A review of the novel “Klara And The Sun” by Kazuo Ishiguro
Ishiguro is a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature but has only written eight novels. This is his latest – published in 2021 – and the third that I have read (after “The Remains Of The Day” and “Never Let Me Go”). Like all his work, the writing is deceptively simple but the messaging profound.
This time, the narrator – the eponymous Klara – is a robot or, in the language of the undefined future setting, an Artificial Friend (AF). More specifically, she is a B2 from the fourth series, which – although not as top of the range as a B3 – is one with many unique qualities, most notably “her appetite for observing and learning”. While having outstanding observational skills, she has a simplistic view of many matters, most relevantly her belief that the Sun dispenses “special nourishment” and “great kindness”.
Klara is chosen as friend to 14 year old Josie who is ill for reasons which only slowly become apparent. Josie is loved in different ways by The Mother, The Father, Melania Housekeeper, her childhood sweetheart Rick, and in time even by Klara herself and this delightful and moving novel is essentially a meditation on what it means to love.