Delirium Lauren Oliver Sparknotes

Annabelle Gaballah

May 12, 2023

Period 7

Title

Imagine a world with no love. A world where no one has feelings. A world where you are given a cure to stop loving others the second you turn 18. In Delirium by Lauren Oliver, the government has led everyone to believe deliria nervosa, or love, is an awful disease that was used to hurt people in the past. To keep everyone safe from deliria nervosa, at the age of 18, everybody must get the cure to prevent them from getting deliria nervosa and having feelings towards one another. Lena, the 18-year-old protagonist of the story, learns that deliria nervosa isn't actually so terrible after falling in love with an intelligent Invalid, Alex. Alex and Lena try to escape into The Wilds and her new life

At the beginning of the story, Lena explains to the readers what amor deliria nervosa is and how it affected the lives of many before the cure was developed. Lena then goes on to explain to the readers that she is about to have her evaluation to get the cure on her 18th birthday and how she will be paired up with her perfect match. During this moment, Lena states, “For a long time, they view it [love] as a good thing, something to be celebrated and pursued. Of course, that's one of the reasons it's so dangerous: ‘It affects your mind so that you cannot think clearly, or make rational decisions about your own well-being (That's symptom number twelve, listed in the amor deliria nervosa section of the twelfth edition of the safety, health, and happiness handbook, or the book of shh as we call it). Instead, people back then named other diseased-stress, heart diseases, anxiety, depression, hypertension, insomnia, and bipolar disorder- never realizing that these were in fact only symptoms that in the majority of cases would be traced back to the effect of amor deliria nervosa,”(3). This verifies that The Book of Shhh symbolizes power and control. The quotation reveals that The Book of Shhh and the ideas the book forced upon people controlled the way they thought about amor deliria nervosa. Control is defined as the capability to instruct or change

Toward the middle of the story, Lena found Raven's old Book of Shhh from when she lived in the fenced areas. The book brought up many memories for Lena and she started thinking about how she used to act and her past friendship with Hana. As Lena pulls out the book, she thinks to herself, “I pull the Book of Shhh onto my lap and flip through the pages. Even though the psalms and prayers are still familiar, the words look strange and their meanings are indecipherable: it's like returning somewhere you haven't been since you were a child, and finding everything smaller and disappointing… It seems impossibly, unbelievably long ago when I could sit in my room with carpet, when [Hana and I] would spend days messing around, doing nothing in each other's company. I didn't realize the privilege that was: to be bored with your best friend; to have time to waste,” (181). This displays that the Book of Shhh to Lena represents her past life. This passage illustrates Lena's past life when she finds the book in her bag, and it brings back the memories of her past life inside the fence. Lena could have stayed in her home on the “safe side” of the fence with her family, lived her life the way the government wanted, and followed The Book of Shhh. Instead, Lena decided to run away into “The Wilds” to live the life she wanted. Lena left her old life behind, but still had a constant reminder of her past