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The Remains of the Day
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12 May 2004, 02:29
<table><tr><td valign="top" rowspan="2"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0679731725/gmatclub0c-20?dev-t=D12SE2OB5WPKEB%26camp=2025%26link_code=sp1"><img src="https://images.amazon.com/images/P/0679731725.01.MZZZZZZZ.jpg" align="right" border="0" alt="Click to buy from Amazon: The Remains of the Day"/></a></td><td rowspan="2"> </td><td valign="top" class="gcNormal">:: <a class="gclink_undecorated" href='https://www.gmatclub.com/content/resources/reviews/index.php?changeCategory()&browse()'>reviews home</a> » <a class="gclink_undecorated" href='https://www.gmatclub.com/content/resources/reviews/index.php?changeCategory(%2Fbooks)&browse()'>Books</a> » <a class="gclink_undecorated" href='https://www.gmatclub.com/content/resources/reviews/index.php?changeCategory(%2Fbooks%2Ffiction)&browse()'>Fiction</a><br/><br/><b>The Remains of the Day</b><br/><i>Kazuo Ishiguro; </i><br/>Price: $10.40; Used: $0.78<br/><br/><a href="https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0679731725/gmatclub0c-20?dev-t=D12SE2OB5WPKEB%26camp=2025%26link_code=sp1"><img border="0" src="https://www.gmatclub.com/design/templates/gcCatalog/books/buy.gif" alt="buy from amazon"/></a></td></tr><tr><td class="gcNormal"><br/><br/>"A tragic, spiritual portrait of a perfect English butler and his reaction to his fading insular world in post-war England. A wonderful, wonderful book" - Amazon.com
Call me a sentimental, but here is another fantastic and sad book. There has been a movie with Sir Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson; the movies is good but it omits about half of the events.
The book has spectacular language and beautiful, beautiful sentences. Kazuo Ishiguro really uses the power of language to bring up his story. I have read several of his other books "When We Were Orphans" but he did not hit it there. _The Remains of the Day_ is a true inspiration.
Short summary of the book:
The novel's narrator, Stevens, is a perfect English butler who tries to give his narrow existence form and meaning through the self-effacing, almost mystical practice of his profession. In a career that spans the second World War, Stevens is oblivious of the real life that goes on around him -- oblivious, for instance, of the fact that his aristocrat employer is a Nazi sympathizer. Still, there are even larger matters at stake in this heartbreaking, pitch-perfect novel -- namely, Stevens' own ability to allow some bit of life-affirming love into his tightly repressed existence.
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