UDC 165.62

A. O. MUNTIAN^1*, I. V. SHPAK^2*

^1*Dnipro National University of Railway Transport named after Academician V. Lazaryan (Dnipro, Ukraine), e-mail muntonya@gmail.com, ORCID 0000-0001-8375-4067

^2*Dnipro National University of Railway Transport named after Academician V. Lazaryan (Dnipro, Ukraine), e-mail shpirinka@gmail.com, ORCID 0000-0002-4305-4987

Humanistic Intention of Dystopia in "The Giver" by Lois Lowry

Purpose. The aim of this piece is to study the manifestations of humanistic pursuits in a literary fiction work. The main interest is related to the interpretation of those existential and sociocultural concepts that underlie the dystopian novel by Lois Lowry. The theoretical basis of the study is based on works on phenomenology and the theory of reader reception. The method of phenomenology is a descriptive method: the phenomena of consciousness cannot be reduced to limited cognitive forms, and therefore language and means of description are important along with their ability to reveal consciousness through phenomena. Originality of the study lies in the investigation of the humanistic aspect of a dystopian society, depicted in the modern literary fiction. The main attention is focused on the phenomenological identification of existential ideas and their manifestation in the literary characters of the given work. The conclusions speak about the tendencies of humanization and dehumanization of a man and society in the context of philosophical, ethical and aesthetic issues, which are the most important and urgent problems of our time. The current study finds out that in the modern dystopian literature and philosophy, the main subject of attention is a human. This human is perceived and depicted as a phenomenon that cannot be grasped by the notions of intimation and essence. The human is a creature whose freedom presupposes a constant departure from nature and habitual reality to the realm of transcendent through the desire to comprehend his or her certain way of existence.

Keywords: human; existential approach; phenomenology; identity; literary reception; dehumanization; utopia; dystopia

Introduction

The study or even cognition of the real living world should commence with the study of consciousness, as far as only due to and through consciousness can one get access to reality. The reality itself is no longer a matter, the matter is the way how it is perceived and interpreted by human beings. Consciousness and acts of cognitions should not be studies as a means of interacting with the real living world, but rather as one of the main subjects of philosophic thought. In order to understand the genesis of concepts and to reveal the nature of true, "pure consciousness", it is necessary to reduce consciousness, that is, to move from the consideration of specific objects to the analysis of their pure essence. All kinds of reality with which a human being deals are explained from the point of view of acts of consciousness; there is simply no objective reality that exists outside and independently of consciousness; and consciousness is explained from itself, reveals itself as a phenomenon (Moran, 2013). Husserl Founders of phenomenology understood that this was a new science of consciousness, a new beginning in philosophy that reflects a certain frontier: the transition from constructivism and irrationalism to the possibility of reflective research of infinitely diverse types of human experience. The methods of phenomenology had a great influence on the development of philosophy in the 20^th century. Especially these methods influenced the development of existentialism, hermeneutics, and analytical philosophy as well as literary criticism and receptive theory.

Based on this concept, a general methodological principle of phenomenological research is emerging. It says: to study things as objectively existing, without considering that they are to us phenomena of our consciousness, is impossible. Things need to be studied considering that they exist only in the experience of the perceiving consciousness (Moran, 2013). With this kind of methodological attitude, in the process of phenomenological research it is necessary to refuse to contemplate everything that is not part of the experience of the perceiving consciousness. In the understanding of the work of art and in the approaches to it, phenomenological critics are fundamentally different from structuralists. Phenomenologists overcome the methodological omnivorousness of structuralism, emphasizing the spirituality of a work of art and pointing to its human dimension.

Another point, that is particularly interesting for us, is the development of the concept of dystopia from the historical and philosophical point of view. If we closely look at the characteristic features of the modern-time dystopias it will not be difficult to find if not the same, but very similar in the utopian/dystopian projects of antiquity. Naturally, the roots of utopias lie in the historical reality of ancient times. There has never been a clear division of idealized living of the past and idealized (utopist) living of the future. The human being is not limited to the present; the human being is historical in his or her essence. Mankind retains the past; the past is integral part for all human beings. The consciousness of the historicity of human existence as a cross-cutting motive of Hegelian philosophy has had a significant impact on the understanding of tradition in philosophy (Hegel, 1999). Another important thing is to pay attention to the text and comprehend whether the author supports the ideas expressed in his or her work.

