Johannes Beller The Remains of the Day 22.02.2007 1. Kazuo

Johannes Beller
The Remains of the Day
1. Kazuo Ishiguro
Kazuo Ishiguro was born in Nagasaki, Japan 1954. As his father was
recruited by the National Institute of Oceanography, the whole family
moved to Britain in 1960. He graduated with an Master in Creative
Writing. From 1982 on he became a full-time writer and soon was
nominated as one of the best 20 young British writers. He lives now in
London with his wife and daughter. (Other books: A Pale View of Hills,
An Artist of the Floating World, The Unconsoled, When We Were
Orphans, Never Let Me Go)
2. Content
22.02.2007
Author
Kazuo Ishiguro
Country
United Kingdom
Language
English
Genre
Historical Novel
Publisher
Faber and Faber
Released
May 1989
Pages
258 (paperback)
ISBN
0-571-20073-7
The Remains of the Day (1989) tells the story of an elderly butler, who
has given everything to his duty. By reflecting his past he must ultimately come in terms with his
disillusionment about his service and thus with his wasted life.
Stevens is a butler at Darlington Hall. It's the mid-1950's and Stevens finds himself employed by an
American, who engages him to take some time off. He sets out on a six-day motoring trip to meet a former
co-worker called Miss Kenton. As Stevens travels the English countryside, he reflects his past actions when
he were a Butler under his former employer Lord Darlington. Gradually he is not only revealing his own
character but also enfolds that the “great Lord Darlington”, whom he devoted his life, was in fact a Nazisympathiser and that he has had deep feelings of love for Miss Kenton,
which were never stated nor acknowledged by him. In the end of the
The Remains of the Day
book Stevens tries to face his misguided life, and wants to make the
best out of “what remains of the day”.
Narrator Stevens, a butler
Setting
Few years before
WW2, Darlington
Hall, England
3. Stevens
Stevens is an elderly butler, the protagonist and the narrator of the
novel. His main feature is his trying to achieve “dignity” by being the
Protagonist Stevens
perfect butler. Thus Stevens denies his individualism and personal
Conflict
Stevens struggels with needs and never achieves intimacy.
his „failed life“ and
finally tries to come
to terms with it
Themes
Dignity, Englishness
& Americans, humor,
seeing & blindness,
regret
Johannes Beller
The Remains of the Day
22.02.2007
4. Perspective
In the end Stevens is finally facing the truth with Lord Darlington as a Nazi-sympathiser and has ultimately
lost the love of his life. Sitting on a bench at the pier he talks to a retired butler, who reminds him to “make
the most out of what remains of the day”.
5. Style
Main-feature: Stevens is an unreliable narrator. On several occasions he is quite untrustworthy (e.g. That he
only wants to see Miss Kenton because of professional reasons).