Kazuo Ishiguro: Remains of the Day (2001, Tandem Library)
245 pages
English language
Published March 29, 2001 by Tandem Library.
In the summer of 1956, Stevens, the ageing butler of Darlington Hall, embarks on a leisurely holiday that will take him deep into the countryside and into his past . . .A contemporary classic, The Remains of the Day is Kazuo Ishiguro's beautiful and haunting evocation of life between the wars in a Great English House, of lost causes and lost love.
There's so much in here. It bears another read, and I'm very curious how they managed the film adaptation.
Content warning spoilers for the ending
This book is not a love story but a character study. It's a meditation on professional dignity, and what happens when you sacrifice everything - every opportunity, every chance for connection, for human emotion - on the altar of that dignity. It's a book about misleading yourself. It's a book about giving in to sunk costs.
The last few pages are what made this story work for me. Because Stevens is a sympathetic, if deeply frustrating, narrator. I was rooting for him to have some kind of growth, to leave him ready to grasp the remains of the day. And it seemed like Ishiguro was leading him there, showing him reconsidering the value of bantering (and thus, human connection). But the very last thing Stevens thinks is how this will make him a better butler. Because in the end, he is too scared to be anything but what he has always been.
Superbly done by Ishiguro.
I didn't start getting into the story until around the 40% mark and even then, I felt like I had to make myself read it. If it hadn't been a book club pick, it'd probably be a DNF. I'm glad I stuck with it until the end. It was worth it from a literary and historical standpoint. But that ending felt incredibly depressing to me and I'm not sure it was meant to be? Was there meant to be little to no growth of the main character? Did he grow, but my own views are just so vastly different I can't see it? I have a lot of feelings to think about before my book club's discussion.