Purpose

The aim of the research is to apply phenomenological approach to the analysis of a literary work and study the manifestations of consciousness as reflections of sociocultural concepts within the horizons of readers’ cultural level as well as look at the development of utopia and dystopia in historical and literary context. One of the tasks of phenomenology is to describe not only regular things pertinent to day-to-day life, but also people’s intentions and the way these intentions are manifested in different context. The existence of a human being in biological aspect is rather unstable. This is the reason to explore both the human essence and human development in sociocultural aspect first. It is obvious that in present day world solving of economic, political, or technological issues is highly improbable without solving of existential issues first.

Methodology

The methodological basis of the current piece is the woks of foreign and domestic scientists devoted to the issues of phenomenology and literary perception. Phenomena are not the matter of subjection to causative connections; they are connected to the units of meaning. Method of phenomenology is a descriptive method: consciousness cannot be restricted or limited to a cognitive form, thus the importance lies with the choice of language and wording, as well as their capability of revealing and relaying the greatness of consciousness through description.

Analysis of Publications

Each stage of the development of philosophical thought was characterized by its own accents, which were placed under the influence of cultural and religious norms, as well as numerous social aspects. For example, for the ancient period of philosophical thought, it was characteristic to pay attention to the problems of the formation of the principles of philosophical knowledge; it was especially important to understand the differences between "philosophy" and "sophistry". However, all the emphasis shifted after the establishment of Christianity. During this period philosophy mainly dwelt on its role in apologetics. Particular attention was paid to the concepts of realism, nominalism, and conceptualism. In the Renaissance, a new worldview was formed with a shift in emphasis on the principles of philosophical thinking: humanism, anthropocentrism, pantheism. Regarding the philosophy of modern times, the development of science has determined the relevance of the epistemological problems of this period. The basic principle of the new European philosophy is the principle of Scientism. Two lines of cognition – sensualism and rationalism, which in their turn gave impetus to the development of two basic methods of cognition – inductive (Baconian empiricism) and deductive (rationalism of Descartes). Modern western philosophic tendencies are numerous and far from being homogeneous. There is no single and comprehensive concept, thus distinctive features of different philosophies have their own advantageous peculiarities. Some scholars and philosophers accentuate ideas based on scientific point of view, while others stress out aesthetics of philosophy and its morality. When we talk about presence of different philosophic approaches in the current scientific field, it is worth saying that among the descendants of Vikings and Saxon tribes prevails the analytical philosophy, where the main focus is on the linguistic analysis, whereas in Germany, where old philosophic traditions are still strong, it is phenomenology and hermeneutics that reign in the realm of metaphysics. Phenomenology is one of the most influential systems of philosophy in the 20^th century. In the course of its development phenomenology greatly influenced existentialism and hermeneutics; phenomenological approach is used in such scientific fields as psychology, sociology, ethics, aesthetics, literary science etc. Phenomenology is tightly connected and strongly associated with such names as Heidegger, Husserl, Rieker, Schutz, etc.

