A conversation with the British author of Japanese origin, who with his last novel, Do not leave me , recently released by Einaudi, has a parallel world where cloning is a reality. But the events futuristic appearance of the characters allow the author to reflect on issues that are dear to him as the difficulty to arise in a conscious way of their destiny in the brief flash of human
MARIA TERESA CARBONE
In his enthusiastic review of Kazuo Ishiguro's latest novel, Never Let Me Go - Do not leave me in Italian , translated by Paola Novarese Einaudi (pp. 295, € 17.50) - Canadian writer Margaret Atwood, however, that the book probably is not going to please everyone, to become "everybody's cup of tea." A synthetic way to warn readers that the text of Ishiguro likely to deter those who enjoyed the title so far the most famous writer, The Remains of the day (and even more movie that has made James Ivory), with its melancholic reconstruction an England to its full splendor. Do not leave me at least apparently differs completely from that atmosphere and brings the reader into a kind of parallel reality: set in the nineties, the novel revolves around the adventures of three young men - Kathy (narrator of the book), Tommy and Ruth - who, raised in a boarding school nestled in the English countryside, they face their sad fate. As the author makes it clear gradually, in fact, the three boys are actually clones, the function of organ donors assigns them to a premature end and, at least within certain limits, resigned. Yet, despite appearances, do not leave me reveals more than one point of contact with Ishiguro's previous novels, The Remains of the same day at the beautiful The inconsolable. From these similarities begins our meeting with the writer, these days in Italy just for the presentation of the novel.
At first glance, the fact that the protagonists of not leave clones appears to be the key element of the novel. Yet, a closer reading, you feel that cloning is only a pretext to stage issues have little to do with scenarios related to research in this field.
In fact, the scientific aspect of cloning does not interest me much, as I do not feel particularly affected by the ethical problems that may raise the issue. Indeed, the choice of taking clones as protagonists of the novel has come very late, was one of the last things I decided. I started writing this story about fifteen years ago, after the release of The Remains of the Day . Even then, the center of the story was a rather mysterious group of young people who lived in the English countryside, but in that first text, which I then left to write The inconsolable , their fate was somehow linked to the use of atomic weapons. Later, when the novel was published, I began to work on those materials, but again to no avail. And finally in 2001 after the publication of When We Were Orphans , I found the key by listening to a morning radio program on the cloning, I realized that if I replaced the nuclear weapons through biotechnology could I run history. But what I really wanted was to present a group of people with a reduced life expectancy, about thirty years, a situation that could become a metaphor - a sort of distorted mirror - the human condition, that we all grow old and die, but we tend to evade this fact. Besides, I realized that having clones as the protagonists of the novel would bring other benefits, that I might face in an unusual way the old questions over the centuries in many literary texts: What is a human being? there is a soul? what is the purpose of our lives? These questions, which fill pages and pages of Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky, are very difficult to translate for the writers of my generation, even seems to lack the appropriate vocabulary. If the fiction and the cinema of today, from a Terminator Houellebecq, often figures of clones or cyborgs is just from a different perspective to discuss an ancient theme.
On the other hand, do not leave me in seem to resurface themes explored in The Remains of the day or in inconsolable : Kathy in as early as butler or porter emerge - along with the painful sensation of the limit set by his condition - a form of pride, almost an idea of \u200b\u200bbelonging to an elite.
The perspective that effectively unites these characters derives from the attempt to find a source of pride and dignity in the role that was imposed on them. It is difficult for anyone assess its position in a larger world, we all tend rather to make us a great idea of \u200b\u200bour little area. Kathy, for example, does not challenge the system in which it appears, but look at all ways of being a good version of what is to be given. And for me, I admire the effort to live with dignity in difficult circumstances. I find it fascinating to explore these characters, who are rebels in a minor key, and only gradually, with great difficulty, change positions.
All his novels are characterized by the presence of a narrator. How he came to choose Kathy as "voice" of Do not leave me?
When I wrote my second novel, An Artist of the ephemeral world, I was initially "wrong" the narrator, and this led me to work harder and further. Since then, the choice of narrator is one of the data to which more attention. In some ways I could say would like to bring my characters to a real test. In the case of Do not leave me, however, the choice of Kathy has been relatively easy because I wanted this story revolves around love and friendship, and Kathy was in the right position, almost in the center of love unaware that test for and friendship with Tommy Ruth, difficult but profound friendship. Again, this was very important for me, I wanted to show how two people in a friendship can sometimes hated, and even hurting themselves while feeling the deep bond that unites them. In Do not leave me, as indeed in The Remains of the Day , love and friendship, and how these feelings are part of a life that passes too quickly, to represent me at the core.
In this novel, however, even the art - to which small clones are encouraged - seems to play an important part.
Within school attended by the protagonists of the book applies the principle - very common after all - according to which the art would be a test of our deepest humanity, and therefore also the possibility for the clones to have a 'soul'. But art, and in general the idea of \u200b\u200bleaving a trace behind, is mainly one of the tools at our disposal to mitigate the idea of \u200b\u200bdeath - and this is particularly evident for the characters of Do not leave me , are denied the possibility of having children. At the same time, however, I tried to emphasize in the book the old theme, this fairy tales and myths, according to which only love can sweeten death, or even can change the rules, in short, that love is stronger than death: an idea is silly, of course, but it is an idea that I would like to believe.
Why did you choose to set a story apparently futures today, and indeed, to be exact, in the nineties?
If I set the novel in the future, I ran the risk that the story sounded like a warning or a prophecy. I wanted instead of the readers felt like the world described is only a reflection of the unusual lives we lead today. But my choice was also conditioned by aesthetic reasons: the futuristic landscapes and environments to Blade Runner not interest me, and I did not want to waste time and energy to imagine the future of automobiles or vending machines. I did however create a weird version of England, based on England that I know, but at the same time very different, almost the opposite of the country which was described in The Remains of the Day: the grand and magnificent, here dark and gray, as if the colors were eliminated or mitigated. Empty fields and the skies are covered, as seen in the coastal towns in winter, agreed well to the general feeling that I wanted to make history by including the love and friendship on a background of melancholy.
Just recently came out in Italy by James Ivory film The White Countess , of \u200b\u200bwhich she wrote the screenplay. As it developed its relationship with the cinema?
In fact the beginning of my career, I had already written a few screenplays. And later, when I became a full-time novelist, I continued to deal with passion for cinema, among other things, putting together a very extensive collection of DVDs and video. So the proposal to write the screenplay for The White Countess (and already a few years ago to The Saddest Music in the World , the filmmaker Canadian Guy Maddin) attracted me very much. Besides, as a novelist, working alone, a situation that in some ways I like, but with the passage of time also presents some risks, because the lack of a comparison hinders the possibility of personal growth. Even this, however, I find that writing fiction and film belong to two different worlds: a little 'because a script is never a "thing over," but has been conceived thinking of his target, a little' because it is necessary to think in terms of images and not words. There is also a third difference, that touches me in a special way: in the film the camera is the nature of things outside action. In short, there is no narrator in the film.
(from the "manifesto", 17 February 2006)
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