The Giver — Chapter 23

About This Passage

This passage is the moral heart of the chapter: Jonas has a brief chance to keep a memory of warmth for his own body, and he chooses to give it away to Gabriel instead. The passage shows the exact moment love wins over the instinct to survive alone. Practicing it lets students feel the rhythm Lois Lowry gives to the struggle between the self and love for another.

Narration Prompt

In five or six sentences of your own words, retell chapter 23 from the moment the snow begins falling to the moment Jonas and Gabriel ride down the hill on the sled. Include Jonas's choice to keep going, the memories that come to him at the top, and what he hears at the end.

Discussion Questions

1. What does Jonas's decision to open his own tunic and hold Gabriel against his bare chest tell us about how Jonas has changed since the beginning of the novel? Support your answer with one detail from chapter 23 and one from an earlier chapter.
2. Jonas almost gives up when he wants to lie down in the snow. What does the text say makes him get up and keep going? What does this choice show about how Jonas understands his responsibility to Gabriel?

+ 3 more questions in the complete study guide