As early as the 1920s, Richards (1929) was keenly interested in reading reactions to a fiction text, having devoted the book "Practical Criticism: A Study of Literary Judgment" to the study of this problem. The efforts of A. Richards did not receive support – at that time European and American literary studies were passionate about psychoanalysis and Marxism. Later other ideas and thoughts appeared, such as new criticism and structuralism. But it was precisely the latter that in many respects provoked a sharpening of interest in receptive criticism and in reader reactions because the other methodologies that focus exclusively on the text were practically not interested in the reader and the author. It is in this connection that there is reason to talk about the dehumanization of literature by similar methodologies. This dehumanization of theirs was noticed by phenomenological and receptive critics, who contrasted their understanding of creativity with various text-centric approaches to it. Interpreting the text as an act of consciousness and connecting the readership to the text attracted the attention of representatives of various scientific schools, not only from the field of philosophy and literature, but psychology and a few others. Psychoanalysts sought communication between the author and the reader, manifesting on an unconscious level and based on a community of suppressed drives. It is worth saying that such a point of view could not be viable for a longer period. According to Szollosy (2002) a human being cannot be defined only as Freudian-minded, as far as a human being is much more than a mechanical apparatus set in motion by springs of instinct. The contrast between "nature" and the human "spirit" goes back to Immanuel Kant (1966). Developing the ideas of the latter, Husserl (1907) and Heidegger (2008) defined the world as a "system of meanings", and a human being as the creator of these meanings. The latter, therefore, ceased to be not only a simple bearer of the naturalistic qualities that positivists concentrated on, and not even a "thinking subject", slightly distinguished from the animal world – a human being became virtually the only (the existence of the God was presently out of the question) Creator of the world.

Returning to the idea of "reading reactions to the fictional text" we may also mention that pragmatics has become popularized in few past decades. This theoretical construct (like most things in modern humanities sciences) has more than one definition, however it is more or less general understanding that it means that interlocutors should possess some deductive abilities to differentiate between what was literary said and what was really meant (Grice, 1989; Searle, 1979). This approach is widely used while analyzing a literary text and is rather logical for analyzing modern literary pieces, which belong to mass literature. We would like to back up Lotman’s (1991) idea who, – in his turn, referring to Veselovsky and his comment about literature of Romanticism being far from average people thus glorifying exceptionally immaculate characters – noble aristocrats; literature where all the roads led to the castle away from commoners and their mundane life, – said that mass literature shifts the accents from protagonist being distant and unreachable to the one close and understandable. Modern literature has transformed placing in the center human being – a hero easily recognized and accepted by others. According to pragmatics readers can not only perceive the literal wording of the text, but understand the ideas buried deep down, basing on their recognition level, on the concepts recognized and processed by their consciousness. Another aspect which has become clear in the past 50 years is that literature (mass literature) is the integral part of mass culture and according to Lotman (1991) mass culture is one of the most acute problems of modern sociology and directly impacts theoretical constructs of researchers who conduct investigations the sphere of modern art and literature is not an exception. The ideas of the German school of reader reactions were developed in the writings of the American literary critic Fish, in particular in his works "Surprised by Sin: The Reader in Paradise Lost" (Fish, 1967) and "Literature in the Reader: Affective Stylistics" (Fish, 1970). According to Fish the disappearance of a work in the reader’s reactions to it is exactly what should happen in criticism as well, because this is exactly what happens in the reading process. Everything in literature (content, form, genre, system of images, etc.) is subordinated to the reader’s reaction and is crowned with it.

Statement of basic materials

The support of literary criticism on phenomenological philosophic thought and phenomenological approach gave rise to an original theory of a work and an original methodology for working with it. The universal phenomenological theory of literature is based on the notion of a work that is polemic with respect to Heidegger’s (2008) hermeneutics: a work is not an independent, self-contained, and objectively given aesthetic object, supposedly hiding the fullness of meanings in itself, the work is a phenomenon of consciousness, the product and its result activities. In other words, a work is not a thing, it is a subjective phenomenon generated by an individual consciousness and without taking this fact into account, and it may not be considered as a subject of study.

