2/24/2015 Author Lois Lowry Talks about ‘The Giver,’ Memories' Influence and Travel to Maine | MapQuest

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TRAVEL Q&AS

Author Lois Lowry Talks about ‘The Giver,’ Memories' Influence and Travel toMaineMovie adaptation of her young adult novel stars Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep, opens Aug. 15

by Jenie Skoy | Posted Jul 30th 2014 11:53a.m. Jenie has documented stories for more than twenty years as a journalist, photographer and storyteller. Follow her on Google+ and Twitter.

Jonathan Wiggs/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

To help kick off the release, author Lois Lowry—who in the tradition of her book’s “The Giver” character—shares a handful of her memories of places in Maine (and other regions) that

inspired scenes from her novel. Lowry suggests a trail along the Presumpscot River or a ferry ride around the islands of Casco Bay (in memory of her character Jonas’s first sailing

venture) or a paddle­wheel trip on a lake that Lowry overlooks while writing from her summer home (show above).

She also shares a couple of new memories, like of a botanical garden in Boothbay and an appointment­only destination in Hope, where visitors can bond with a pair of elephants, Ruby

and Opal, in memory of one scene where Jonas is given the heartbreaking memory of an elephant.

Tell us some of your memories of places that shaped the setting of "The Giver?"

My father was a career military officer, and in describing the community (so safe, so orderly) where Jonas lives, in "The Giver," it was easy to look back on the army installations of my

own early years: Schofield Barracks, in Hawaii, where I was born; Governors Island, NY, where I lived as an adolescent; and others in between, from Tokyo to Atlanta to Pennsylvania.

Army posts vary in geography and architecture, but they all have the feel of order and comfort and sameness that I envisioned in Jonas’s world. I was a little startled when I visited the

Well-loved young adult novel, "The Giver," will soon hit the big screen in a film starring Jeff Bridges and Meryl Streep.

2/24/2015 Author Lois Lowry Talks about ‘The Giver,’ Memories' Influence and Travel to Maine | MapQuest

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movie set, and saw its sleek ultra­modern dwellings, so unlike the brick and mortar in which I always lived. But the feel was the same, and of course the more futuristic homes were

appropriate.

How did these places influence you as a writer? Do you draw from scenes in your childhood (even small things, like the smell of a flower or the shape of the river againstthe bank, or colors, etc.)? What about scenes from adulthood?

Because I moved so often as a child, the memories to which I cling are the smallish things that traveled with us: my mother’s monogrammed silver; colorful dishes that I loved; a

hairbrush, an umbrella, a dollhouse that we left behind in Pennsylvania, and a green bicycle that I had in Japan. But Jonas’s world has no such objects. Everything is colorless and

utilitarian, without sentimental attachment.

So I had to give him those things in the memories that he begins, gradually, to acquire. When I gave him flowers, I probably recreated the flowers in my grandmother’s garden. When he

saw his first rainbow it was likely a rainbow I had seen in Honolulu. And his first ride on a sled? That was probably the sleds—and the snow, and the hills—that my own children grew up

with in Maine.

There is also a memory given to Jonas of a horse—a boy and a horse— in which he learns for the first time about the bond between animals (there are none in his world) and humans. I

drew, for this scene, quite consciously on my own son, who had a horse when he was a boy. He used to ride along the Presumpscot River in Falmouth, Maine, where he grew up. In

those years it was untrammeled territory! Now there are places to park and trails to walk beside that same river.

If you could plan an itinerary for a lover of "The Giver," where would you send visitors just to soak up a scene and try to relive some of the magic you experienced whileyou wrote the book? Or places that echo in your book.

Jonas, early in his acquisition of memories, experiences the bliss of sailing, with the white billow of sail against a blue sky. He sails first on a lake; later he learns of ocean, the vastness

of it, and that there are sailboats there, as well. I live in Maine, where sailing, on lake or ocean, is always a part of recreational life. I would send a traveller to take the ferry from Portland

around the islands of Casco Bay on a summer afternoon when the water is dotted with boats, their sails billowing. But I would send the traveller inland as well, to lake country where

from the various mountain trails one can look down on countless lakes, countless boats, and on a sunlit day one can experience the same kind of joy that Jonas felt for the first time

when it was given to him by The Giver.

