Whatever your opinion is, the emotional reactions to the upcoming film reveal that more than 20 years after its publication, Lois Lowry’s thought-provoking novel still packs a punch. Here are 10 favorite quotes from Lois Lowry’s classic novel.

The Giver Quotes

  1. “If you were to be lost in the river, Jonas, your memories would not be lost with you. Memories are forever.”
  2. “For the first time, he heard something that he knew to be music. He heard people singing. Behind him, across vast distances of space and time, from the place he had left, he thought he heard music too. But perhaps, it was only an echo.”
  3. “I feel sorry for anyone who is in a place where he feels strange and stupid.”
  4. “Our people made that choice, the choice to go to Sameness. Before my time, before the previous time, back and back and back. We relinquished color when we relinquished sunshine and did away with a difference. We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others.”
  5. “…how could you describe a hill and snow to someone who had never felt height or wind or that feathery, magical cold?”
  6. “Even trained for years as they all had been in the precision of language, what words could you use which would give another the experience of sunshine?”
  7. “There’s much more. There’s all that goes beyond – all … that is Elsewhere – and all that goes back, and back, and back. I received all of those when I was selected. And here in this room, all alone, I re-experience them again and again. It is how wisdom comes. And how we shape our future.”
  8. “You may lie.”
  9. “His mind reeled. Now, empowered to ask questions of utmost rudeness-and promised answers-he could, conceivably (though it was almost unimaginable), ask someone, some adult, his father perhaps: ‘Do you lie?’ But he would have no way of knowing if the answer he received was true.”
  10. “He knew that there was no quick comfort for emotions like those. They were deeper and they did not need to be told. They were felt.” Here are 30 motivating and inspiring quotes to keep you feeling uplifted!

The Giver Book Quotes  10 Best Lois Lowry Quotes from The Giver - 39The Giver Book Quotes  10 Best Lois Lowry Quotes from The Giver - 86