How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
The box ended up at the back of a closet, shoved behind some old bags and bundles. There it sat, unnoticed, year after year, until its time arrived, and the lock quietly clicked open. (The Instructions.14)
Some things should be forgotten—embarrassing first dates, traumatic trips to the dentist, and so on. But a box that contains instructions for how to escape your city that becomes a death trap once the supplies run out? Yeah, that might be something you'd want to remember.
Quote #2
More and more, her grandmother's mind seemed caught in the past. She could explain the rules of pebblejacks, which she'd last played when she was eight, or tell you what happened at the Singing when she was twelve, or who she'd danced with at the Cloving Square Dance when she was sixteen, but she would forget what had happened the day before yesterday. (4.19)
Forgetting the past is no good, but living entirely in the past isn't good either. Granny's condition is familiar to people all over, whether they've got dementia or another psychological or mental condition brought on by age or an accident. Like a lot of folks struggling with mental deterioration, she'll latch on to some facts but not others. She ends up obsessing over the object her grandfather had said he'd lost, but she forgets to look out for her own grandchild (Poppy, who just loves to get into trouble).
Quote #3
"They say the Builders made the city. But who made the Builders? Who made us? I think the answer must be somewhere outside of Ember." (4.92)
Clary raises some good questions here. Everyone in Ember knows that the Builders made their city, but the Builders must have come from somewhere, too. So must've the citizens of Ember (because as far as we know, the Builders only built stuff, not people). It's the classic "where did we come from?" question, but with a unique twist.
Quote #4
She remembered other years, when she had stood with her parents, too short to see the Songmaster's signal, too short to see anything but people's backs and legs, and waited for the first note to thunder out. She felt her heart move at that moment, every year. (16.40)
The Singing is such an important event in the lives of Ember's citizens that everyone remembers it and has emotional associations with it. For Lina, those associations include memories of her parents, now dead.
Quote #5
But suddenly, with a flash of joy, he remembered: he didn't have to wait for the lights to come back on. He had what no citizen of Ember had ever had before—a way to see in the dark. (17.11)
Old habits die hard, since you basically have to retrain your brain to override past memories of how to operate. This is true for Doon as much as anyone else in Ember, since they've spent their whole lives without portable lights, and it was mere days ago that Doon and Lina discovered the candles and matches that the Builders had stashed away safely.
Quote #6
"They're expecting us!" said Lina. "Well, they wrote this a long time ago," Doon said. "The people who put it here must all be dead by now." "That's true. But they wished us good fortune. It makes me feel as if they're watching over us." (19.4-6)
Nothing like a message from dead people to make you feel connected to the past. In this case, it's a sign from the Builders, welcoming the refugees from Ember to the path to their new home.
Quote #7
I have put everything I can into my one suitcase—clothes, shoes, a good wind-up clock, some soap, an extra pair of glasses. Bring no books, they said, and no photographs. We have been told to say nothing, ever again, about the world we come from. (20.3)
This account from our mysterious old lady journal writer tells how the first citizens of Ember were to carry nothing that conveyed any of Earth's history or a sense that there's a whole world outside Ember. That must've made packing a difficult task. No books? No movies? No photographs? How would people remember their lives?
Quote #8
I don't know yet which one of these gentlemen I'll be matched with. We are all strangers to one another. They planned it this way; they said there would be fewer memories between us. They want us to forget everything about the lives we've led and the places we've lived. The babies must grow up with no knowledge of a world outside, so that they feel no sorrow for what they have lost. (20.7)
Again, we learn from journal-writer-lady that the people coming to populate Ember are being encouraged to forget what they know of the world. This is so that they won't mention it to the babies who will grow up to be Ember's first native-born citizens. If these young folks knew there was an outside world, they might go seeking it… and it likely wouldn't be safe for them.
Quote #9
Absently, Doon dug his finger into the ground, which was soft and crumbly. "But what was the disaster that happened in this place?" he said. "It doesn't look ruined to me."
"It must have happened a long, long time ago," said Lina. "I wonder if people still live here." (20.30-31)
Does every disaster leave a trace? The aftermath of a forest fire looks different than that of an earthquake. What if the disaster the Builders feared happened so long ago that its effects are no longer visible? Or worse, what if its effects were never visible in the first place, like radiation from a nuclear bomb? How would Lina and Doon have any clue whether the ground was safe for them to walk on, the water safe for them to drink, the fruit safe for them to eat? Having zero connection to the past is leaving them pretty clueless right now.
Quote #10
"Oh, our city… Our city is at the bottom of a hole!" She gazed down through the gulf, and all of what she had believed about the world began to slowly break apart. "We were underground," she said. "Not just the Pipeworks. Everything!" (20.58)
Yes, Shmoopers, this is one giant light bulb moment: realizing that everything you'd ever been told about your world and your past was a lie. Kinda like Neo's many "Whoa" moments in The Matrix. What do you do when you learn this kind of stuff? How do you put the pieces back together so you can live your life? This happens right at the end of the book, so we're not sure entirely what Lina and Doon decide about how to interpret their world and its history. But still: whoa.