I bought this novel not long after it was published in 2005
but I didn’t get very far with it back then, mainly because I didn’t take to
its chatty narrative style. I picked it up again last month because it was our
local Book Club choice, and I was very glad that I was prompted to revisit it.
The overtly superficial approach hides a story with a profound and deeply
unsettling context. The main characters, all young, seem content with their lot
despite their isolated, institutional upbringing and a full awareness that
their future lives will be short and probably painful. It is difficult to
believe that these young people would not have rebelled, and tried to escape from theor situation, but
I think Ishiguro’s point is that human beings are often passive and accepting,
and do not think enough about the world they find themselves in or how to
change it. There are echoes of this in The Remains of the Day where servants
provide an underclass in 1930s England that do not question their position in society.
Stephens, the butler at Darlington Hall, puts up no defence to the ribbing he
gets from the obnoxious friends of his employer, Lord Darlington, and does not let himself comment on their fascist plots. He is so tied to his role that he is prepared
to supress his affection for the new housekeeper, who ends up looking elsewhere
for romance. The main characters in Never Let Me Go are even prepared to
die.
We could dismiss some of the uncomfortable truths of The
Remains of the Day by saying that the 1930s was a long time ago and we know
better now. But Never Let Me Go is set in the 1990s, a point that
confused me at first because I assumed that its dystopian setting had to sometime
in the future. I think Ishiguro was pointing out that despite changes in society and education we don’t necessarily know
better. We may not be as well-informed about what goes on around us as we
think we are. He was implying, I believe, that we all have a responsibility to find
out, and to question, how our fellow human beings live their lives, and to care
for each other. We should never let each other go.
This was a very thought-provoking read, and I can see why it
was stated of Ishiguro when he won the Nobel Prize for Literature that ‘he has
uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world.’
