A beautiful, challenging book about the question of whose lives matter, and how. It was made into an acclaimed film in 2010 starring Carey Mulligan and Keira Knightley. When Ishiguro received the Nobel Prize in literature in 2017, the citation described him as a writer "who, in novels of great emotional force, has uncovered the abyss beneath our illusory sense of connection with the world.”
Notes and Discussion Prompts
Written by Dr. Honni van Rijswijk, Senior Lecturer, UTS Faculty of Law
Although Never Let Me Go is written as a naturalistic, realist text, the story also works at a deeper structural level as allegory. Allegory is a helpful way to think about the novel, because it opens up unique frameworks of meaning, and unique questions, not only about law and ethics, but about the human condition.
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines “allegory” as “a story, picture, etc. which uses symbols to convey a hidden or ulterior meaning, typically a moral or political one; a symbolic representation; an extended or continued metaphor.”
Which reading of Never Let Me Go, which allegory, resonates most for you?
One possibility is to read the novel as an allegory for the way in which legally, ethically and culturally, we regard some lives as mattering more than others. In Australia in 2018, we don’t use “lesser” humans as human parts, but we do commit violence against certain groups—eg legal and cultural treatment of asylum seekers, or of the poor. In many different ways, legal frameworks are set up to do violence against specific groups (most starkly, against asylum seekers and against members of the indigenous population).
Another possibility is to read the novel as an allegory of the way in which, legally and ethically, we create a false, bright line between human and non-human lives: human lives matter and non-human lives matter less. Non-human lives can be treated violently where that violence is instrumental to human lives (eg in providing food, or scientific evidence or medical utility).
A third possibility is to read the novel as an allegory of the human condition more widely. In this reading, Kathy and her friends Tommy and Ruth have limited lives in a way that is analogous to ours: like Kathy, we are trapped within certain norms and rules that we did not devise, and which we only understand obliquely. In some ways, we are as sheltered, “protected” and ignorant as the students of Hailsham House. M John Harrison takes up this reading in his moving review of the book, “Clone Alone,” published by the Guardian in 2005 (which you can read online.). Harrison concludes “This extraordinary and, in the end, rather frighteningly clever novel isn’t about cloning, or being a clone, at all. It’s about why we don’t explode, why we don’t just wake up one day and go sobbing and crying down the street, kicking everything to pieces out of the raw, infuriating, completely personal sense of our lives never having been what they could have been.”
Now to read, reflect and claim.
Read and reflect by writing a full 1,000 word reflection on the justice themes conveyed in this book or using the above thought starters to frame your reflection. Using the resources on this page to kick start your reflection, you can upload your piece as a claim to CareerHub to receive 20 Brennan ROJ points.
Have questions? Get in touch with the Brennan Administrator.