Securing Memories

Never Let Me Go, by Kazuo Ishiguro, is narrated by one of the main characters Kathy. The book is written so that it jumps between the past and present, where Kathy is a carer, and the reader is able to learn what it was like growing up as a clone and living at Hailsham. From this way of writing, Ishiguro emphasizes how even as fallible as memory and perception can be, they provide a sense of security for the characters to accept their fate. 

In the very beginning of the novel, Kathy’s current donor doesn’t want to discuss his past, rather, he wants to learn about Hailsham. Kathy realizes that “what he wanted was not just to hear about Hailsham, but to remember Hailsham, just like it had been his own childhood” (5). Kathy describes Hailsham to her donor in the time leading up to his completion and becoming immersed in Kathy’s good memories provides him a soothing comfort. Even though the memory isn’t his, it’s better than his actual memories and so it provides an escape into a fantasy. 

Early on, we know Kathy’s time caring for organ donors is soon going to end and she will become a donor herself. Similar to her past donor, it seems that Kathy recalling her memories at Hailsham with her friends Ruth and Tommy, is also a way to cope with her impending fate. When the kids are explicitly told what their purpose in life is, Kathy points out that “it feels like I always knew about donations in some vague way” (83). This explains why Kathy, Ruth and Tommy never tried to run away and only searched for deferral late in their lives. Even though Kathy had comfort in knowing what was going to happen, she still tried to cling to the good memories at Hailsham. Kathy tries hard to get the others at the Cottages to finish their readings and essays that were assigned before leaving Hailsham because “if our sense of essays being important was allowed to seep away, then so too would whatever bound us together as Hailsham student” (197-198). Throughout the entire novel, Kathy is aware of what every clones fate will eventually be, but, until replaying her memories and caring for donors, including Ruth and Tommy, she never seems quite ready to move on from the past. At the very end of the novel, Kathy acknowledges that she lost Hailsham and her friends, but she treasures what memories she still has of them. These memories are cormforting since they will be safely in her head where no one can take them, despite the process of giving up her organs.