Chapter 22 · The Giver

Copywork

All of it was new to him. After a life of Sameness and predictability, he was awed by the surprises that lay beyond each curve of the road. He slowed the bike again and again to look with wonder at wildflowers, to enjoy the throaty warble of a new bird nearby, or merely to watch the way wind shifted the leaves in the trees. During his twelve years in the community, he had never felt such simple moments of exquisite happiness.

Once he had yearned for choice. Then, when he had had a choice, he had made the wrong one: the choice to leave. And now he was starving.

Read both passages aloud. On a hungry night, Jonas calls leaving “the wrong one.” Would he have said that while he watched the wildflowers?

For the educator Two passages; copy them as shown. The first holds the vocabulary word “exquisite” and keeps the capital S in “Sameness.” Its second sentence opens with a phrase and a comma (“After a life of Sameness and predictability,”). Its third lists three things Jonas slows down for, each beginning with “to,” the last turned with “or merely.” Its fourth opens with a phrase and a comma again. The second passage is Jonas's first verdict at night, and it holds the vocabulary word “yearned.” Its three sentences step through time: “Once,” “Then,” “And now.” The middle one sets off “when he had had a choice” with commas, uses “had had” correctly, and puts a colon before the words that name the choice. The passage stops before “But if he had stayed...”, where Jonas thinks again. That is on purpose: the last written question weighs both of his answers, so neither is handed to the student here. The talk prompt has no single answer. Among the wildflowers he may never have thought it, or the fears may already have been “building in him now as well,” even on the happiest days.

Discussion

Narration Tell the chapter back in order. Start where the road begins to change. Stop when Jonas and Gabe cry in the rain.

A small reddish-brown creature looks at Jonas and Gabe, “curious and unafraid.” Do those words fit Jonas too? Character
At night Jonas tries to remember feasts. Afterward he is left with a “gnawing, painful emptiness.” Why would a starving boy do that to himself? Inference
Jonas had liked the rains in the memories, but this one is “different.” Is it the rain that is different, or Jonas? Character
Gabe is safe only if Jonas stays strong. At the end, Jonas “no longer cared about himself.” What could that mean for Gabe? Moral reasoning

Make a Connection Think of a story, or a time in your own life, when someone had plenty to eat but was hungry for something else. What were they hungry for? What did they do about it?

Vocabulary

subtle: It was a subtle change, hard to identify at first. Small and hard to notice at first.
perils: the unfamiliar landscape held hidden, unknown perils. Serious dangers.
exquisite: During his twelve years in the community, he had never felt such simple moments of exquisite happiness. So fine and lovely that it is felt very deeply.
relentless: The most relentless of his new fears was that they would starve. Never stopping or easing up.
meager: They finished the meager store of potatoes and carrots they had saved from the last agricultural area Very small; barely enough.
makeshift: Finally, in desperation, he fashioned a makeshift net, looping the strands of Gabriel's blanket around a curved stick. Made quickly from whatever is at hand, to do for now.
gnawing: But when the memory glimpses subsided, he was left with the gnawing, painful emptiness. Aching steadily, like something biting slowly.
yearned: Once he had yearned for choice. Wanted something very deeply, for a long time.

Critical thinking

When Jonas was small, he was told, “You will never be starving.” Now he is. He also thinks that at home he “would have starved in other ways.” How alike are those two kinds of starving?
Jonas first calls leaving “the wrong one,” then decides “there had not really been a choice.” Is he right that he had no choice?