into a tub so that he can bathe her.
Another example comes in the fourth book, Son. Claire is a Birthmother. Parents in the Community do not bear their own children; that task is left to a group of young women specifically selected for the task. They bear several children through unnatural means (in vitro fertilization) before retiring to a life of tedious, hands-on labor. We never see Claire's actual procedure take place or hear an explanation. The unborn children are referred to as "Products," and their mothers "Vessels." The strangest part of all this might just be that Claire is only fourteen. The story of Son is her search for the child she bore, taking her to a land where she eventually relates her experiences. Most everyone is horrified by what they hear, prompting one woman to explain to Claire that they are all aghast that she had a child outside of marriage.
Reason #4: Violence
Infanticide. Suicide. Releases. Maiming.
In Gathering Blue, the sick and disabled are left to the "Beasts" and never heard from again. In Messenger, Matty has to undergo terrible struggles as the whole Forest is against him. Several character come to sad ends.
After all that, why read these books?
The Giver Quartet is intense. But if you read it at the right age (12-14 years, I'd say, depending on maturity level) you get a full appreciation for how great the stories are and the depth of their messages.
The characters are brave and, for the most part, innocent. In the instances of Jonas and Claire, they never do anything wrong in their Community while knowing it is wrong. They are brainwashed into their terrible, inhumane lifestyles.
These books are incredibly pro-life. They're also pro-family, as Gabe yearns for his mother, Claire yearns for her son, and Kira's father adopts Matty as his own when the boy has no one. No one is totally unwanted, and everyone yearns to give and receive love.
As I've said, the main reason these books are controversial is because they are assigned to the wrong age group. To 11-year-old me, The Giver was just a scary, intense book. But I know slightly older children who can now truly appreciate--as I now can--what a beautiful, fantastic story Lois Lowry has woven for readers.