Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro
1) Summary: The novel itself is broken up into three parts, mirroring the elements of plot by doing so. Although the events of this novel are not in chronological order, they still follow these trends. The story follows the lives of a three young children through adulthood, Kathy (main character), Ruth, and Tommy. All three attend a school known as Hailsham, a boarding school in 1990’s England, which essentially raises children to become Donors; as in people who will donate their organs to those in need in the future, which will lead to their “completion” eventually. The first part of the novel introduces the audience to the relationships between our three main characters. Kathy and Ruth have a strange and somewhat competitive relationship, which then goes a bit sour when Ruth begins dating Tommy since Kathy harbors strong feelings for Tommy.
As the plot begins to pick up we see this tension grow, and in part two, they are now teenagers who have finally begun to feel the weight of their future. While up to this point the novel has only presented a bleak and sad future for Donors, there is now hope. With the possibility of deferrals (students can defer donations for three years if they are truly in love), there is a chance for happiness. However, this whole time the relationship between Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy begin to falter as they grow up. This leads to part three, where Kathy becomes a Carer upon request, a person who cares for the Donors. We are further in the future now; Ruth’s health is deteriorating after a poor response to her first donation, and Kathy had chosen to become her Carer. Their relationship begins to heal when they go out on a trip, bringing Tommy along as well. Old wounds are opened up when Ruth admits to keeping the two apart, and in hopes of redeeming herself she gives them the address to Madame, and urges them to try and defer. Shortly after she completes after her final donation.
When Tommy and Kathy go to see Madame, they also meet Miss Emily, but they are devastatingly told that deferrals do not exist. But they also explain why they were raised the way they were at Hailsham, and why there was such a stress on the arts. The whole time they were only meant to prove to society that these “clones” were real children, who deserved a more “humane” treatment before reaching the ends of their lives. Society ultimately opted against this, and Hailsham was closed. After such a shocking discovery, hope is really all gone. The novel ends with Tommy’s completion, as well as Kathy beginning her own donations soon, where she will complete as well.
2) In my opinion, the theme of the novel is deception; about how we grow up being deceived and it is our choice to either accept it or question it. We watch the transformation of three characters that essentially spend their whole lives being raised in a world that treated them like human’s on the outside, while in reality they are literally walking donations for the “normal” people.They are fooled into thinking they were actually cared about by most people, which in some ways is good and bad. No one really wants to be told that people only care about them for their vital organs, or that eventually you will die from this. By being fooled they are being sheltered; but on the other hand, the impact of realizing the truth is far harsher. Which is what we see when Kathy and Tommy are told that deferrals do not exist. “All children have to be deceived if they are to grow up without trauma.” This quote illustrates the main argument for lying essentially, but what most people fail to recognize is that you are only prolonging the pain. This novel’s controversial theme portrays both sides to this argument of lying for “protection” by showing the effects directly upon those who are deceived.
3) I found the tone of this novel to be somewhat imbalanced, because our narrator Kathy is looking back on her life in a mature and realistic way, while also capturing the innocence of her youth. The tone comes off as a more somber realism since from the beginning we understand that they will all most likely die, or “complete”. So right from the get go we understand that their lives will not be long. “It was like when you make a move in chess and just as you take your finger off the piece, you see the mistake you’ve made, and there’s this panic because you don’t know yet the scale of disaster you’ve left yourself open to.” There is a certain sadness in understanding what is happening to you, and what your future looks like.“Your life must now run the course that’s been set for it.” The ironically gentle bluntness of Kazuo Ishiguro’s writing allows the reader to ease into the ideas he presents his readers. “You need to remember that. If you’re to have decent lives, you have to know who you are and what lies ahead of you, every one of you.” There is a balance between truth, deception, and innocence in what Ishiguro writes, which captures the realistic tone of the novel.
4) Literary Devices -
Point of View: The first person narrative of Kathy allows the reader to have insight on her perspective, especially since it is told from a future perspective as she looks back on her life. It is centered on events pertaining to Kathy, so we understand the events unfolding from her view only. “Because maybe, in a way, we didn’t leave it behind nearly as much as we might once have thought. Because somewhere underneath, a part of us stayed like that: fearful of the world around us, and no matter how much we despised ourselves for it—unable quite to let each other go.”
