Loss of Innocence

Authors Note: This is an essay about the theme in The Giver by Lois Lowry. The purpose is to explain one of the major themes.

What if one day you were living like everyone else, a plain and simple life, and then you had to be one of the only ones who felt pain? One of the major themes in the story The Giver by Lois Lowery is loss of innocence; it shows this in several ways.

    

One theme of the story is loss of innocence. Jonas loses his innocence when he becomes the new receiver. He has to keep all the secrets and memories that no one else knows. Everyone else gets to live a plain life while Jonas has to keep all the memories of pain and loss.

Jonas also loses his innocence when he leaves his home. People started searching for him so they could bring him back to the community. He left to force the people to have the memories that he had been holding the entire time he was the receiver.

Jonas's dad also loses his innocence. When he kills the twin, even though that was what he was taught. He never knew that what he was doing was actually killing it, he just thought it was "release". Jonas was horrified when he learned what release was, and he knew that no one in the community was innocent anymore.

Jonas and the rest of the community had lost their innocence. If the theme had been different, it would be a different story.