The Remains of the Day in Reading with Style

Jan 10, 2017 Claire rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 1001-books-to-read-before-you-die

What a beautiful book! I thoroughly enjoyed it and can't rate it with less than 5 stars ...more

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Sep 21, 2018 Shirley (stampartiste) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: challenge-bingo-2018

My overwhelming feeling when I finished this book was one of sadness for Mr. Stevens, the narrator and main character. Because it would be difficult for me to say anything about this book without giving away the essence of the story, I will put the rest of my review in spoiler brackets.

(view spoiler) My overwhelming feeling when I finished this book was one of sadness for Mr. Stevens, the narrator and main character. Because it would be difficult for me to say anything about this book without giving away the essence of the story, I will put the rest of my review in spoiler brackets.

(view spoiler)[ Mr. Stevens narrates his story of being a butler/valet primarily to one man, Lord Darlington in the first half of the 20th century. It is this role that defines his life. We meet Mr. Stevens in 1956, his present time. But his story goes back decades as he reminisces about his life as butler at Darlington Hall. Mr. Stevens paints a picture of a man whose very nature is one of complete control… over himself and over those who work for him. The most important thing in his life is to attain the highest level of what he termed “dignity” as a butler and be numbered among these elite few.

But what makes this so sad is that Mr. Stevens missed out on life. He tethered his goals to a system that was no longer of any value. The world had changed, but he was too insulated at Darlington Hall to realize it. He sacrificed his life to serve the life of someone he believed merited it, only to find that Lord Darlington’s values were just as flawed as his. So Mr. Stevens comes to the end of his life realizing that he could have experienced a life with someone who loved him (Miss Kenton), but whom he couldn’t allow to come between him and his value system. And how tragic that he forced himself not to look back on his life because that process would have been too painful.

In looking to the genesis of Mr. Stevens’ aspirations in life, I thought it so tragic that he was trying to emulate a man who also could not love or be loved… his own father. Mr. Stevens held his father as his idol and lived his life in such a way that he would make this unbending man proud. So in a sense, Mr. Stevens gave his life away twice: once to his father, and once to Lord Darlington. What a heavy price to pay for respect alone.

The one gleam of hope is when Mr. Stevens realizes that he “should adopt a more positive outlook and try to make the best of what remains of my day.” He even begins to look forward to practicing his “bantering” skills in order to develop human warmth with his new employer, Mr. Farraday.

For me, this was just a wonderful, tragic story of wasted lives. (hide spoiler)]

As to Mr. Ishiguro's writing style, it is impeccable!
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Aug 15, 2013 Thomas Acland rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, modern-classics, 20th-century, war, 1980-s, set-in-the-uk, seen-the-film, world-book-night-2012, man-booker-prize-winner, man-booker-prize-nominee

I really enjoyed reading this book but it's not one that you can pinpoint your enjoyment down to any specific component of the novel.

It is essentially the reminiscences of Mr Stevens, a good old fashioned English butler of a grand house in Oxfordshire. Now given that one of the character traits of an old fashioned butler is to have an largely uneventful life in the service of the master of the house this does not really set up the premise for a exciting novel. The butler in this novel is every I really enjoyed reading this book but it's not one that you can pinpoint your enjoyment down to any specific component of the novel.

It is essentially the reminiscences of Mr Stevens, a good old fashioned English butler of a grand house in Oxfordshire. Now given that one of the character traits of an old fashioned butler is to have an largely uneventful life in the service of the master of the house this does not really set up the premise for a exciting novel. The butler in this novel is every bit that man never really doing anything extraordinary or unusual for a man in his position.

So far I have painted a fairly bleak and boring picture for this novel and has the same plot been taken on by another author or written by the same author in a different style then I could easily have been a very dull read.

However this is far from being the case. The vividness with which one can can view the scenes in this novel is what really makes it stand out, you can really get into the scenes and see things through the eyes of Mr Stevens. This isn't because of the wonderful descriptions of the scenes, in fact so far as I remember the book had a general lack of scene setting and left a lot of the images to the imagination of the reader. What makes you able to see into this book with such clarity is the narration, the novel is narrated in full by Mr Stevens the style of narration feels almost personal allowing you to empathise with him and experience his memories in exactly the way the author would have wanted you too.

I'm clearly not alone in thinking there is something special in the way this book has been written, the novel won the Man Booker prize in 1989 and was included on the world book night list in 2012.

It has also been made into a very successful film, it's not initially the type of novel that I would consider to make a good film since it lacks in action and relies so heavily on it's narration for it's quality. However the film is clearly working it was nominated for 8 OSCARs including best picture and best lead (both male and female). I haven't yet seen the film but am looking forward to seeing how they have adapted this work. ...more

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Jan 27, 2015 Ed Lehman rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 1001-list, 2015-reading-challenge-books, completed-1001-list-book

Perhaps I have been reading too many stream-of-consciousness works lately, but this work struck me as one of the most clear and precise uses of the English language I have ever read. The reader is brought into the mind and circumstances of a head butler and learns bit by bit about the events which cause him to question his long-held tenets of dignity, loyalty and obligation. He begins to realize that he may need a new perspective for the remainder of his days. A beautiful novel and I'm putting I ...more

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