The subjects of consciousness, whose activity in phenomenological criticism is associated with the constitution of a work, that is 1) the author, who is the carrier of the creative consciousness, and 2) the reader, who is the carrier of the perceiving consciousness. So, if a work is studied as a phenomenon of author’s consciousness, then it explores how the world is the consciousness of the author and what kind of processing the author’s consciousness undergoes in an act of artistic activity. In this case, the acts of author’s consciousness are studied, which ensure the creation of a literary work, such as fantasizing, imagination, recollection, imitation, perception of the world and self-perception (Kalmykova, Kharchenko, & Mysan, 2021). However, if the work is studied as a phenomenon of a reader’s consciousness, then it explores how the work is presented to the reader, what processing or interpretation it undergoes in the act of reading, and what happens to the reader himself or herself. In this case, we study the totality of acts of consciousness that provides artistic perception. In this regard, we talk about aesthetic reaction and identification with the character and notions presented in a literary work. The basic principles of receptive criticism were outlined by Derrida in his numerous works. The scholar like many deconstructivists, does not recognize the stability of textual meaning (Morris, 2007). But if deconstructivists consider the reason for this to be the ambiguity of the text itself, the receptive critics argue that this instability is determined by the variety of reader reactions to the same text. In order to gain some firmness in the perception of the text and the judgment about it, the reader or critic begins to correlate its content or meaning with the real world, not noticing that the text is losing its purely literary meaning. The work of art, according to deconstructivists, does not reflect the real world, instead it competes with it. The text occupies an intermediate position between the world of real things and the world of the experience of the readership. The scholar believes that due to this the act of reading is therefore a process in which the reader seeks to attach the vibrating structure of the text to either one or another meaning. For Fish, on the other hand, it is extremely important to identify the meaning in the work. He does not support various relativistic concepts of meaning. He reckons that the main intellectual, or in other words emotional, basis for skepticism in the field of modern literary theory, is the assumption that all knowledge is relative (Fish, 1970). Any text cannot be interpreted or perceived in isolation; such interpretation can take place only along with the perspective that was given to it by the author of the text. Any other procedure will no longer be an interpretation, but authorship (Fish, 1970). It is worth noting that while supporting and substantiating the argument about subjectivity of the perception and interpretation of a literary text, phenomenologists nevertheless pay attention to socially significant points relevant to art, such as ethical and moral aspect and they stress out the humanistic orientation of art itself. They emphasize the communicative nature of literature, the medium of which is the "dialogue" of consciousnesses (between a writer and a reader, a text and a reader, between different eras in the development of consciousness). With the rise of totalitarian societies in the 20^th century utopias and dystopias received a lot attention from readership. Leaving aside profound works by Orwell and Haksli a great number of authors tried to follow this path and create their New Brave Worlds. Margaret Atwood created her Republic of Gilead that overthrew the United States Government and established and cemented tyranny in patriarchal society: that society was characterized by subjugation of women and complete eradication of emotions. Published in 1985 "The Handmaid’s Tale" was a reaction to the process developing in the western societies – rise of feminism. The novel was an illustration of the fight for individuality and independence. In 2017 the TV series with the same name was aired, in its turn covering even broader spectrum of inequalities of the modern time, such as suppressing of will, gender inequalities, one-size-fits-all policy, depersonalization, etc. The issues of both physical and mental suppression were raised in a number of other literary works, namely Delirium by Lauren Oliver. In this novel the author gives readers the opportunity to get to another dystopian society whose main problem is disease – Delirium nervosa. To fight this disease is a paramount task, because otherwise imposing of total control will be challenging. Emotions give freedom and it is hardly deniable that love is one of the strongest emotions: "Safe, and free from pain. Things weren’t always as good as they are now. In school we learned that in the old days, the dark days, people didn’t realize how deadly a disease love was" (Oliver, 2011, p. 24).

From the early childhood children are taught that love is dangerous and painful. From early childhood children are preprogrammed that emotions are destructive. Even sympathy requires punishment. In this idyllic religious society people live without emotions under total control out of duty. This society clearly resembles some modern religious communities and thus provokes readers’ recognition. Arranged marriages are from being a novelty, however this novel introduces the reader to the idea of a marriage arranged by the Government: "The evaluation is the last step, so I can get paired. In the coming months the evaluators will send me a list of four or five approved matches. One of them will become my husband after I graduate college (assuming I pass all my boards)" (Oliver, 2011, p. 31).

