Nocturnes

Kazuo Ishiguro is one of my favourite authors. His books take the reader on voyages of the imagination; not just to other times and places but into the thoughts, feelings and memories of the central characters. He explores the power of the past on individual motives and actions. The unreliability of memory and the ways in which time, emotion and personal perception act as a prism to distort recollections are recurring themes.

It always takes me some pages to truly get into an Ishiguro novel. His writing has its own particular cadence and the dialogue is often stylised and - to my mind - betrays his Japanese routes even in those novels which aren't set there. Once I get into them, however, I find they have they have their own peculiar momentum and are ultimately satisfying.

Nocturnes is different. It is a series of five bitter-sweet short stories with a musical theme. The characters are all at some form of decision point whether personal or professional and reflecting on how they arrived at their current situation as well as their next steps.

For all that the stories were, of themselves, nice stories, the book lacked the impact that his novels have. Partly this was because none of the stories had a killer punch in the way, say, Remains of the Day does, partly this was because the short story format doesn't lend itself to the author's style. Ishiguro's books are populated with characters with complex feelings and motives which are developed and revealed gradually - many of the protagonists in Nocturnes are as well but these are underdeveloped. As a result, this reader was left with a lack of empathy for them.

Nocturnes is a pleasant distraction which belies the skill and talent of the author. One or two of the stories hint at something bigger - a story which could cover the canvas of a novel. Indeed, two of the stories share a character and I wonder if these might have originally been part of a greater whole in Ishiguro's mind. As it is though all that is left is, at best, a series poignant vignettes some of which could well have been critical points in a larger work but none of which left a lasting impression.

Andrew

P.S. I found it difficult to write this review and to criticise Ishiguro. For something more positive, please click here. For alternative views on this book, turn to Amazon or Goodreads.

A Pale View of Hills

Kazuo Ishiguro is one of my favourite novelists and I find reading one of his books is a bit like putting on a pair of old shoes that haven't been worn in a while - slightly strange at first while your feet adjust to the contours and feel of them. Once adjusted to his writing style though, he carries you along with tales which hint at hidden secrets kept tantalising just out of reach.

As with some of his other novels, much of the story told in flashback and explores the reliability of memory and the perspective that comes with age. If the past truly is a different country, though, it is doubly so here, set as it is in post-war Nagasaki.

The main protagonist is Etsuko who following the death of her daughter is reminded of a friendship she formed as a young woman in Japan before she moved to England. The book is largely set in a Japan in the throes of post war reconstruction and the Atom bomb is still a recent memory.

While some of the dialogue may seem overly-formal, stilted and lacking naturalism, I take this to be a reflection of the societal norms in Japan at that time. In places, it's almost as if it had been written in the Japanese and re-translated to English.

Throughout the book seems to be nothing more than a middle-aged woman remembering the events of a summer years below from which she is drawing parallels with the obvious future path of her own life. It is only in the last few pages that the extent of the unreliability of memory - and the ability of the mind to consciously or subconsciously construct it's own perspective of events - become, for want of a better word, clear.

This is book which leaves so many loose ends it's hard to know where to begin to sort them out. Paradoxically, it is this lack of clarity which makes the book all the more satisfying. It's as if by leaving the reader with lots of questions, Ishiguro neatly illustrates his point.


Andrew