A few years ago I reviewed the 2005 film `The Island' and in my review I mentioned that the initial concept was stunning and that the direction that concept could have taken was really one of two ways; either a thinking man's intellectual film or a `no holds bar' action film. `The Island' was the later (and a really good one at that), but I really would have loved to see the concept fleshed out thoroughly to become something more engrossing and poignant.
The novel, `Never Let Me Go', by award winning author Kazuo Ishiguro is exactly what I was craving.
What I love so much about `Never Let Me Go' is that it is far less about the actual `cloning' concept and more or less an astute and extremely effecting portrait of adolescence and young adulthood. While yes, the main idea of humans being cloned for their eventual `donations' is always hanging over our heads as we read this engrossing novel (so engrossing that I read it in two sittings), it really becomes a secondary character, leaving open the way for the true meat of this novel to shine forth. This is a beautifully detailed (although never demandingly so) portrait of life and the coming of age realizations that come with it.
Told from the eyes of young Kathy (her protagonist reminds me of Benjamin Button in that she is really just our eyes into the lives of those around her), `Never Let Me Go' tells of three friends (Kathy, Ruth and Tommy) who grow up at somewhat of a boarding school named Hailsham. They grow up with the knowledge (although they rarely understand completely) that they have a specific course in life to follow. After they complete their school they will start their training to become carers (somewhat like nurses) before they get their notice that their donations will begin, where their bodies will serve the greater good of society, or humans.
After that they wait to complete, or die.
What Ishiguro's novel so marvelously does is create a sense of normalcy that is something completely unexpected and ultimately more moving. One might think that a concept like this would be ripe with `oh no we are going to die', thus making this something rather one-note and distancing it from the reader. Instead of placing divisions between these `clones' and the reader, Ishiguro makes each of the characters human. Instead of focusing on their impending doom (it is always there, but never the focal point) it focuses on their present life. They form friendships, relationships, aspirations, loyalties; everything that you and I form. They form attachments to songs, they enjoy visiting the city, they enjoy intimacies with one another. Ishiguro makes them just like you and me, and so when they are forced to face their mortality it doesn't feel like something far fetched or inhuman. Their eventual demise feels like a natural and heartbreaking death of a friend or relative because, thanks to Ishiguro's brilliant writing, these characters are not clones but humans.
You can feel it as if it were you going through the pain.
I also wanted to make mention of the writing style used here. I really found this commendable because of the small detail used to really take you inside the minds of these characters in each stage of their life. I initially found the writing to feel slightly amateurish and really felt that I was going to begin to dislike the novel, but as the pages turned I realized that this was so smart on Ishiguro's part. You see, when the novel opens Kathy is taking us back to the early years of her life at Hailsham, and she is merely eight years old. Ishiguro really makes her age and mindset so real to us, giving us conversations and actions that seem amateurish until you put it into perspective. His writing style makes subtle yet powerful shifts as Kathy grows up and discovers more about herself, her friends and her fate.
Stunning; really, truly stunning.
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So good - go in blind!
Innocent, beautiful, devastating.One of my favs, such a great read!
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- Reviewed in the United States on January 21, 2010
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Maurício Fontana FilhoReviewed in Brazil on September 6, 2021
nota máxima dou seis se der não dá
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Felix BERGERACReviewed in France on October 6, 2017
Une pure merveille qui me marquera longtemps comme beaucoup d'autres lecteurs
