Theme of Identity in Never Let Me Go
Response to Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go
Never Let Me Go is an incredibly intense novel, filled with many emotional scenes. Ultimately, it includes the perfect examples of a full-blown identity crisis. The children raised at Hailsham are desperate to understand the purpose of their own lives, bodies, and minds. The children attain a sense of identity through their treasured collections, creativity, artwork and delicate social structures.
Always Searching
No one appears exempt from the harsh realities offered by the ambiguity of human identity; people seem to search incessantly for meaning and purpose in their lives. Reflecting upon the vast array of material explored this semester; I realized how frequently literature, films, and artwork focus on the complexity of human identity and humanity. Kazou Ishiguro’s novel Never Let Me Go presents a dystopian society that focuses on the search for identity and meaning through curiosityand self-expression. This work demonstrates how disease and human imperfection can disconnect people from the external world, often causing them to forget the present and lose themselves in the future. By looking at the novel through Susan Sontag’s essay AIDS and Its Metaphors we can better understand the haunting correlations between the stigmas surrounding illness and their effects on one’s identity. Through the ability to interpret and understand these correlations we might craft a better understanding of our own identity.
Ishiguro’s novel, Never Let Me Go, is a gripping portrayal of humans who are being stripped of their identity and labeled as mere copies. The novel, set in Britain during the mid-1990’s, portrays a bleak world, where cloning humans is socially acceptable solely for the purpose of becoming organ donors for “real” people. Ishiguro focuses on three distinct characters, Kathy, Tommy, and Ruth, all of whom are clones. These three students – among others –are considered advantaged because they are fortunate enough to
Never Let Me Go is an incredibly intense novel, filled with many emotional scenes. Ultimately, it includes the perfect examples of a full-blown identity crisis. The children raised at Hailsham are desperate to understand the purpose of their own lives, bodies, and minds. The children attain a sense of identity through their treasured collections, creativity, artwork and delicate social structures.
Always Searching
No one appears exempt from the harsh realities offered by the ambiguity of human identity; people seem to search incessantly for meaning and purpose in their lives. Reflecting upon the vast array of material explored this semester; I realized how frequently literature, films, and artwork focus on the complexity of human identity and humanity. Kazou Ishiguro’s novel Never Let Me Go presents a dystopian society that focuses on the search for identity and meaning through curiosityand self-expression. This work demonstrates how disease and human imperfection can disconnect people from the external world, often causing them to forget the present and lose themselves in the future. By looking at the novel through Susan Sontag’s essay AIDS and Its Metaphors we can better understand the haunting correlations between the stigmas surrounding illness and their effects on one’s identity. Through the ability to interpret and understand these correlations we might craft a better understanding of our own identity.
Ishiguro’s novel, Never Let Me Go, is a gripping portrayal of humans who are being stripped of their identity and labeled as mere copies. The novel, set in Britain during the mid-1990’s, portrays a bleak world, where cloning humans is socially acceptable solely for the purpose of becoming organ donors for “real” people. Ishiguro focuses on three distinct characters, Kathy, Tommy, and Ruth, all of whom are clones. These three students – among others –are considered advantaged because they are fortunate enough to