Girls (and boys, too) are placed in inhumane conditions when they have to go through governmental evaluation to be married with the sole purpose of having a marriage without emotions as well as the whole unemotional life, because government will make sure the residents remain emotion-free after the procedure. The people from this society, like people from Gilead, live on a secluded territory, which is cordoned with electrified fences and leaving this Paradise can and most probably will cost you your life if you ever decide to leave this haven. Of course there is a great amount of propaganda and residents are sure that that other world is a complete failure: "My mother, sister, and I had lived closer to the border, and I was amazed and terrified by all the winding, darkened streets, which smelled like garbage and old fish" (Oliver, 2011, p 34).

However, despite this totalitarian society Oliver lets us know, that there is Resistance and there is fight to crash this order and if you want to fight there is the chance to win this battle and there is the place where you can find an alternative. When we talk about "The Giver" by Lowry we are not sure that the alternative exists, we may only hope that it is somewhere there. The novel by Lois Lowry "The Giver" is a bright example of dystopian literary fiction, the characters of the novel live in a highly structured society, with a number of phenomena peculiar to discourse of a totalitarian society. The characters do not discern obvious inconsistencies within this society that contradict common sense. They do not have moral limits; their ethical and moral codes are extremely perverted and lack human characteristics. In the dystopian society of "The Giver" one of the main is the phenomenon of a human being’s dehumanization.

In modern literature there is one theme that, one way or another and to a different extent, is always present in almost every literary piece – individual interpretation of social, ethical and political issues of postmodernism. Introduced in a greatly detailed way Lois Lowry’s "The Giver" introduces the readership to a non-existent, utopian, or dystopian community that lives in unknown location and in time which is unknown as well. The intent of the author is to reach to the readers’ consciousness and form within their consciousness an understanding that this dystopian form of ruling that governs The Giver’s society is umpteen times worse than all contemporary forms of existing governments. There is a real unreal world of perfect control, sameness and alleged happiness, however from the early childhood every member of the dystopian society starts hearing about "Elsewhere": "Elsewhere that they were both sure existed. They knew it would be a very difficult journey" (Lowry, 2003, p. 71).

In the beginning the phenomenon of Elsewhere is not relevant for the characters, as far as it is something hypothetical and ethereal, while functioning within the dystopian society is what really matters. However, in the end, Elsewhere becomes the place of last resort. The phenomenon of Elsewhere is crucial for the readers’ consciousness; it signifies the hope for a new start, for a new life after escaping from living in compliance with totalitarian schemes and inhuman dogmas. This phenomenon is recognized by the reader due to a number of facts, primarily because of prior exposure to dystopian texts and already existing concepts in his or her consciousness, as well as because of the notion of hope, of visceral and intuitive emotions, which are natural for every human being. While the society of "The Giver" is dystopian, Elsewhere is a phenomenon of utopia; the reader perceives it as an opposition to the existing status quo. Elsewhere, which could probably be our own world, is hardly reachable for a character from a dystopia. The phenomenon of lack of appreciation for what one has, the warning that progress is not always for the better are concepts recognizable by a modern reader who lives under the current political and socio-cultural conditions and historical background of the 20^th and 21^st centuries:

The Giver shrugged. "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 differences". He thought for a moment. "We gained control of many things. But we had to let go of others". (Lowry, 2003, p. 79)

The freedom of choice, which was not really an option for so many nations in the 20^th century, continues to be an important phenomenon in the 21^st century as well. This philosophical and ethical issue found reflection in literature and as a result in receptive literary science. The phenomenon of Sameness, which was widely applied in the countries of post Soviet Bloc, finds recognition in the minds of present-day reader. Soviet Sameness and Colorlessness are still the subjects of investigation for scientist that hold their research in different fields, ranging from philosophy to psychology to linguistics. On the other hand, the one-size-fits-all policy is still popular within multitudes despite the experience of the past days and collapsed/failed states. Populism is one of the things that lead to establishment of totalitarian states. People do not opt for decision-making as it may result in difficulties; they opt for promises the "ever-good" will be delivered to them by someone. In Lowry’s society, not having the possibility to choose the main character craves for one: "Well…" Jonas had to stop and think it through. "If everything’s the same, then there aren’t any choices! I want to wake up in the morning and decide things! A blue tunic, or a red one?" (Lowry, 2003, p. 82).

