Problem/Conflict.
In my opinion, the main conflict in this novel is based on the relationship between the main hero and society. Throughout the story, Jonas more and more dislikes the rules of the community he lives in. He does not agree with not being able to see colors, experience feelings, music, people getting released for no reason and only one person receiving pain – him. Furthermore, Jonas suffers from keeping the truth by himself, he is trying to share it, but nobody believes him.
"Lily," he asked that evening when his sister took her comfort object, the stuffed elephant, from the shelf, "did you know that once there really were elephants? Live ones?"
She glanced down at the ragged comfort object and grinned. "Right," she said, skeptically. "Sure, Jonas."
Thus, incomprehension between man and society becomes the main problem of this novel.
What life lessons can be learned from this book?
I believe that the principal moral that is hidden behind this novel is the value of both good and bad experiences, as there is no pleasure without pain and no pain without pleasure. No matter how delightful an experience is, you cannot value the pleasure it gives you unless you have some memory of a time when you have suffered. Since Jonas was obtaining both grievous, like war, and enjoyable, like family holidays, memories he was able to feel to whole range of different feelings. The members of Jonas’s community cannot appreciate the joys in their lives because they have never felt pain as they are deprived of all the memories: their lives are totally monotonous and devoid of emotional variation. Thus, one more life lesson that is learned from this story is the importance of memory because nation, which forgets its past is doomed to extinction as it appears to be dystopian, rude and severe: death is not tragic to them because life is not precious without memories. Moreover, on the example of Jonas’s dystopian society, the author teaches readers to appreciate our world, which is based on democracy and freedom of choice.
Two questions to ask the author of the novel.
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