The Giver 《记忆传授人》

            In the dystopian novel The Giver, the author Lois Lowry created a world in which there is no memory, no color, no music, no humanity, but full of rules. This world seems to be a utopia, a perfect society – there is no conflict, no war, no wrong decision, no inequality, and an omnipotent and omnipresent government body that could make the seemingly most “reasonable” choices for you in your lifetime. You would take the job that suits you the best according to the observation of the Elders, you would receive the best education, and you would not need to worry about bad weather or food shortages. But, in fact, the community has to pay two terrible prices to maintain this “perfect” society: Nobody possesses memory of the distant past except the Giver, who is forbidden to share his memories with others; And the governing body must create an extremely strict set of rules that everybody must adhere to and sacrifice their freedom of decision to keep order. From my point of view, these two costs outweigh the benefits a lot.  

            In The Giver, we as readers can certainly perceive the dread of a world without memory. Individually, without memory, just like in the novel, one cannot feel the real world, cannot live in reality or a solid life (Lowry 165). In a complex world of memories, without pain, there is no true flavor in pleasure. Without betrayal, there is no intrinsic value in loyalty. Without cowardice, there is no solid admiration for courage. And without hatred, there is no naïve purity in love. All of this, pain, pleasure, betrayal, loyalty, cowardice, courage, hatred, and love, all enrich an individual’s life in the form of memories. Socially, collective memories create a society’s identity. Those collective memories unite us as a society together, they inject into us certain emotions or values or feelings that define our society. A good case in point in reality is the Chinese society. Most Chinese believe that diligence, intelligence, and sacrifice are three crucial definitive words of their society. Throughout Chinese history, these three words have been displayed in nearly every period of time, in nearly every local Chinese community. People have this belief in those three words because all of us can remember that our country’s success today has been based on the diligence, intelligence, and sacrificial spirit of generations before. In The Giver, since only one person in the community holds all of the collective memories, nobody has a sense of what defines their society, and thus their society has no clear identity (Lowry 97). 

            What is more, it is absolutely imperative to share and transmit down our memories. What is the present, except an endless chain of memories? Memories has the special ability to link the past to the present and to the future. They could help us to pass down our ancestors’ revelations to the future and advise us of our future ahead. In the world of The Giver, memories are certainly not shared nor passed down from previous generations. The results of this decision are that people are not able to decide their own life, their own future because they have nothing to seek advice from, and so they blindly obey even inhumane orders. Similarly, the community could not determine the path it is taking without the Giver, because its Elders could not use the collective memories of generations before to wisely choose (Lowry 141). Thus, Lowry argues that memories are meant to be shared and passed on to others, they could provide invaluable advice of the world ahead (Lowry 120). 

            Further, another significant theme presented in The Giver is rule and order in a human society. In the novel, the government acts more like an administrative parent, forcing everyone to adopt a stringent and specially designed set of rules that permeate every aspect of daily life, going as far as regulating specifically where it is appropriate to stow one’s bicycle (Lowry 91). But from my point of view, those rules have devastating effects. The rules forbid people to acquire memory, thus completely disabling people’s natural ability to think independently and for themselves. More importantly, some of the rules are completely inhumane and horrific. For example, one rule instructs Nurturers, such as Jonas’ father, to “release” the lighter one when a twin is born (Lowry 186). This rule utterly ignores humans’ natural inclination to love and care every offspring and does not even give the lighter baby the natural right to live. Another rule states that teenagers cannot choose their eventual job. This rule is also inhumane, as it strips teenagers of their right to discover their interests and choose a job that they think would fit them the best. So, the rules in The Giver lead to the question: What are the best rules for any society?  

            In my opinion, the best rules are the most natural rules. Of course, this idea is not new. According to the Greek philosopher Aristotle and the medieval scholar St. Thomas Aquinas, the best rule is one that takes into account our natural humanity and patterns of human behavior as well as society. Friedrich Hayek pointed out in the 20^th century the best law system is made up of rules that are spontaneously created by human behavior and social patterns (Hayek). I think that besides that point about natural laws, another reason why unnatural rules would not work is that the goal of those rules usually violates the law of nature and humanity. In The Giver, one of the goals that the Elders believe the rules could help them achieve cis a society without overpopulation or an aging population. In order to do so, one of the rules in the community states that the elderly’s death time must be planned, and many could not live to their natural moment when they pass away. This rule would not simply function in a real society, it does not provide the old with the natural right to enjoy their final years and pays no heed to our humanity, which drives us to take care of the old and respect their choices. 

