Who’s Afraid of a Nobel Prize Winner – a Celebration of Kazuo Ishiguro

By Catriona Troth

Stop the average reader in a library or bookshop and ask them to name five winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature and many would struggle. Ask them to name one that they’ve read, and they might struggle even more. The impression, however unjust, is that the prize is given to the obscure, the difficult – to authors you certainly wouldn’t think of taking away on holiday.

This year’s winner is different. Even non-readers are likely to know of Kazuo Ishiguro, through the films of his books Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go.

I remember shortly after reading Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go (2005), I was in Cornwall. Walking along a cliff path, I came upon one of the stewards of the Boardmasters Festival. She was sitting on a stile, a book in her hands. I recognised the cover of Never Let Me Go and had to stop and talk to her. It was that sort of book. One you wanted to share with everyone. Even if the book infuriated you, you had to talk about it.

Ishiguro’s first two novels, A Pale View of the Hills (1982) and An Artist of the Floating World (1986) were set in Japan. In an interview in the Paris Review (2005), Ishiguro talks of how writing about Japan freed him from the constraints of everyday life in London. It seems those two novels allowed Ishiguro to find his own voice, because Remains of the Day (1989) which won the Booker Prize, is set in an English country house and is narrated by a pitch-perfect English butler.

In another interview from 2015, widely quoted since the Nobel Prize announcement was made, Ishiguro gently mocked those reviewers so taken up with the novelty of a Japanese-born author heritage writing in English they couldn’t avoid clichéd Japanese-y metaphors.

“They would talk about a still pond. With carp.” 

I will try not to fall into that trap! But it is certainly true there is a stillness and quiet on the surface of Ishiguro’s writing that he uses to conceal underlying turmoil. It draws you in, only slowly revealing what lies beneath.

In Remains of the Day, that stillness conceals both the narrator’s own emotions and dark political secrets. In Never Let Me Go, the characters appear to move almost placidly from childhood innocence towards their inevitable fate. But pay attention! The anguish is there. You just need to listen for it in the quiet.

Here are some other comments on Ishiguro’s writing:

JJ Marsh on Nocturnes

Occasionally, you come across a piece of art which creeps up on your emotions. Kazuo Ishiguro is a master at that with his novels, but can also pull off a similar feat with his short stories.

 In Nocturnes, literature and music intertwine. A collection of short stories, which feels like a full concert in five movements, changes mood and tempo with great subtlety, leaving a melancholy resonance behind.

This is about relationships, both between characters and with music, all in a minor key. Classic Ishiguro understatement leads to achingly poignant moments, but he also demonstrates his sense of humour with a few well set up moments of pure farce. As the title suggests, there is darkness, but also moonlight, laughter and that quiet magic which happens when you catch a lovely refrain carried on an evening breeze.

Gillian E Hamer on Never Let Me Go

One of the most poignant and thought provoking novels I have ever read. One of the only books on my shelf I've read more than twice! There's something unique in the writing of this novel that as a reader I find captivating and as a writer fills me with jealousy. The characters are so real, vivid and engaging - and yet the narrative is a plethora of questions and confusion.

It's very difficult to describe the storyline without giving too much away, and I don't want this to be a plot synopsis, but what seems like a story of innocence and adolescence through the eyes of a group of youngsters, always has a dark, ominous cloud hanging over the story, and, as the truth is gradually revealed the reader is pulled through every feasible emotion. And it also contains one of the strongest plot twists that stays with me still.

If you want a book that ticks every box and ties up every loose end, this isn't for you. But if you want a book that will turn your world on its head for a while I would highly recommend Never Let Me Go. I am so glad a writer like Kazuo Ishiguro has won the Nobel Prize - for ordinary readers like me it's a justification somehow that our feelings count too!

Sheila Bugler on When We Were Orphans

I read the final section of When We Were Orphans on a London bus, travelling from my job in Oxford Street to my home near Tower Bridge. I spent the entire journey weeping uncontrollably, devastated by the haunting sadness at the heart of Ishiguro’s fifth novel.

Like many of my favourite books, When We Were Orphans was recommended to me by my father. I had already read – and loved – The Remains of The Day (another ‘dad’ recommendation) so my expectations were high. 

The novel is narrated by Christopher Banks, a famous detective in 1930s England. Through the gradual unfolding of his memories, Christopher’s early life is revealed to the reader – an expatriate childhood in Old Shanghai, boarding school in England and on to the privileged world of high society London.

Although he’s a top detective, Christopher has never been able to solve the central mystery that has shaped his life – the disappearance, in Old Shanghai when he was still a young boy, of his parents. As the novel unfolds, it becomes painfully clear that this loss is at the heart of everything Christopher does. It defines him and renders him incapable of moving past this tragedy. 

Believing his parents are still alive, Christopher returns to Shanghai, a city on the brink of war. By now, it’s apparent that the great detective’s image of himself is at odds with the impression others have of him. The more he is drawn into the catastrophic events of the Sino-Japanese War, the more he loses sense of what is real and what isn’t. 

The moment Christopher finally learns the truth about his mother’s terrible fate, and realises how much she loved him, is unbearably moving. Although it’s too late to free him from the ‘emptiness’ that has been with him since he lost her, he realises too that ‘Her feelings for me, they were always just there, they didn’t depend on anything.’

When We Were Orphans is a devastating tale of the unconditional nature of parental love. Having spent over half my life in a different country to my own parents, the novel reminded me that afternoon on the bus that I should never take that love for granted.