Irony: The irony in the fact that they were raising these children “humanely” while knowing they would all die. They raised them to be “normal” or and to give them as much of a life as possible while they tried to hide the truth from them, and in the end society didn’t like this idea. Raising children to be “human” when all you really want is to eventually treat them like a temporary container for organs they need. “We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.”
Flashback: Kathy spends a majority of the novel explaining events that have happened in the past, and even when she reconnects with Ruth and Tommy she flashes back to moments growing up. This is central to showing where they are now, and where they used to be in life. How much has really changed, and also how much of their lives have really stayed the same. Also, in such a short life, you really only have your memories to think of when you know you won’t have a future. “Memory is quite central for me. Part of it is that I like the actual texture of writing through memory…”
Setting: The setting of Hailsham, a perfectly nice and beautiful school, is quite opposite to the future of these children. It is almost a picturesque place you’d imagine for boarding school, yet these students are there for a whole different purpose. It also represents a major part of Kathy’s life, and she often sees things which remind of Hailsham. “Driving around the country now, I still see things that will remind me of Hailsham. I might pass a corner of a misty field, or see part of a large house in the distance as I come down the side of a valley…I’ll think: ‘Maybe that’s it! I’ve found it! This actually is Hailsham.’ Then I see it’s impossible and I go on driving, my thoughts drifting elsewhere.”
Tragedy: Not only is it a tragedy that all of these characters face a certain death, we also watch a relationship pass and go twice. Kathy and Tommy had a chance to be happy had Ruth not kept them apart, and when they finally do reconnect, it’s too late and far too much time has been wasted.“That was the only time, as I stood there, looking at that strange rubbish, feeling the wind coming across those empty fields, that I started to imagine just a little fantasy thing, because this was Norfolk after all, and it was only a couple of weeks since I’d lost him. I was thinking about the rubbish, the flapping plastic in the branches, the shore-line of odd stuff caught along the fencing, and I half-closed my eyes and imagined this was the spot where everything I’d ever lost since my childhood had washed up, and I was now standing here in front of it, and if I waited long enough, a tiny figure would appear on the horizon across the field, and gradually get larger until I’d see it was Tommy, and he’d wave, maybe even call. The fantasy never got beyond that —I didn’t let it— and though the tears rolled down my face, I wasn’t sobbing or out of control. I just waited a bit, then turned back to the car, to drive off to wherever it was I was supposed to be.”
Symbolism: In a way the deferrals for donations represented more than just three years to be in love, it also represented the last shred of hope for our characters’ fairly bleak lives. It is the one thing that could bring them some final happiness before completion, but in the end it only creates greater pain. In our world we often hope for things that will never come, but still do because we feel it’s better to have hope than to not. The deferrals symbolize this idea of how we falsely cling to things that we shouldn’t. “I saw a new world coming rapidly. More scientific, efficient, yes. More cures for the old sicknesses. “A few minutes later, he said suddenly: ‘Kath, can we stop? I’m sorry, I need to get out a minute.’
…I could make out in the mid-distance, near where the field began to fall away, Tommy’s figure, raging, shouting, flinging his fists and kicking out. I caught a glimpse of his face in the moonlight, caked in mud and distorted with fury, then I reached for his failing arms and held on tight. He tried to shake me off, but I kept holding on, until he stopped shouting and I felt the fight go out of him. Then I realized he too had his arms around me. And so we stood together like that, at the top of the field, for what seemed like ages, not saying anything, just holding each other, while the wind kept blowing and blowing at us, tugging our clothes, and for a moment, it seemed like we were holding onto each other because that was the only way to stop us being swept away into the night.”
Conflict: The conflict between Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy often highlights the fractured childhood they had. It also creates a sense of reality that despite the reasons they exist, they are human beings who have the same emotions as everyone else. Even the teasing and bullying inflicted upon Tommy shows us just how real they were. “Then there were rumours almost every day of pranks that had been played on him. … I thought sooner or later someone would start saying it had gone too far, but it just kept on, and no one said anything.”
