A Study Of Unreliable Narration In The Remains Of The Day

Kazuo Ishiguro is a famous Japanese-born English novelist in the 20^th century,who is considered as one of the“Three Migrant Giants”in the literary field of Britain,the other two scholars are V.S.Naipaul and Salman Rushdie.The unreliability of Stevens'narration in The Remains of the Day is explored in this thesis by adopting the theories of Wayne Booth and James Phelan on the unreliable narration of the protagonist Stevens to reveal the effects of it.The unreliable narration in The Remains of the Day in this thesis are from three aspects,namely the unreliable narrator,the three axes,and the narrative progress.First,the unreliability of the narrator Stevens is analyzed,which can be separated into two parts,concentrating on Stevens'unreliable narration about himself and other characters.Second,the unreliability of Stevens'narration is analyzed according to the three axes,the Axe of Facts and Events,the Axe of Ethics and Values,and the Axe of Perception and Knowledge.Third,the unreliability of narrative progression is analyzed,which is consisted of two parts,part A analyzes the instabilities caused by conflicts between Stevens and other characters,and part B portrays the tensions caused by distances between Stevens'narration and the readers'comprehension.Based on these conflicts,the stories are readable and the unreliability of Stevens'narration can be found by readers.The last part of this thesis is the conclusion,it can be pointed out that the unreliable narration of Stevens is so fascinating and interesting for it brings the readers a lot to think carefully and deeply about the reason why Stevens narrates in the unreliable way.