KazuoIshiguro’s Never Let Me Go reveals Kathy’s world simultaneously to the readers. Except at the beginning, readers go on the same journey as the students of Hailsham, experiencing excitement, loss, and eventual hopelessness. They are asking questions about their future and learning about what the future may hold. Ishiguro urges readers to empathize with characters through hope for normal lives, love, freedom, and compassion. He challenges the use of clones to donate organs, as well as the conflicting role that hope plays.
The novel’s science fiction nature is characterized by the possibility of accessing the entire world. This gives the reader hope. While the story began in the late 1990s, it was published in 2005. It creates a familiar world for readers, but adds organ donors. The readers are not told at the beginning that these characters are clones. Hailsham was described as a nice place just like it was to Tommy and Kathy. Ishiguro focused on one possible issue in future scientific innovation, and forced readers to confront it with their own reactions and hopes. Hailsham and most of the children in grade school are unaware of what adulthood looks like. Many of them dream of being an actor, a basketball star or an astronaut. The readers’ society children are likely to live long lives, and will not die like the children at Hailsham. Ishiguro offers two perspectives on how to deal with clones. One is the Hailsham-like environment. Miss Lucy is a bit more skeptical and states that she has heard children talk about their dreams. I have heard some of the plans of some of them, and none of you will work at supermarkets. Your life is set up for you” (81). Kathy felt relieved to hear Miss Lucy’s end of her ranting and felt that the rest of her classmates felt the way. The novel’s first explicit mention of the Hailsham children’s fates is for readers.
The Hailsham children experience a different reaction to their fate as they transition into adulthood. Kathy describes a time in which she lived in a “cozy condition of suspension” where she could contemplate her life and not be bound by the norms. Ruth, on the other hand, would talk about her “dream futures”. Since the future was still very distant, they found solace in dreams and hope. Kathy and Ruth loved looking for the “possible”, which was the actual person they were being cloned from. Ruth doesn’t give up on her dreams, and she continues to examine her “possible” to see if it is possible. Ruth and readers both feel this is a difficult moment. Her little hope disappears and Ruth confronts her “possible” status. She describes her situation as one of the undervalued people she knows. Tommy isn’t the only character to deal with this knowledge. In fact, he ends up being the least hopeful of all the characters.
The desperation in the lives of the readers is only possible after Tommy and Kathy lose their last hope. Ruth’s last wish is that Kathy and Tommy prove their love and defer their donations. Miss Emily believes that they will not be able to prove their love. What harm could there be? (258). Ishiguro’s words convey the hopelessness and lack of empathy of many humans. Miss Emily’s impersonal response raises questions about the authority she has to have started Hailsham. The novel doesn’t give the “creatures” (known as Kathy, Tommy or Ruth) any voice about their freedom or how they spent their time as caregivers. Ruth accepts her fate and finds joy in little moments of happiness. Tommy is uncontrollable and rageful, but he eventually gives up trying to make a difference. It’s obvious that Ishiguro is not a judge of right or wrong, but rather wants readers to feel the emotions and lack thereof.
It is unclear how to handle people without hope in the future, even after reading the novel. It’s cruel to tell children young to not dream, but does the sadness overpower the misery. Kathy describes it as feeling like walking past a reflection and feeling cold. Kathy was content in her current situation but she is still troubled by the memories she can’t let go of. However, Kathy and Tommy probably wouldn’t have had a happy marriage without hope. In the same way, Hailsham’s connection to Kathy is also rooted at that moment in blissful ignorance. Some people may feel that the cold moment is a stumbling block and destroys all hope, making them even more dead.
