Melancholy: Recognition of Mortality, Sacrifice, Throbbing, Donate and decease in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go

Abstract

This research paper examines Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go, with emphasis on the way the novel considers questions concerning “melancholy” in the novel and nature of “existence” of Clones. The study builds on these questions to consider the complex ways the author expresses the concept of “Melancholy” as shown through the experiences of clones who have socially programmed life expectancy and other issues pertaining to acceptance of mortality, sacrifice, pain, donation and death. The story is about human clones destined with short life span, the survival plight of ordinary people and the description of human cloning mistakes and traumatic experiences are also referred to in the study, Ultimately, the novel provides a way of approaching a kind of melancholy, hopelessness and no resistance towards death, despite the crushing weight of its, and our, unalterable circumstances. This story takes us back in time to explore the importance of nature and its origins. It raises challenging questions about how memory, reproducing, imagination, and our sense of self are connected. These ideas are explored in a psychological reading of Ishiguro's novel. The novel Never Let Me Go harps on melancholy all through the lives of the clones, their nostalgic memory of Hailsham, friends together, traumatic past and inevitable traumatic future.

Contribution: This article In Never Let Me Go, the characters are actually clones, and they were made with the purpose of donating their organs to humans. Hailsham works hard to show the clones individuality to try to create social change, but they fail in the end, and Kathy must still face the fate of her.