(2004), Kazuo Ishiguro's sixth novel, resumes the author's preoccupation with memory and its affective imbrications, with the combined means of science-fiction and the moral parable. Its first-person narrator-protagonist, Kathy H, like most of the supporting cast, is a clone designed for organ donation and, in the interim, a carer (or nurse) to other, already donating, clones; her narrative details her childhood and early adulthood in a language that is evidently inscribed by her condition. Yet, rather than engage critically with the ethics of genetic engineering or the condition of clones, the book normalises its protagonists and concentrates within their predetermined lifespan the experiences of a lifetime, foregrounding the need to belong and will to live, along with…
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Citation: Schneider, Ana-Karina. "Never Let Me Go". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 September 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=20410, accessed 26 November 2024.]
