Two-World Literature: Kazuo Ishiguro's Early Novels

161 Pages·2021·4.534 MB·English

by  Rebecca Suter (author)

TWO-WORLD
LITERATURE
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TWO-WORLD
LITERATURE
Kazuo Ishiguro’s Early Novels
Rebecca Suter
University of Hawai‘i Press
Honolulu
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© 2020 University of Hawai‘i Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Suter, Rebecca, author.
Title: Two-world literature : Kazuo Ishiguro’s early novels / Rebecca
Suter.
Description: Honolulu : University of Hawai‘i Press, 2020. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020007889 | ISBN 9780824882372 (cloth) | ISBN
9780824883256 (pdf) | ISBN 9780824883263 (epub) | ISBN 9780824883270
(kindle edition)
Subjects: LCSH: Ishiguro, Kazuo, 1954—Criticism and interpretation. |
Cultural fusion in literature.
Classification: LCC PR6059.S5 Z896 2020 | DDC 823/.914—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020007889
Cover art by Thomas Campi
University of Hawai‘i Press books are printed on acid-free
paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and
durability of the Council on Library Resources.
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To Olivier
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Contents

Acknowledgments ix

Chapter 1: A Two-World Author 1

Chapter 2: Across and Beyond Cultures 23

Chapter 3: Memory Can Be an Unreliable Thing 51

Chapter 4: Appearance and Pretense: Narrative Responsibility 76

Chapter 5: The Butler Did It: Diegetic Responsibility 99

Conclusion: A Two-World Literature 125

Notes 131

Works Cited 135

Index 141

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Acknowledgments

This book was the product of a long journey, and a number of different peo­
ple and institutions gave important contributions toward its realization. I first
discovered Kazuo Ishiguro’s fiction when I was a student at the University of
Napoli “l’Orientale” many years ago. I am grateful to professors Paolo Calvetti
and Donatella Izzo for encouraging me to follow my interest in this author as a
possible object of academic inquiry, and more broadly for inspiring me to pursue
critical analysis of world literature alongside my study of contemporary Japanese
culture. My interest in Ishiguro was rekindled during my years in Japan as a doc­
toral student on a Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and
Technology scholarship; I am particularly thankful to Professor Shibata Motoyuki
for his thought-provoking seminars at the University of Tokyo, which I attended
in a formative period of my life and that were important in shaping my vision of
literary studies and comparative cultures.
Over the years, many colleagues and friends helped me think through my
ideas about global fiction that coalesced in the concept of “two-world literature”
deployed in this book. I would like to thank, in no particular order, Christopher
Bolton, Susan Napier, Tatsumi Takayuki, Kotani Mari, Alisa Freedman, Eve
Zimmermann, Jim Dorsey, Will Gardner, Deborah Shamoon, Denis Taillandier,
Christophe Thouny, Matthew Fraleigh, Mary Knighton, Roger Pulvers, Tomoko
Aoyama, Barbara Hartley, Emerald King, Lucy Fraser, Jeffrey Angles, Emmanuel
Lozerand, Jaqueline Berndt, Toshio Miyake, Marcella Mariotti, Koichi Iwabuchi,
Charlotte Epstein, Giorgio Amitrano, Gala Follaco, Paola Scrolavezza, Chiara
Ghidini, Roberta Strippoli, Fabio Rambelli, Jolyon Thomas, Seth Jacobowitz,
Anna Zielinska-Elliott, David Karashima, Jay Rubin, Chikako Nihei, and Gitte
Hansen. A special mention goes to my colleague and friend Romit Dasgupta, who
passed away, way too young, in July 2018. His work on Ishiguro, while it may not
have been central to his own research, provided an inspiration for my analysis
with its genuinely transnational approach; I would have loved for him to be able
to read this book. I am sure that I speak for many of my colleagues in Australia
and throughout the world in saying we all miss him very much.
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