In The Giver, Lois Lowry does something interesting with the concept that knowledge is power- that the more knowledge one has the more powerful they are. For example in Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein has the knowledge of how to create a human being thus he has the power to do so (even if it turns out horribly). In The Giver however, the giver is the one with the most knowledge since he has all the memories of the world, and he is passing that knowledge on to Jonas, but it is questionable how much power the Receivers/Givers have.

The Giver undoubtedly is the most knowledgeable person in their society, yet he is not the one in charge. The people with the most power are the leaders and committee- the ones who make the strict rules of the society, and can order releases of those who break them. The original creators/leaders decided that in order for them to live peacefully, they had to get rid of the knowledge and memories of the past, so they can have a more simple, controlled way of life where individuality is stifled and everyone has their given role. The way The Giver presents knowledge is that it is important to have, but not necessarily desirable, and can be given to anyone, but each person will act on it differently.

In addition to the way that knowledge is given, it causes the Receivers great pain to hold those memories. This is interesting because it reflects how in real life learning the darker aspects of the world and humanity is painful and not easy, but it is important nonetheless because, as Milo may know, learning and knowledge can be applied to do a great number of things, and because the bad parts of the world can’t be fought against if we ignore or forget them as the people in the world of The Giver do.

The knowledge that the giver and Jonas have in this book represents the knowledge we may have if we are open to receiving it. By limiting the knowledge of the past, the leaders of their society are ensuring that their way of life will be accepted by everyone, as they have no knowledge of what things were like before. At the end of the book (spoilers), Jonas leaves his town and gets as far away as possible, so that all the memories he received from the Giver would go into the people in his town so they could know the truth. By giving them this gift of knowledge, he is giving them both pain and power. Power- for the knowledge of things past and the choices that could come from the entire society knowing these things, and pain- for the horrible events that have taken place in human history that these people have never known about. Whether knowledge is pain, power, or both- it can be a hard burden to hold, but it is ultimately worth bearing.