Driving the back roads of inland Maine, one is very likely to encounter a deer, a moose, a fox, a raccoon or a porcupine—all the kinds of things that Jonas saw, and marveled at, for the

first time after he fled his own community. I have had, recently, a sandhill crane in my meadow; and a pair of bald eagles are raising young nearby. I think, sometimes, of what it must

have been like for him, fascinated and unafraid, discovering wildlife out in the wilderness that he must cross.

"I would send a traveller to take the ferry from Portland around the islands of Casco Bay ona summer afternoon when the water is dotted with boats, their sails billowing. But I wouldsend the traveller inland as well, to lake country where from the various mountain trails onecan look down on countless lakes, countless boats, and on a sunlit day one can experiencethe same kind of joy that Jonas felt for the first time when it was given to him by TheGiver."—Lois Lowry

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Can you point to specific spots? Is there a certain bike path/trail? Or a path through the woods that you often took while you were writing? Is the sledding hill Jonas wasgiven a memory of a real place? Or how about the lake where he sailed?

I mentioned that I would send a traveller in summer to Casco Bay—and also nearby, to Two Lights State Park, with its breathtaking rocky coastal view of the Atlantic (and be sure to

have a lobster roll for lunch at the Lobster Shack). Then they should go inland, where in summer I look through the window beside my desk across a wildflower­filled meadow to Long

Lake. In Naples, Maine, where Long Lake begins, tourists can board the Songo River Queen for a paddle­wheel vessel trip around the lake.

But I would send visitors to this part of Maine in winter, too. Here is where the hills are, in ski country (from my house in winter I can see night­skiing lights of the slopes at Shawnee

Peak). Here, too, would be the kind of snowy trail that Jonas found at the end of his journey, the trail that led by sled to a welcoming house. (This scene was actually shot in Utah. But it

could have been here in Maine. The Maine mountain slopes are dotted with log cabins, smoke from their fireplaces drifting from the chimneys in winter.)

Jonas learns of other things as well, more sophisticated concepts like art museums, and there are plenty of those in Maine, from the outstanding Portland Museum of Art to the very fine

Farnsworth Art Museum farther up the coast in Rockland, with its Wyeth collection.

And as some of the strongest memories Jonas experienced were related to connections between he and loved ones, feel free to share a memory shared with family orfriends.

My favorite memories always include my grandchildren here at the farm in Maine. My only granddaughter lives in Europe but has always come to visit in summer, and one of the things

she looks forward to most is blueberry pie! (And the wild blueberries have been picked in my meadow, by my son and two grandsons.) She also goes with me each summer to

Deerwood Farm and Gardens nearby in Waterford, ME, to choose a new variety of daylily—we must have 25 different ones in the garden now. Over many summers the grandsons have

always raised a monarch butterfly after carefully taking the chrysalis from the leaf of a milkweed plant, where they find them in August. And the night sky! Every summer we lie out on the

lawn at night, far from any city lights and watch shooting stars.

As authors are, in a sense, givers, sharing memories and sensory experiences with readers, would you mind giving us a new memory about a place you recentlyconnected with on the East Coast?

There are two places on the Maine Coast that are relatively new discoveries for me. One, midway up the coast beyond Portland but before Rockland, is the incredible Coastal Maine

Botanical Gardens in Boothbay. This is a still little­known treasure which I recently saw listed among the top 10 botanical gardens in the USA. What a memory it would have given to

Jonas—the colors, the aromas, all set against the ocean.

And the other? This will come as a surprise. But how Jonas would have loved this! A retired veterinarian in Hope, Maine—inland, not far from Rockland—is caring for two retired circus

elephants, Ruby and Opal. You must call and make a reservation to visit and if you do, you will see these magnificent creatures, well­loved and cared for, up close, and hear about the

threat to elephants in the wild—the heartbreaking memory that Jonas received.

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