            Overall, the seemingly perfectly utopian society in The Giver is actually one of the most shocking and dehumanizing deceptive societies. Although the Elders seem to be wise in making choices for everyone in every stage of their lives, the cost of no memory still inflicts unimaginable damage mentally for everyone in that community. What is more, what Lois Lowry is profoundly indicating in her novel is that as we gain more and more scientific knowledge, we spontaneously feel that we are step by step closer to being true gods, able to replace natural rules with artificial ones. Governments around the world have a stronger and stronger desire to control the natural world, and even the human world as described in The Giver, with those artificial laws. But it is in this arrogance and seemingly “dazzling success” that our true dangers as a species lies. We as humans must understand, that when we are trying to construct more sophisticated social systems and rules, we could not acquire all of the necessary knowledge to dominate the natural, human worlds, we could not disregard the natural laws, our own humanity, and that our capacity of knowledge has unsurpassable obstacles. We must remain humble, and try not to be gangsters who have an uncontrollable desire to control everything, for what is more dangerous and dehumanizing than that?

WORKS CITED

Lowry, Lois. The Giver. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014. The Giver Quartet 1. 

Hayek, Friedrich. "Friedrich A. Hayek Quotes (Author of 'The Road to Serfdom)." Goodreads.com, www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/670307.Friedrich_A_Hayek. Accessed 1 Jan. 2021. 

PICTURES FROM:

https://www.artofvfx.com/the-giver-mark-breakspear-vfx-supervisor-method-studios/

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https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Thomas-Aquinas

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https://www.history.com/news/7-things-you-may-not-know-about-the-sistine-chapel

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VIDEOS CITED

Schama, Simon, director. Civilizations, BBC, 2018. CCTV 6, director. General History of China EP1. General History of China, 23 Aug. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTRvs6bW6CQ. 

"The Giver - Memories Returned Scene." YouTube.com, uploaded by Khatleen Tjahjadi, Khatleen Tjahjadi, 24 Aug. 2019, www.youtube.com/watch v=QTYP4Rur3yw. Accessed 6 Jan. 2021. 

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"'The Giver' Movie (2014) Ending." YouTube.com, Petittwo, 3 Feb. 2018, www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PghMqkTo1M. Accessed 6 Jan. 2021. 

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在反乌托邦小说《记忆传授人》中，作者洛伊斯-洛瑞创造了一个没有记忆、没有色彩、没有音乐、没有人性，却充满规则的世界。这个世界似乎是一个乌托邦，一个完美的社会—那里没有冲突，没有战争，没有错误的决定，没有不平等，还有一个无所不能、无所不在的政府机构，它可以在你的一生中为你做出看似最 "合理"的选择。你会根据长老们的观察，选择最适合自己的工作，你会接受最好的教育，你也不用担心天气不好、粮食短缺。但事实上，为了维持这个 "完美 "的社会，书里的人们要付出两个可怕的代价：除了记忆传授人之外，没有人拥有过去的记忆，而传授人又被禁止与他人分享他的记忆；同时，管理机构必须制定一套每个人都必须严格遵守的规则，每个个体都必须牺牲自己的决定权来维持秩序。在我看来，这两个代价后果十分严重。

            在《记忆传授人》中，作为读者的我们当然可以感受到一个没有记忆的世界的可怕。从个体的角度来说，没有记忆，就像小说中一样，人无法感受到真实的世界，也无法坚实地活在现实生活中。在一个复杂的记忆世界里，没有痛苦，就无法体味快乐的滋味；没有背叛，就无法彰显忠诚的可贵；没有懦弱，就无法用勇气激励英雄；而没有仇恨，就无法用爱与宽容感化灵魂。这一切，痛苦、快乐、背叛、忠诚、懦弱、勇气、仇恨、爱与宽容，都以记忆的形式丰富了个人的肉体和灵魂。从社会的角度来说，集体记忆创造了一个社会的认同感。这些集体记忆把一个社会团结在一起，它们给我们注入了某些情感或价值观或感情，决定了我们的社会身份。现实中一个很好的案例就是中国社会。大多数中国人认为，勤奋、智慧、个体奉献是我们社会的三个至关重要的定语。在中国历史上，这三个词几乎在每一个时期，几乎在每一个地方的华人社会都有体现。人们之所以对这三个词有这样的信念，是因为我们每个人都能记得，我们国家今天的成功是建立在前人的勤奋、智慧，和奉献精神之上的。在《记忆传授人》的世界中，由于社会中只有一个人掌握着所有的集体记忆，所以没有人知道什么定义了他们的社会，因此他们也没有明确的社会身份。