The popularity of literary utopias rises due to totalitarian discourses that are getting more and more recognized among the readerships. Totalitarian mode, compliant societies, sublimation, and unfulfilled hopes are becoming an integral part of human consciousness nowadays. According to Foucault (1990) the purpose of any political or governmental entity is to enforce subjugation within a society or group; to ensure dominance of a force. It is difficult to disagree that a definite level of control over a human being can be achieved through the control of sexual urges and suppressing sexuality. For illustration we may turn to Lowry’s The Giver where at a definite age all the members of society start taking pills in order not to feel sexual desires. On the one hand it may sound ridiculous, but on the other, as it had been mentioned before the control over sexuality gives opportunity to control the whole societies, as far as without sexuality human beings become docile, suggestible, and thus easily controllable.

Another way to achieve control is through the lies. The dystopian society lived by the great number of rules. One of these rules was that no one could lie. It relates to the precision of language as well; if a person lies his or her language is not precise, thus he or she breaks yet another rule. Moreover, lying meant that a society member broke the rules and the society lost control over this individual. However, when Jonas (the protagonist of the story) was assigned to be the next Receiver, he receives a list of instructions, one of which allowed telling lies at his discretion: "Now Jonas had a thought that he had never had before. This new thought was frightening. What if other – adults – had, upon becoming Twelves, received in their instructions the same terrifying sentence? What if they had all been instructed: You may lie?" (Lowry, 2003, p. 93).

All the members of the dystopian society lived under total control; all aspects of their lives were controlled by the others, they received their routines and lived according to the plan drawn by others. They were told when to choose their careers, and those careers were chosen for them by others. They were told whom to marry, they were given appropriate children, and their lives did not belong to them. Dehumanization of a human being also happens through the name deprivation: The author intends to connect with the readership, to reach the consciousness of the readers and to instill notions of inhuman practices that are pertinent to a dystopian society.

They were arranged by their original numbers, the numbers they had been given at birth. The numbers were rarely used after the Naming. But each child knew his number, of course. Sometimes parents used them in irritation at a child’s misbehavior, indicating that mischief made one unworthy of a name. Jonas always chuckled when he heard a parent, exasperated, call sharply to a whining toddler, "That’s enough, Twenty-three!". (Lowry, 2003, p. 107)

As it had been mentioned before, having a historical background of totalitarian states of the 20^th century, and having literary experience of main utopias and dystopias the reader can quickly perceive the phenomena of stripping a human being from his or her personality and achieving the sameness of all the members of a society, thus dehumanizing the human nature. These ideas are easily recognized in the countries of Post Soviet Bloc as far as very similar things had been introduced into the real life of those generations. "The Giver" as many other samples of dystopian literature to some extent exploits the ideas firstly mentioned in "1984" by Orwell; the utopist idea of building a utopian society with absolute sameness and equality proved to be futile, however still enticing even for today generation. At some point intentions of building an egalitarian society turn into building a totalitarian regime, where human beings are dehumanized, and the value of life equals close to nothing. Yet another phenomenon is dehumanizing a human being through destroying the abundance of language. It is worth remembering Orwell’s’(1949): "Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past" (p. 47).

Newspeak the official language of Oceania (Orwell, 1949), was created to limit the freedom of thought; the main characteristic features of Newspeak were restricted grammar of shortness of vocabulary. People who used Newspeak eventually started thinking in very simple terms and all the meaning were extremely simplified. There was no possibility of double thinking, which leads to the idea of "precision of language" (Lowry, 2003) in the Giver. And even though the dystopian society of the Giver has not invented the official language, they were not too far from trying to restrict thinking and apply thought control within the community. However, according to this literary text, the most important factor that plays a key role in dehumanization is memory loss or rather stripping of the memory. The dystopian society of the Giver has no recollection of feelings, colors and, in fact, emotions. They have a generation long memory. "It’s much the same. Everyone in the community has one-generation memories like those…" (Lowry, 2003, p. 59).

