THE REMAINS OF THE DAY: A POSTMODERN REFLECTION ON MEMORY, IDENTITY, AND NARRATIVE UNRELIABILITY

Abstract

Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day offers a postmodern exploration of memory, identity, and the unreliability of narrative. Through Stevens, the ageing butler, Ishiguro constructs a fragmented narrative that challenges the reader’s perception of truth and self-awareness. Stevens’s recollections of his service to Lord Darlington and his interactions with Miss Kenton are filtered through his rigid adherence to professionalism and dignity, creating a narrative steeped in self-deception and selective memory. The novel interrogates the reliability of Stevens’s perspective, revealing how his unwavering loyalty blinds him to Lord Darlington’s moral failings and his own emotional repression. Ishiguro employs the literary device of unreliable narration to underscore the tension between subjective memory and objective reality, inviting readers to question the authenticity of Stevens’s account. The novel’s non-linear structure mirrors the fragmented nature of memory, emphasizing the fluidity of identity and the impossibility of fully understanding the past. This paper examines through the lens of postmodern literary theory, focusing on how Ishiguro’s use of narrative unreliability, temporal disjunction, and introspective monologue challenges traditional notions of truth, selfhood, and historical accountability. The novel ultimately serves as a meditation on the human condition and the elusiveness of meaning.