Ishiguro, A Pale View of Hills Essay Example

how Sachiko had a girl named Mariko whom her mother had intended to take her along with an American soldier to America.

The story as the Etsuko narrates can be paralleled to her own. One of the obvious facts that come out in the story that Etsuko is narrating, is the similarities between her story and Mariko’s story. It can then be said that she highlights her own story but distances herself because of reasons that are known to her. One of the main reasons why this assumption may be true is that Etsuko may not feel comfortable in mentioning her dead daughter’s name Keiko and as she puts it “I have no great wish to dwell on Keiko right now, it brings me little comfort” (11).

Etsuko points out that Niki comes to somehow reassure her that she was not responsible for the death of Keiko. It is with this that Etsuko tries to give the story of Mariko to draw parallels to her life without necessary mentioning the name of her daughter who committed suicide. The author provides a disturbing story one that is full of grief and examines what people try to hide about the truth in the way we know about things, tell them and deny the basic essence of the truth.

Ishiguro has done a marvelous job in presenting this literal masterpiece and the use of the Japanese middle aged woman to narrate the story has turned out to be a huge success of the novel. The novel obviously has some flaws with the lack of proportionality in length and a slight plot being one of its

downfalls. However, the novel comes out great and the story that tends to capture the emotional turbulence that Etsuko is going through comes out just fine.