The Giver Ending Explained: Does Jonas Die?
Snow, a sled, faint music, and a question Lowry answered years later
The last page of The Giver has produced more classroom arguments than almost any other in children's fiction. A boy, a baby, a sled and a hill, and then nothing more.
Years later, Lowry quietly gave readers an answer, though not in the book where they expected it.
No, Jonas does not die. The Giver ends ambiguously, with Jonas and Gabriel half-frozen on a sled heading toward lights and music, but Lois Lowry's later books confirm that both of them survive. In Messenger, Jonas is the respected leader of a village, and in Son, Gabriel is a teenager.
Lowry deliberately left the first book open so readers could decide for themselves.
What happens at the end of The Giver?
Jonas and the Giver plan for Jonas to slip away so that the memories he holds will return to the people, while the Giver stays to help them through it. The plan changes suddenly when Jonas learns Gabriel is to be released the next morning. He takes the baby and flees at night on his father's bicycle, hiding from search planes by day.
As they travel, the land changes: hills, birds, rain, then snow. Starving and freezing, Jonas finds a sled at the top of a hill, the same sled from his very first memory, and rides it down with Gabriel toward lights in the windows below. He thinks he hears music, for the first time with his own ears, and the book ends there.
↑ Back to the topWhy is the ending ambiguous?
Lowry has said she wanted readers to reach their own conclusions. Some read the ending as a hopeful arrival, others as Jonas's final dream as he freezes, using the last memory the Giver gave him. Teachers love the debate, which is part of why the book is so widely taught. Lowry herself said she saw it as hopeful, but she wanted that to be the reader's choice.
↑ Back to the topWhat the later books reveal
In Messenger, published in 2004, the village has a gentle leader, called simply Leader, who came years before with a small child on a sled and who has a special inner sight. Readers soon realize he is Jonas. In Son, published in 2012, Gabe is a teenager in the same village, and the novel follows his mother's search for him and his own confrontation with a dangerous figure called the Trademaster. So, officially, Jonas and Gabriel make it.
↑ Back to the topWhat happens to the community?
The book does not show it, but the plan is clear: the Giver stays behind to guide the people as the memories of color, pain, love and loss return to them. The film shows the moment the memories flood back; the book leaves it to the reader's imagination, which is one more reason the ending feels open.
↑ Back to the topThe ending in short answers
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Does Jonas die at the end? | No, according to the later books |
| Does Gabriel survive? | Yes |
| Where do they end up? | In the village of Messenger |
| What happens to the community? | The memories return to everyone after Jonas leaves |
| What happens to the Giver? | He stays to help the people cope |
| Is it a dream? | Lowry left that open in 1993, then answered it later |
More about The Giver
Books Like The Giver
MessengerLois Lowry
Gathering BlueLois Lowry
SonLois Lowry
The Hunger GamesSuzanne Collins
The Maze RunnerJames Dashner
InsurgentVeronica Roth
The Death CureJames Dashner
DivergentVeronica RothThis guide discusses the whole plot, including the ending.