On the Uses of Nostalgia in Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go

This article examines the uses of nostalgia in Kazuo Ishiguro's dystopian novel Never Let Me Go. Set against a backdrop of pastoral England in the late 1990s, this fictional memoir of a clone named Kathy H. provides a poignant account of clones who are fated for compulsory organ donation and premature death. While Never Let Me Go can be seen as a nostalgia-inducing, feel-good commodity, its main function is to present a philosophy of reclaiming and repurposing what has been given through remembrance. The article also focuses on subjects who fail to use nostalgia as a therapeutic tool to counter despair, with special attention to an original character added in the Japanese television adaptation. To further augment this point, the article explores the possibility of queer nostalgia in Kathy's recollection of Miss Emily, Madame, and Ruth. This in-depth analysis of (queer) failed subjects tackles the question of how memories with rather negative valence, when remembered with endearment can operate as an acknowledgment of the act of wishing otherwise. The importance of Never Let Me Go as an affective cartography of hope is paramount in that it points to somewhere between despair and submission.