Book of the Month: Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro (2021)
Critical Evaluation
“For four decades now, Ishiguro has written eloquently about the balancing act of remembering without succumbing irrevocably to the past. Memory and the accounting of memory, its burdens and its reconciliation, have been his subjects. With “Klara and the Sun,” I began to see how he has mastered the adjacent theme of obsolescence. What is it like to inhabit a world whose mores and ideas have passed you by? What happens to the people who must be cast aside in order for others to move forward? “
A Humanoid Who Cares For Humans, From the Mind of Kazuo Ishiguro,” The New York Times Book Review. February 23, 2021.
First Excerpt
“It was almost midway through our fourth morning in the window when I saw the taxi slowing down, its driver leaning right out so the other taxis would let him come across the traffic lanes to the curb in front of our store. Josie’s eyes were on me as she got out onto the sidewalk. She was pale and thin, and as she came towards us, I could see her walk wasn’t like that of other passers-by. She wasn’t slow exactly, but she seemed to take stock after each step to make sure she was still safe and wouldn’t fall. I estimated her age as fourteen and a half.
Once she was close enough so all the pedestrians were passing behind her, she stopped and smiled at me.
‘Hi,’ she said through the glass. ‘Hey, can you hear me?’
Rosa kept staring ahead at the RPO Building as she was supposed to do. But now I’d been addressed, I was able to look directly at the child, return her smile and nod encouragingly.
‘Really?’ Josie said — though of course I didn’t yet know that was her name. ‘I can hardly hear me myself. You can really hear me?’
I nodded again, and she shook her head as if very impressed.
‘Wow.’ She glanced over her shoulder — even this movement she made with caution — to the taxi from which she’d just emerged. Its door was as she’d left it, hanging open across the sidewalk, and there were two figures still in the back seat, talking and pointing to something beyond the pedestrian crossing. Josie seemed pleased her adults weren’t about to get out, and took one more step forward till her face was almost touching the window.”
Second Excerpt
“The Mother by this time was standing right behind Josie. She was black-haired and thin, though not as thin as Josie, or some of the runners. Now she was closer and I could see her face better, I raised my estimate of her age to forty-five. As I’ve said, I wasn’t so accurate with ages then, but this was to prove more or less correct. From a distance, I’d first thought her a younger woman, but when she was closer I could see the deep etches around her mouth, and also a kind of angry exhaustion in her eyes. I noticed too that when the Mother reached out to Josie from behind, the outstretched arm hesitated in the air, almost retracting, before coming forward to rest on her daughter’s shoulder.They entered the flow of passers-by, going in the direction of the second Tow-Away Zone sign, Josie with her cautious walk, her mother’s arm around her as they went. Once, before they left my view, Josie looked back, and even though she had to disturb the rhythm of their walk, gave me one last wave.
”