Kazuo Ishiguro, Never Let Me Go

Ana-Karina Schneider (Lucian Blaga University of Sibiu)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.09: English Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary Britain , 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Kerry Myler (Newman University), Jenni Ramone (The Nottingham Trent University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 2004

Places

Japan (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

Never Let Me Go (2004), Kazuo Ishiguro's sixth novel, resumes the author's preoccupation with memory and its affective imbrications, with the combined means of science-fiction and the moral parable. Its first-person narrator-protagonist, Kathy H, like most of the supporting cast, is a clone designed for organ donation and, in the interim, a carer (or nurse) to other, already donating, clones; her narrative details her childhood and early adulthood in a language that is evidently inscribed by her condition. Yet, rather than engage critically with the ethics of genetic engineering or the condition of clones, the book normalises its protagonists and concentrates within their predetermined lifespan the experiences of a lifetime, f…

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2727 words

Citation: Schneider, Ana-Karina. "Never Let Me Go". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 September 2007 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=20410, accessed 26 November 2024.]

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