            更多的是，分享和传承我们的记忆是绝对必要的。毕竟，没有那些连绵不断的过往记忆，又何来今朝呢？记忆具有连接过去、现在和未来的特殊能力。它们可以帮助我们把祖先的启示传给未来，为我们未来的发展提供建议。在《记忆传授人》的世界里，记忆当然不是共享的，也不是上一代人传下来的。这种决定的结果是，人们无法决定自己的生活、自己的未来，因为他们没有任何东西可以征求意见，所以即使是不人道的命令，他们也会盲目地服从。同样，如果没有记忆传授人，社会也无法决定自己要走的路，因为它的长老们无法利用前人的集体记忆做出明智的选择。因此，洛瑞认为，记忆是用来分享和传递给他人的，它们可以为世界提供宝贵建议。

            此外，《记忆传授人》中呈现的另一个重要主题是人类社会的规则和秩序。在小说中，政府更像是一个行政家长，强迫每个人采用一套严格的、专门设计的规则，这些规则渗透到日常生活的方方面面，甚至专门规定在哪里适合存放自行车。但从我的角度来看，这些规则具有破坏性的影响。这些规则禁止人们获得记忆，从而完全剥夺了人们独立思考、为自己思考的自然能力。更重要的是，有些规则完全是不人道的、可怕的。比如，有一条规则指示养育者，比如主人公乔纳斯的父亲，当一对双胞胎出生时，要 "解放 "体重较轻的那一个。这条规则完全忽视了人类爱护每一个后代的天性，甚至没有给弱者以天然的生存权利。另一条规则规定，青少年不能选择自己最终的工作。这个规则也是不人道的，因为它剥夺了青少年发现自己的兴趣，选择最适合自己的工作的权利。所以，《记忆传授人》中的规则引出了一个问题：什么是最好的规则？ 

            在我看来，最好的规则就是最自然的规则。当然，这个观点并不新奇。根据希腊哲学家亚里士多德和中世纪学者圣托马斯-阿奎那的观点，最好的规则是考虑到我们自然人性和行为模式以及社会运转规律的规则。佛雷德里奇-哈耶克在20世纪指出，最好的法律体系是由人类行为和社会模式自发创造的规则组成的。我想，非自然规则行不通的另一个原因是，这些规则的目标通常违反了自然和人性法则。在《记忆传授人》中，长老们认为规则可以帮助他们实现的目标之一就是一个没有人口过剩或人口老龄化的社会。为了做到这一点，社区中的一个规则规定，老人的死亡时间必须是有计划的，很多老人无法活到自然逝去的那一刻。这个规则在现实社会中并不能简单地发挥作用，它没有给老人提供享受最后岁月的天然权利，也没有理会我们的人性，人性促使我们照顾老人，尊重老人的选择。 

            总的来说，《记忆传授人》中看似完美的乌托邦社会，其实是一个最令人震惊和丧失人性的欺骗性社会。虽然长老们看似很明智地为每个人做出了每个阶段的选择，但没有记忆的代价还是给这个社会的每个人带来了难以想象的精神伤害。更重要的是，洛伊斯-洛瑞在小说中深刻表明的是，随着我们获得越来越多的科学知识，我们自发地觉得自己离真正的神正在一步步靠近，能够用人工规则代替自然规则。世界各地的政府越来越强烈地想用这些人工法则来控制自然界，甚至是人类世界。但正是在这种傲慢和看似 "眼花缭乱的成功 "中，我们这个物种真正的危险才在此。作为人类，我们必须明白，当我们试图构建更复杂的社会体系和规则时，我们不可能获得所有必要的知识来主宰自然、人类世界，我们不可能无视自然规律、无视自己的人性，我们的知识能力有着无法超越的障碍。我们必须保持谦卑，尽量不做那些有控制一切欲望的匪徒，因为还有什么比这更危险、更没有人性的呢？