Transcript Never Let Me Go quotation discussion slides

Friday, 17 July 2015
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“I don’t know how it was where you were, but
at Hailsham we had to have some form of
medical almost every week.”
Kathy, Page 13
Would Kathy be surprised that we question
the lack of rebellion in the novel?
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“Then there were rumours almost every day
of pranks that had been played on him. ... I
thought sooner or later someone would start
saying it had gone too far, but it just kept on,
and no one said anything.”
Kathy, Page 15
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Does this link with the lack of rebellion?
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“Didn’t we all dream from time to time about
one guardian or other bending the rules and
doing something special for us? A
spontaneous hug, a secret letter, a gift?”
Kathy, Page 60
Might this allow for the sex act to be seen as
a form of unconscious rebellion?
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“If you’re to live decent lives, you have to
know who you are and what lies ahead of
you, every one of you.”
Miss Lucy, Page 81
Kathy does know – nevertheless, how does
she respond to impending death?
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“We all know it. We’re modelled from trash.
Junkies, prostitutes, winos, tramps. Convicts,
maybe, just so long as they aren’t psychos.
That’s what we come from. We all know it, so
why don’t we say it?”
Ruth, Page 166
Does Ruth have evidence for this or is it
suggestive of something else in the clones’
attitude?
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“Something in me just gave up. A voice went:
‘All right, let him think the absolute worst.
Let him think it, let him think it.’ And I
suppose I looked at him with resignation,
with a face that said, ‘Yes, it’s true, what else
did you expect?’”
Kathy, Page 195
Kathy disassociates herself from her
surrender – is this because of the inevitable
fate, or does it make it inevitable?
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“The fact was, I suppose, there were powerful
tides tugging us apart by then, and it only
needed something like that to finish the task.
If we’d understood that back then––who
knows?––maybe we’d have kept a tighter hold
of one another.”
Kathy, Page 197
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Was it fate, or was it Kathy’s own actions…?
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"Why would he know? ... How could he
possibly know what Chrissie would have felt?
What she would have wanted? It wasn't him
on that table, trying to cling onto life. How
would he know?"
Ruth, Page 226
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How might we be misjudging Ruth?
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“Why did we do all of that work in the first
place? Why train us, encourage us, make us
produce all of that? If we’re just going to give
donations anyway, then die, why all those
lessons? Why all those books and
discussions?”
Kathy, Page 259
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What is the “purpose” of education?
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“I can see ... that it might look as though you
are simply pawns in a game. It can certainly
be looked at like that. But think of it. You
were lucky pawns. There was a certain
climate and now it’s gone. You have to accept
that sometimes that’s how things happen in
this world.”
Miss Emily, Page 266
Does this satisfy – does the quotation have a
bearing on Ishiguro’s view of human life and
attitudes?