Indirect Characterization: We often understand the way the other characters are based on the responses by the others. We understand Ruth’s character as a somewhat selfish and self conscience person in the beginning because of the way she treated Kathy and the way she spoke, but at the end we see how much she regrets some of her choices as she desperately tries to fix them. “I’d like you to forgive me, but I don’t expect you to…The main thing is, I kept you and Tommy a part.”
Mood: The mood of this novel helps convey the somber tone; it takes on a serious and reflective mood as Kathy looks back on her life and what happened. “Memories, even your most precious ones, fade surprisingly quickly. But I don’t go along with that. The memories I value most, I don’t ever see them fading.”
Connotation/Diction: “We all complete. Maybe none of us really understand what we’ve lived through, or feel we’ve had enough time.” Certain words are often chosen with different connotations in order to soften the blow of their true meaning. Like how “complete” is used instead of “dead”. Complete insinuates an accomplished ending, like you finished with a productive product. While “dead” is obviously a bit morbid. The choice of words
Characterization -
1) Direct Characterization: “She had a squat, almost bulldoggy figure, and her odd black hair, when it grew; it grew upwards so it never covered her ears or chunky neck.” It was important for the reader to recognize along with the characters that Miss Emily, who is described in the quote, is different from the others. It is clear that Miss Emily isn’t like the rest of the guardians at Hailsham and the direct characterization allows us to see this.
“There was something about Tommy himself – the way he carried himself, the way he looked people in the face and talked in his open good natured way – that was different from before and which had in turn chanced the attitude of those around him.” This direct characterization allows the reader to visibly understand the change in Tommy, how he is no longer the temper – tantrum throwing young boy. Or that he simply managed to handle his emotions better.
- Indirect Characterization: “I was so desperate for her to realize I wasn’t with the girls behind me, and had had no part in whatever it was that had made her cross.” This indirect characterization of Ruth shows how much influence she had other those around her. It proves her personality is almost contagious, making those around her want to be her friend. She was a leader, and this quote shows that because Kathy was so desperate to be seen as no associated with the girls who had angered Ruth.
“’What do you know about it? You just don’t know anything, because you’ve been out of it for ages now! If you knew everything we’d found out, you wouldn’t dare say anything so daft!” This quote by Kathy just shows how for a long time she just wanted to be a part of something. She stood up for Ruth as a loyal friend would despite being snubbed. So she was desperately clinging to what she could, afraid she would lose it, while also proving her connection to Ruth would always be loyal, which is seen at the end of Ruth’s life again.
2) The diction from character to character does not change, but does change over time in the book as seen with the way Kathy describes her friends at the beginning of the novel and then at the end. For example, at the beginning of the novel Kathy looked down at Tommy, almost like she was a disappointed mother and the words chosen to describe Tommy were ones used to describe a temperamental toddler. By the end of the novel Tommy is more romantically and kindly regarded upon. So as the characters changed, so did the diction used to characterize them.
3) The protagonist, Kathy, was a static character because she changed from the beginning of the novel to the end. She clearly gained more insight into her life as she grew older, which is only natural when growing up. She began to see things clearer, but at the same time she still had so many unanswered questions. Even though she was able to find answers to some (and change because of those answers) at the end of the novel we understand that there are many things that could of happened, but didn’t because of what occurred.
4) I feel like I have learned a lot about Kathy since I was able to read about her childhood, and into adulthood. I understood how relateable Kathy’s emotions, even though she lived in a completely different world. There was a sense of confusion in Kathy that I could relate to. She was always putting her friends above her, so it makes sense why she would chose to be a carer. I felt like she was telling me her story, as if I were a stranger, and she was at the end of her life explaining what it was really like to be a Donor, and how she was just one story among many. There was one quote in the novel that I particularly liked, which was “The problem, as I see it, is that you’ve been told and not told. You’ve been told, but none of you really understand, and I dare say, some people are quite happy to leave it that way.” It sums up the story as a whole, and how you feel after reading it. Like you just barely have begun to grasp something, yet feel like you missed something else as well. It also captures the essence of how I feel about Kathy. There are times where I wanted to know why she did the things she did, and just when I thought I understood, I really didn’t, and had to just settle for what I could.
