Narrative Spaces In Never Let Me Go

Kazuo Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki in1954. At the age of5, he moved to Britain with his parents. He is a distinguished modern Japanese-born British novelist. Since the publishing of his first novel A Pale View of Hills, Kazuo Ishiguro’s works and himself as a novelist entered the vision of the literary critics. In more than30years of literary creation, he accomplished six novels. They are A Pale View of Hills (1982), An Artist of the Floating World (1986), The Remains of the Day (1989), The Unconsoled (1995), When We Were Orphans (2000) and the latest one Never Let Me Go (2005). Kazuo Ishiguro’s novels brought him great honor. After his first novel A Pale View of Hills which won him Winifred Holtby Prize of the Royal Society of Literature, almost every novel of Kazuo Ishiguro is among the list of bestsellers. The plain writing style, broad vision and profound philosophy that embedded in his works altogether lead to his great fame and his position as an outstanding novelist.Never Let Me Go is Kazuo Ishiguro’s latest work. This novel depicts a group of clones, or "students" as the narrator prefers to call, whom humans brought into world in order to harvest their vital organs."Students" has a predestined life journey which is brief and pathetic. Before30, they will go through3or4times donation until they complete on the cold operating table. Though inheriting the plain writing style, Kazuo Ishiguro adopted a brand new science-fiction-like setting. However his concern is by no means science or the ethics of science. Instead, he tries to make this novel to be a metaphor of the real situation of modern people. Since the publishing, Never Let Me Go becomes one of the major concerns for critics of Kazuo Ishiguro’s works. This thesis, through textual analysis from the perspective of narrative space, tries to illustrate the features of its narration and the theme construction by narrative space. Through the chronological arrangement of physical space and the map of memory space bases on events, Kazuo Ishiguro provides readers an explanation of the briefness of time and the importance of memory. The author of this thesis gives analyses from three types of spaces. First, the selection and arrangement of physical space highlight the metaphorical effect of this novel. Second, memory space helps to construct the narrative structure by the map-like depiction and landmark locating. At the same time, the importance of memory is manifested. Third, the manifestation of power space is achieved through the construction of memory while the construction of power space is through the arrangement of physical space. Last, the conclusion part reiterates the importance of spaces in Never Let Me Go on narrative function and theme construction, and proposes some new research fields.