Live Long and Suffer
A child’s death is seen as a life cut short, a terrible tragedy, and often the failure of society. Wanting to die young is such an uncommon desire that we classify those who have this desire as suicidal or diagnose them with mental illness. Rather than focusing on how to die quickly, humans expend every effort into extending life. This desire to live is by evolutionary necessity the most important goal for any organism. Furthermore, in Never Let Me Go the desire to live longer is so powerful that people create clones in order to receive organs which will extend their lives. Yet, Ishiguro refutes this inherent desire through time manipulation and portrays that the best lives are the briefest.
The desire to prolong life seems …show more content…
Both the Madame and Marie-Claude are suffering in their old age. Marie-Claude is suffering obvious physical impairment as she has to be pushed around in a wheelchair. In fact, she has apparently changed so much that Kathy failed to recognize her. Comparatively, Madame is suffering emotionally. When Hailsham was forced to close, she failed at her life’s purpose. She outlived her cause’s success and as such is experiencing emotional distress. Aside from their real purpose which is always fulfilled through donation and death, the clones don’t commit to pursuing causes so they never fail and experience intense sadness. Finally, the teacher of Miss Lucy is most directly contrasted with the clones. This is shown through the scene where Miss Lucy dismisses their possible futures. This scene starts with the clones playing happily outside. As rain interjects, Miss Lucy does as well, so that both the weather and her statements show her internal sadness and anger. The clones, however, are unbothered and return without a second thought to play when the rain ceases. Miss Lucy reacts differently and, rather than rebounding like the clones, leaves the school since she cannot cope. This scene exemplifies the most staggering difference between the clones and their older teachers. The teachers linger on the bad emotions while the clones move …show more content…
Ruth, who lives the shortest life of the three, is happy being a donor and she never experiences sadness. She only express regret slightly for her impact on Tommy and Kathy’s lives, but she never questions her life. The next of the three characters to perish is Tommy. In small ways he struggles with his negative emotions from time to time, but as he parts with Kathy for the last time as he faces his completion he light-heartedly flashes back to gleeful childhood moments celebrating touchdowns sparking Kathy to respond to him, “You’re a crazy kid.” (Ishiguro 285) Kathy is the last to die; as the narrator of the story she by necessity outlives it. She lived long enough to begin to want to be remembered and this combined with her need to process her emotions leads to the writing of the story. More deeply than Tommy and especially Ruth, Kathy works to explore her feelings. Since she lived longer her existence became more difficult to process and the fear of dying so familiar to the older characters started to catch up with her. Still, Kathy lived a happier life than the adults. Ishiguro shows that even a small difference in lifespan past that of other clones led to greater dissatisfaction.
On the surface, it seems that Ishiguro, like most humans, prizes longevity of life. Indeed, in Never Let Me Go he creates a whole society focused on extending
A child’s death is seen as a life cut short, a terrible tragedy, and often the failure of society. Wanting to die young is such an uncommon desire that we classify those who have this desire as suicidal or diagnose them with mental illness. Rather than focusing on how to die quickly, humans expend every effort into extending life. This desire to live is by evolutionary necessity the most important goal for any organism. Furthermore, in Never Let Me Go the desire to live longer is so powerful that people create clones in order to receive organs which will extend their lives. Yet, Ishiguro refutes this inherent desire through time manipulation and portrays that the best lives are the briefest.
The desire to prolong life seems …show more content…
Both the Madame and Marie-Claude are suffering in their old age. Marie-Claude is suffering obvious physical impairment as she has to be pushed around in a wheelchair. In fact, she has apparently changed so much that Kathy failed to recognize her. Comparatively, Madame is suffering emotionally. When Hailsham was forced to close, she failed at her life’s purpose. She outlived her cause’s success and as such is experiencing emotional distress. Aside from their real purpose which is always fulfilled through donation and death, the clones don’t commit to pursuing causes so they never fail and experience intense sadness. Finally, the teacher of Miss Lucy is most directly contrasted with the clones. This is shown through the scene where Miss Lucy dismisses their possible futures. This scene starts with the clones playing happily outside. As rain interjects, Miss Lucy does as well, so that both the weather and her statements show her internal sadness and anger. The clones, however, are unbothered and return without a second thought to play when the rain ceases. Miss Lucy reacts differently and, rather than rebounding like the clones, leaves the school since she cannot cope. This scene exemplifies the most staggering difference between the clones and their older teachers. The teachers linger on the bad emotions while the clones move …show more content…
Ruth, who lives the shortest life of the three, is happy being a donor and she never experiences sadness. She only express regret slightly for her impact on Tommy and Kathy’s lives, but she never questions her life. The next of the three characters to perish is Tommy. In small ways he struggles with his negative emotions from time to time, but as he parts with Kathy for the last time as he faces his completion he light-heartedly flashes back to gleeful childhood moments celebrating touchdowns sparking Kathy to respond to him, “You’re a crazy kid.” (Ishiguro 285) Kathy is the last to die; as the narrator of the story she by necessity outlives it. She lived long enough to begin to want to be remembered and this combined with her need to process her emotions leads to the writing of the story. More deeply than Tommy and especially Ruth, Kathy works to explore her feelings. Since she lived longer her existence became more difficult to process and the fear of dying so familiar to the older characters started to catch up with her. Still, Kathy lived a happier life than the adults. Ishiguro shows that even a small difference in lifespan past that of other clones led to greater dissatisfaction.
On the surface, it seems that Ishiguro, like most humans, prizes longevity of life. Indeed, in Never Let Me Go he creates a whole society focused on extending