The Remains of the Day - Softcover

Ishiguro, Kazuo

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0571225381 ISBN 13: 9780571225385

Publisher: Faber and Faber, 2005

Synopsis

WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 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.

About this title

Review:

The novel's narrator, Stevens, is a perfect English butler who tries to give his narrow existence form and meaning through the self-effacing, almost mystical practice of his profession. In a career that spans the second world war, Stevens is oblivious of the real life that goes on around him--oblivious, for instance, of the fact that his aristocrat employer is a Nazi sympathizer. Still, there are even larger matters at stake in this heartbreaking, beautifully crafted novel-- namely, Stevens' own ability to allow some bit of life-affirming love into his tightly repressed existence.

Review:

'A triumph... This wholly convincing protrait of a human life unweaving before your eyes is inventive and absorbing, by turns funny, absurd and ultimately very moving.' --Sunday Times

'A dream of a book: a beguiling comedy of manners that evolves almost magically into a profound and heart-rending study of personality, class and culture.' --New York Times Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Faber and Faber
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0571225381
• ISBN 13: 9780571225385
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272