While the founders of Hailsham feel it to be important for the clones to be able to represent themselves artistically so that their humanity can be recognised by others, it is just as crucial for the clones to recognise their humanity themselves. Miss Lucy suggests to Tommy that he should start putting more effort into his artwork because, ‘You’ll get a lot from it, just for yourself’ (Ishiguro 2010, 106). In order to see themselves as human, and as having the kind of value we bestow upon the human, the clones must give their lives meaning in the same fashion as the non-cloned humans: through representation. Kerby explains that artistic representation is a particularly human act, and that an exterior rendering of an interior process relays
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It is as if Kathy expects a certain plot to unfold, and her expectation of narrative elements seems to shape both how she approaches, and how she recollects, her life. The clones being aware of their ‘ends’ from the start seems only to add to this sense of expectation of a structured life, as this knowledge affords them the peculiar experience of seeing their lives as a ‘whole’ from the outset. Throughout the novel Kathy often makes remarks such as ‘Then of course I found it’ (Ishiguro 2010, 169), or: ‘I realised I wasn’t surprised by it at all; that in some funny way I’d been waiting for it’ (Ishiguro 2010, 275). She speaks as if she recognises herself as a character in a novel, as if her story pre-exists her and she is merely enacting it. And in a way this is true, if we take her genetic determination, carefully cultivated upbringing, and planned donations as evidence of her life trajectory being authored by others. However, this expectation and subsequent representation of the self in narrative form is one way in which Kathy can present herself as living a particularly human existence; a way in which she can perform her humanity for both an audience and for
It is as if Kathy expects a certain plot to unfold, and her expectation of narrative elements seems to shape both how she approaches, and how she recollects, her life. The clones being aware of their ‘ends’ from the start seems only to add to this sense of expectation of a structured life, as this knowledge affords them the peculiar experience of seeing their lives as a ‘whole’ from the outset. Throughout the novel Kathy often makes remarks such as ‘Then of course I found it’ (Ishiguro 2010, 169), or: ‘I realised I wasn’t surprised by it at all; that in some funny way I’d been waiting for it’ (Ishiguro 2010, 275). She speaks as if she recognises herself as a character in a novel, as if her story pre-exists her and she is merely enacting it. And in a way this is true, if we take her genetic determination, carefully cultivated upbringing, and planned donations as evidence of her life trajectory being authored by others. However, this expectation and subsequent representation of the self in narrative form is one way in which Kathy can present herself as living a particularly human existence; a way in which she can perform her humanity for both an audience and for