The dystopian society of the Giver have no recollection of the distant past, thus they are absolutely deprived of everything transcendental, visceral and intuitive. These people are presented to the reader as totally unthinking slaves of societal rules, routines and structures. So important Freudian and Meinrik’s dreaming, and thus sub consciousness, are impertinent for the community in question. A dehumanized human being (a human being without memory, tradition and past) is controllable and suggestible. According to Hegel, the human is a historical being. Memory and connection to the past is of utmost importance for a human being and for human essence, it is crucial for the development of a man’s spirit. Thus, the search for memory is the search for one’s own spirit and identity both as a personal and religious and philosophical category.

Originality

The originality lies in exploring the dystopian society of a piece belonging to literary fiction in the aspect of phenomenology, and underlying connections with existential ideas. The characteristic features of the utopia in question are dehumanized human beings and the (one) human, whose spirit controls the magnitudes. The human due to his individuality, spirit, human nature, and identity dominates society – affronts and challenges scripted norms and gains the upper hand by virtue of existential cognition.

Conclusions

The fact that humankind can perceive and understand the past demonstrates our profound historicity in terms of our existence and proves that we are not constricted with temporal nature. Without a doubt in the present-day science most spheres are interconnected, it is especially true, when one talks about the so-called social sciences and humanities. The societal structures find reflection not only in philosophy, but in religion, psychology, education and the last but not the least in literature and as a result in literary science and critique. One of the purposes of a literary work is to expose ideological discourses and phenomena, which in their turn may form several consequential discourses. Such exposure leads to interaction between the text itself and the reader: between the consciousness of the author and the consciousness of the reader. This interaction eventually produces new phenomena. On the other hand, and it should be noted, that the level of readers’ anticipation is of utmost importance under the concepts of literary perception. The author tends to raise urgent problems characteristic to this or that society or epoch. Among topics and discourses pertinent to 20^th and 21^st century – humanization and dehumanization, individualism and functioning in the society, philosophical, ethical, and aesthetical issues. Totalitarian discourse became one of the most researched aspects of political discourses in the realm of fiction and the most important motif of literary dystopias; the concept or phenomenon of control as a means of totalitarism in modern societies is easily recognized by the readership. However, it should be noted that such literary texts are not least important in terms of exploration of such categories as existentialism, freedom, freedom of choice, etc. The reality is understood not through rigid institutions, political or social structures, but through the human being, through his or her ability to prevail in all spheres. "The Giver" is the celebration of the human Spirit, the manifestation of human supremacy.

In literary studies, as well as in literature itself, phenomenology is transformed into the reader’s aesthetic response, which depends on the level of expectations. It would be improper to claim that the reader does not take part in the creation of a literary work due to his or her input. For phenomenology language among many others is an important tool of both expressing and reaching consciousness and this tool is used on several levels in a literary work, primarily for establishing phenomena in readers’ aesthetic.

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Szollosy, M. (2002). Surviving Our Paradoxes: The Psychoanalysis and Literature of Uncertainty. Retrieved from https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/3440/1/251463.pdf (in English)

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Szollosy M. Surviving Our Paradoxes: The Psychoanalysis and Literature of Uncertainty. 2002. URL: https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/3440/1/251463.pdf

А. О. МУНТЯН^1*, І. В. ШПАК^2*

^1*Дніпровський національний університет залізничного транспорту імені академіка В. Лазаряна (Дніпро, Україна), ел. пошта muntonya@gmail.com, ORCID 0000-0001-8375-4067

^2*Дніпровський національний університет залізничного транспорту імені академіка В. Лазаряна (Дніпро, Україна), ел. пошта shpirinka@gmail.com, ORCID 0000-0002-4305-4987