Harrison Bergeron and the Giver

[jooyoungpark]

When I was reading Harrison Bergeron, a novel kept coming into my mind, a novel that is quite related to harison bergeron.
The novel is called Lois Lowry's "The Giver."
If any of you guys have heard or read about "The Giver." It has a very similar theme as Harison Bergeron.

The Giver also has a futuristic background, it sets its story about a world where everyone has been genetically changed into all being some what equal.
Everybody in the Giver has been set by the government to be color-blind, unable to feel love and to relie on the government for most of their decisions.
With all these similarities, i believe the most similar point about the Giver and Harrison Bergeron, is the fact that there is an exception.
In all of these stories, the Handicap General in Harrison Bergeron, and the Giver in "The Giver" are all exceptions to the "average" society.
The Handicap General have abnormal intelligence but without handicaps, and the Giver can see color and feel love.
Both were great novels and stories and for me, reading Harrison Bergeron while thinking of the Giver have made the story more interesting.

How about it? Did u guys have any stories or movies that came up to your mind while reading Harrison Bergeron?
Oh and if you have not read The Giver before, it is a great book and google it or search it in the library.

[mirim002]

I agree that the Giver is same with Harrison Bergeron. I read it long time ago and now that i think about it, i feel that it has some similar feeling to it. I don't have some story or movie that is same to this...only the Giver.

[woojongpark]

Yup, The Giver sure is a great novel. I enjoyed reading it.

I've noticed that many novels of George Orwell have similar themes to those of Harrison Bergeron. (Daniel mentioned Animal Farm before) The similarities between two are that they talk about the authorities of people who are in higher position. Harrison Bergeron talked about the general who didn't wear handicap, and Animal Farm shows the pigs not following the rules they've made.

If you haven't read George Orwell's books yet, try them. They made me ponder a lot about communism and social life.

[bilal15]

"The Giver" hmm it reminds me a little bit. I read this novel a while ago but i don't remember this novel that much but i know that it was a good novel. I also read the novel of kurt Vonnegut it was called "The Sirens Of Titan" it was a similar novel to harrison bergerron based on the equality thing they also used handicaps to make all people equal in the novel The Sirens Of Titan. hey guys did any of you people read "The Sirens Of Titan"?

[junilee26]

I agree with you jooyoung!! i said in one of my post, this story reminded me of the story The Giver

[ExtremelyExtremeExtremist]

I agree that "The Giver" is similar to Harrison Bergeron, and I found another related novel, which is "Brave New World".

Brave New World takes place during future, but it mostly deals with freedom of people. The government uses machines to control people's emotions and actions that they think they are living in happiness. As a result, people lost their humanity and became like robots.

Overally, Brave New World is quite similar to Harrison Bergeron, except that there's bad government instead of dictator.

[brandonina]

Wow, you guys read a lot of good books. Unfortunately, i haven't read the Givers yet. (I will soon!) But I have read the Brave New World. Brave New World introduces a society where people's actions are quite limited in certain way of how the society is shaped. The difference might be how the Brave New World consists of social classes/roles and more of a technology (?). It's been a long time since I read it . And one of the character acts like Harrison Bergeron, who tries to rebel against this limited society.

[nadiraamalina]

I guess there are similarities between The Giver and Harrison Bergeron, but The Giver was far better for me because it had a happy ending, if you wanted to interpret it that way, since Jonas actually successfully breaks free of the government's control, even if the plan didn't really go the way he and the Giver wanted it to, and he ends up saving the people of his community. Harrison's attempt didn't go that well. I guess it's because Lois Lowry's intended audience was different from Kurt Vonnegut's

[munisa]

This story kinda reminds me of a story that I read when I was in 8th grade called Ender's Game, I don't really remember the plot but it takes place in the future. All I remember is that there is this aggressive kid named Ender he gets sent to this place where he trains to become a space marine I think, and the government secretly controls him. I guess that story was kinda interesting even though I was forced to read it. If you guys don't know this story check it out its kinda interesting and all futuristic.

[woojongpark]

I also found some differences between H.G and the Giver.
In Giver, the "government" of the community does not restrict people by using handicaps. They have wider range of choices, as people can express their feelings kinda freely (Although I don't think it is entirely free)

[dwsuh1]

One movie that came up in my mind was The Island. This movei is story about clones made for humuan to have organ to live on which is pretty much good. But the whole story is very sad since they kill these clones telling them they will go to this awesome Island which is death. The mood is same to it sets in future and clones in the movie is known to get equal treatment wich is true but at the same time they are not equal when you look at socially since they are just property used to save there real human.

[irin]

I think Giver relate to Harrison Bergeron talking about equailty and talking about higher position than others.

[lukejoo1092]

Miss. Boyd already mentioned about this movie but since nobody watched it yet, I'll briefly compare The Pedestrian with the movie, Equilibrium

Equilibrium is a future society where everyone is equal by having no emotions. The general belief is that a perfect society can only be achieved through emotionless people. They get rid of their emotions by taking pills on a daily basis. But there are people who at first accidentally forgot to take the pills and then felt the pleasure of being able to feel. So they plan a rebellion against the government by shutting down the factories that produce the pills.


The method for equality shown in this movie is being emotionless and only being logical and rational. Nothing else. Since we then all share common beliefs and rules, there is balance within the society.

I believe this is wrong as well. People should equally have the freedom to feel things the way they want to. They should not "become" equal but more like "being able to be" equal. They should have the freedom to choose what they want for themselves rather than being brainwashed by others before having the chance to make a decision for themselves. To me it seems that the fact of everyone having the freedom to choose already proves that we are equal. Therefore it would be contradictory to say that we aren't equal already.

[james]

I didn't read the book the giver but I've heard of it when I have to choose a book for ms. boyd's book report thing. I also heard that it was very similar to Harrison burgeron.
Although I didn't choose the book the giver as my book project, I'd like to read it in someday.
It has a very interesting theme and I personally like the author. Also, because I enjoyed reading Harrison Burgeron, The Giver is going to be one of the most awesome book that I've ever read. It really has an interesting themes. How can you even imagine something like making people all equal by wearing some kind of stupid and idiodic handdicaps?

[bilal15]

i haven't read the giver, but people say that it has a similar theme and similar story to harrison berguron.