The Giver — Chapter 23

About This Passage

This passage captures the chapter's structural argument in miniature: Jonas is physically on his knees, almost out of memory, and still reaches for the capacity to transmit — the capacity the Giver trained in him and the community had monopolized in the Receiver office. The verbs descend (impeded, stumbled, fell, unable to rise) and then ascend (grasped, enlarge, pass, stood, climb). Practicing this passage trains the hand in a rhythm of moral effort — falling and rising — that mirrors Lowry's claim about how moral strength actually functions under depletion.

Narration Prompt

In a substantial paragraph of at least seven sentences, retell chapter 23 by organizing its events around a single interpretive claim: that Jonas's ascent of the hill is not merely a plot climax but Lowry's compressed demonstration of how moral consciousness forms — through exhaustion, transmission, and eventually the acquisition of a memory that is one's own.

Discussion Questions

1. In chapter 23 Jonas asks himself whether Gabriel 'could still Receive' — the capitalized verb the Giver used to describe the central capacity of Jonas's office. What does it mean that Jonas now asks this question about a baby rather than about himself, and how does Lowry's shift of the verb 'Receive' from Jonas to Gabriel redefine what the Receiver role actually is?
2. When Jonas finds the memory of warmth 'flickered suddenly,' he experiences a 'fleeting second' in which he wants to 'bathe in sunlight, unburdened by anything or anyone else' — and then an 'urge, a need, a passionate yearning' to share the warmth with Gabriel overrides the impulse. Is Lowry presenting moral choice as a conscious act of will, an instinctive urge that overpowers self-interest, or the acquired habit of a person who has already become something through prior choices? Argue for one reading using the specific language of the passage.

+ 3 more questions in the complete study guide