The Influence Of Empires’ Vicissitude On The Protagonists’ Identity Construction In Kazuo Ishiguro’s Novels

When We Were Orphans (referred to as Orphans hereafter), The Remains ofthe Day (referred to as Remains hereafter), and An Artist of the Floating World(referred to as Artist hereafter) are three important works by Kazuo Ishiguro withRemains winning Booker Prize in1989and the rest two of them shortlisted forBooker Prize. In these three novels, Kazuo Ishiguro presents objectively to readersthe vicissitude of British Empire and Imperial Japan through the protagonistsidentity construction. Besides, from them, Ishiguro s artistic ideas of theinternational stance would be seen obviously. In addition, Ishiguro has not onlypresented to readers the rise and fall of British Empire and Imperial Japan, but alsoreprimands the colonial predatory behavior and the Eurocentric ideology of BritishEmpire and condemns the behavior of Japan s launching wars against China andits imperial ideologies. In order to explore Ishiguro s artistic ideas, this paper aimsto probe into the process of the protagonists identity construction to conclude thattheir identity construction is affected by the vicissitude of British Empire andImperial Japan. Apart from that, this paper also attempts to explore the practicalsignificance of Kazuo Ishiguro s creative themes and tries to replenish thedeficiency of the researches and studies within the academic field upon KazuoIshiguro.The paper is mainly composed of three chapters. Chapter One examines theconstruction process of Banks and Akira in Orphans and tries to argue that bothBanks and Akira s identities are influenced by the heyday of British and Japaneseempires. Since both Banks and Akira who are the ones alienated by people of theirown nation in their childhood become representatives of their nations in theirmanhood, after taking into consideration the factors of the time period andhistorical events in this novel, this chapter argues that the construction of their identities is mainly affected by the imperialism during the heyday of British andJapanese empires. Chapter Two mainly examines the construction process ofStevens in Remains and tries to argue that his identity is affected by the collapse ofBritish Empire. In post-imperial England, imperialism is gradually substituted anddemocracy becomes the dominant ideology. Since in Remains, Stevens s identity ischallenged by democracy and it is under the influence of democracy inpost-imperial England that Stevens s identity is reconstructed, therefore thischapter aims to conclude that Stevens s identity is strongly influenced bydemocracy in post-imperial England. Chapter Three studies the constructionprocess of Ono in Artist and is to demonstrate that Ono s identity construction isaffected by the decline of Imperial Japan. After WWII, with the decline ofImperial Japan, imperialism is replaced by democracy and people come toabandon imperialism and begin to admit their wrongdoing guided by this ideology.In Artist, since the identity of Ono undergoes a process from being loyal to andpersistent of imperialism to abandon imperialism and accept democracy, this papersuggests that the reason why Ono reconstructs his identity is because of thechallenge of democracy after Imperial Japan collapses.As the study shows, with depictions in Orphans, Remains, and Artist, it isobvious that the identities of the protagonists in the three novels are affected bythe vicissitude of British Empire and Imperial Japan. Besides, in the world wheremany a history is distorted, Ishiguro s criticism of England and Japan s cruel deedsis also worthy of praise. What s more, this specific creative idea also manifestsIshiguro s thinking over human beings and the society in which they live.