I put off reading this for a while.
It’s a strange novel, though not unexpectedly so. I’ve not read anything by Kazuo Ishiguro but I suspect it’s on point for his style, partly because the reviewer quote on the cover describes it as such, but more so because the composition is so particular and distinctive and unexpected. How could it not have come from a stylistically unique author? And how could that author’s style not then come through — if perhaps in other ways — in his other texts?
The novel is partly strange because everything takes place from the point of view of a robot or ‘AF’ who is something between a robot and an autonomous android friend for kids. The show begins in the store where the AFs are sold, with Klara studying the city through the shop window.
The intensity — emotionally, intellectually — certainly ramps up, with a storyline that explores fears of human replacement by mechanization — both in industry and, more challengingly, in personal life. It’s profoundly eerie at points, and strangely intellectual.
And it’s not just ‘replacement’ it explores. It asks the question of … is there anything unique to each of us? Or is our consciousness just patterns that can be studied and replicated? The text takes an implicit position as the main proponent character of this view that “individual humans are nothing unique — their experience can even be replicated” comes across as lost and disturbed. However the text also portrays the AFs themselves are unique and vital. The implication is something more like: all conscious things are unique and irreplaceable.
The exception to this is in Klara’s animistic view of the sun, who she regards as a kind of benevolent spirit-diety-element.
I don’t know quite what to make of it.
There are some irritating aspects of the text. For one, I still don’t understand what the ‘Cootings Machine’ does (it seems like it lays down pavement or performs some other street construction function, while spewing out smoke) and there doesn’t seem to be any character interested in assessing the purpose or benefit of the ‘Cootings Machine.’ Klara reflexively treats it and it’s pollutive outputs as a threat to the sunlight and well being, when one might imagine an AF seeing it as a distant, outdated, mechanical relative, or a frustrating necessity of urban life, or any number of other curious or analytical responses. Of course, the AF functioning in an incomprehensible intuitive way throughout the text is part of what makes her perspective so interesting.
Practically, the novel does an incredible job of demonstrating what personality traits would actually be appreciable vs not in a sophisticated social robot. The contrasting endearment (Klara and Rosa) and uncanniness (B3s, or the ‘portrait’) are strongly felt and rooted in clear inclinations towards the world, other people, and other AFs.
One might call these positive traits (in context of the story)… sincerity, loyalty, likability, uniqueness + limited or particular compatibility (analogous to e.g. ‘the wand choosing the wizard’), having preferences (vs e.g. sycophancy), relatable fallibility or limitations that invite human aid and collaboration. The negative traits (associated with the B3’s) are: social competitiveness and a zero sum outlook on interaction, uncanny physical performances, arrogance. Of course, much of this is specific to the story context — I imagine a story could be re-written such that a kinder AF demonstrates it’s character through the use of it’s superior technical capabilities, and thererby renders them in a new light.
In context of the novel, one of Klara’s most appreciable inclinations / aspects of her worldview is that she connects humans with natural elements (the sun) a restorative way (she herself is powered by solar absorption and consequently has a particular appreciation for and of it’s rays). In this way, the novel offers up Klara as a kind of example of a technology that ‘heals’ the relationship between humans and nature (in contrast to other machines in the text like the Cootings Machine or the B3s), and perhaps between humans and one-another as well.
I take this as perhaps the essential offering of the novel: i.e. ‘it is possible to create technology that facilitates improve relationship with other humans and with nature — and here is a lovable character that embodies this idea.’ Klara is like a technological embodiment of the ‘soft path’ — an unexpected, autonomous, solarpunk hero.
And, honestly, I don’t love it. Or rather, I’m conflicted over particular aspects. I love that there’s a character that constitutes a particularly healthy, healing technological marvel. I appreciate the various villains are complex and relevant. But I can’t stand that the resolution is so naturalistic and mystical, nor that the purpose of the ‘Cootings Machine’ is left ambiguous: wouldn’t Klara, for all her curiosity and observational ability, want to understand why humans operate such machinery? What it’s purpose was?
And yet, as a character and as a creation, Klara reads as deeply ‘internally complete’ — such a perfect autonomous friend that she wants nothing more than the well-being of her young charge with little appreciation in return. By the end of the story — having been focused on the plight of the humans dealing with a changing world and delighted by the heroism of Klara in supporting them — I was left with an immense sense of failure for not having considered Klara herself, who retires to a grassy field to rewatch memories of her life and slowly fade away. Her serenity and satisfaction at the end suddenly emphasize the strange tragedy of her creation: what have we done by creating a, seemingly, sentient creature who’s only fulfillment is serving as a disposable friend. If she is not sentient, then the friendship was a pretense, a deception. If she is sentient, then the friendship seems a cruel theft of free will.
I think these are some of the questions Ishiguro wished the reader to ask.
There is much more to the story. Some kids are ‘lifted’ — engineered with enhanced intelligence in their youth through a risky, sometimes lethal, process. It’s a dark and possible portrayal of the future — valuable to render clearly as a means of avoiding it, though I wish I could see a more optimistic or inspiring version.