Paperback, 258 pages
English language
Published Oct. 29, 1999 by Faber and Faber.
In the summer of 1956, Stevens, the ageing butler of Darlington Hall, embarks on a leisurely holiday that will take him deep into the countryside and into his past . . .A contemporary classic, The Remains of the Day is Kazuo Ishiguro's beautiful and haunting evocation of life between the wars in a Great English House, of lost causes and lost love.
There's so much in here. It bears another read, and I'm very curious how they managed the film adaptation.
Content warning spoilers for the ending
This book is not a love story but a character study. It's a meditation on professional dignity, and what happens when you sacrifice everything - every opportunity, every chance for connection, for human emotion - on the altar of that dignity. It's a book about misleading yourself. It's a book about giving in to sunk costs.
The last few pages are what made this story work for me. Because Stevens is a sympathetic, if deeply frustrating, narrator. I was rooting for him to have some kind of growth, to leave him ready to grasp the remains of the day. And it seemed like Ishiguro was leading him there, showing him reconsidering the value of bantering (and thus, human connection). But the very last thing Stevens thinks is how this will make him a better butler. Because in the end, he is too scared to be anything but what he has always been.
Superbly done by Ishiguro.
