The Remains of the Day

"If you read it, you can't help but come away thinking you've spent 10 hours living an alternate life and learned something about life and about regret."

"This won the Booker prize in 1989 and is written by someone of Japanese origin who so gets into the British mindset to write it. I was born in a British Colony, in Aden, South Yemen, and then went to Britain at the age of four. It was a different time then and there were still echoes of the 1930s, of the prewar time he describes in the book. Yes. The teachers at the school I went to were these crusty old types who said you had to adjust your tie before you spoke to them. Now they are all young things shagging each other and shagging the pupils. Remains of the Day is such a fantastically insightful study into the British character. This very British butler who doesn’t know what to make of change, being so rigidly adherent to his upbringing and he never gets to realise his true love. It’s all done in flashback so that we meet him going to visit her, the woman he loves, and he’s excited because finally now, after all this time, they might have the chance to be together, and he’s looking back at how he has been hurt by being who he is. And they meet, but there isn’t a love interest and nothing happens and he is sitting on a bench by the sea realising that he’s facing the remains of his day. It’s about missed chances and what the British character does to a person’s emotions. There is this brick wall that they can’t crack through and after a while a bit of the grout wears away and there is a chink to peer through, but it’s too late. Of course it was made into a wonderful film. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount ."

"The clarity that Ishiguro achieves is absolutely crystalline. It is quiet and calm and spellbinding."

"I love “Remains of the Day” — Ruth Prawer Jhabvala adapted Ishiguro’s book so brilliantly that both film and book lose nothing and gain so much."

"Kazuo Ishiguro, whose first three books are works of genius."