Outside Innocence, Inner Guilt

Most of Roald Dahl´s short stories before he started to write books for children lets us see of what the author liked to write about. A great example of his grim stories is a story titled Lamb to the Slaughter, this story tells about a little fragile woman waiting for his husband waiting to come back home. After a little, very little talking, Mary was told by his husband that he wanted to go live with another woman. Mary was in sudden shock and decided to just cook her husband some supper, by the time Mary took the lamb's leg out of the freezer she did not hesitate to smash the frozen leg directly into her husbands skull, killing him. Then she decided to call the cops and the detectives, they inspected everything and questioned Mary. But Mary was not foolish and decided to cook the evidence and serve it to the cops instead, after that, she giggled.


"And he told her. It didn't take long, four or five minutes at most, and she say very still through it all, watching him with a kind of dazed horror as he went further and further away from her with each word." (Dahl 3),  This example draws an image in our head of how Mary feels when her husband tells her she is going away, the quote describes the sudden feeling of loss at that particular moment.

He didn't answer, so she bent her head again and went on with her sewing; bet each time he lifted the drink to his lips, she heard the ice cubes clinking against the side of the glass.  Even though she loves him, is husband seems to be not interested in her at all, then again he loves another lady.

I think that the theme in this story is that jealousy very often is life threatening and can kill, but however some people, with just a little bit of sneakyness, can get away with it. 

The Giver by Lois Lowry Chapters 17-20

Right after Jonas was at the war game and had a fight with Asher, Fiona asked him to ride along by the river. Jonas was so sad that he denied and went back home, during his walk home he started to think about his friendship with Asher and Fiona as he felt the feeling of loss. At diner time, the family had a talk about the twin baby to be released the next day. Jonas´father explained that he was sent to Elsewhere and would find the peaceful place. The next day, Jonas asked the Giver about release, as they talked about release he bringed up the "failure" Reciever and what happended to her. The Giver talked of how she was and told Jonas that her name was Rosemary, he also explained what was good about her and he loved Rosemary. After they talked about how was she a failure, the reason was than she chosed to be released:


"Finally one afternoon, we finished for the day. It had been a hard session. I tried to finish-as i do with you- by transferring something happy and cheerful. But the time of laughter were gone by then. She stood up very silently, frowning, as if she were making a decision. Then she came over me put her arms around me. She kissed my cheek." (Lowry 142)

After that, Rosemary was released.

Jonas begged the Giver to him the releasing of this mornings baby. While Jonas saw the video and learned that "release" is actually murder. The baby was injected with a needle, causing his death. Jonas was frightened too see his dad kill a newborn baby, so he stayed with the Giver for the night

The Giver by Lois Lowry Chapters 13-16

Jonas can now see a full perspective of all colors that surround him. After many weeks of training with The Giver, he’s starting to wonder where the pain of the whole training is. Then, the Giver gave him a memory which involved the same hill from the memory of snow, only that this has much steeper and felt more dangerous. Jonas had rode down the cliff and couldn’t handle the sleigh very well.  After a while of riding down the cliff, Jonas landed violently on ice, making his leg break. After the memory, at home, he still felt his leg sore for such pain the memory involved. Jonas had returned once more to the training even if he didn’t want to and saw the Giver with a sad look on his face. The Giver told him to retrieve the memory he was having, and then that was how he learned about the memory or warfare, which disgusted Jonas. That evening when Jonas was walking back home, he noticed Asher and all of Jonas´ friends where playing. They had all making what happened to be the sound of gunshots and men falling down. Jonas was invited to play, but he simply stood in the middle, in shock, remembering the warfare memory he had retrieved. He ignored all that happened at that time and he just remembered, Asher was upset of how Jonas had ruined the game for him. In desperate frustration, Jonas tried to explain his friends how is it wrong, the problem is, none of Jonas’ friends can see beyond.

Quotes Make People Think

"Our people made that choice, the choice to go to Sameness. Before my time, before the previous time, back and back and back. We relinquished color when we relinquished sunshine and did away with difference. We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others.” (Lowry 95)

This piece of text made me think about the past of the community. How the quote is said has some aspects of regret, not only sadness but also nostalgia. All the “sameness” that the Giver is talking about is of the community nowadays, but he said that they removed all color and all sunshine. While the Giver says that they removed all sunshine and color, it made me think, what if this community (as black and white as it is) is all based on the ideas of the Elder Chief from this period of time, but not as in the other Elder Chiefs would have done. The Giver still remembers the days where colors still existed. What if the drastic color change of his home made his sad and doesn’t feel to teach memories anymore?

The Giver by Lois Lowry Chapters 5-8

A few days before the Ceremony of Twelve, Jonas dreamed about his crush, Fiona, and is medicated with pills to prevent his "stirrings". Jonas described his dream as a strong "wanting". He recalls something the speakers had said about their parents preventing their child stirrings. The next day, Jonas and Lily talk about some of their major accomplishments each year, and they mention Caleb, which was a "loss", the people on the commuity say that a loss is extremely rare around. Baby Caleb was lost due to a bad nurturing of his father, leading Caleb to fall into the river. After that same night it was finally Ceremony of Twelve's. The first kid to come into the stage was Asher, and they made him remember his childhood. It was Fiona´s turn after a while, but once she was off-stage, Jonas noticed that he was skipped, Jonas was really worried, he thought what he did wrong and kept reflecting and wondering after the end of the ceremony, then Jonas is finally called up on stage. The Chief Elder gave a speech, saying how Jonas was different and special towards this community. At the end of the day, Jonas was given a very special assignment as "Reciever".

"The Giver" by Lois Lowry Chapter 1-4

The Giver tells the story about Jonas and the community. The community among Jonas is a very organized and square community, where each citizen is given a assignment to work on for his entire life. All the supplies for his community come with a cargo plane, and once a jet flew by and Jonas was frightened. Shortly after, a speaker said that we would be released. A little newborn baby came to the house at the time father came home, his name was Gabriel. Jonas then is introduced to the Ceremony of Twelve which is a big step into Jonas´ life. After a while, Jonas´ notices that his eyes and Gabe´s were different in the whole community, and Lily got her hair ribbons which she doesnt really like. 

One the next day, Jonas and his best friend, Asher to go the Volunteer Hours to be able to have a succesful Ceremony of Twelve. The 2 friends had to bathe an old lady, and she talked to Jonas about Roberto, and how his "releasing" went for the old man.

Jonas´ Dystopia

11/18/14



Jonas feels like his whole word is a perfect place, everything is organized and under control, the birds are chriping and there is just peace and no war. Every person has his own role on the community. But he is sent to meet a person called what seems to be "The Giver", he says theat he holds the truth about the world Jonas lives in.