Death Between Europe And Japan:Kazuo Ishiguro’s A Pale View Of Hills And An Artist Of The Floating World

This paper takes the “death” in two works of Ishiguro that A Pale View of Hills and An Artist of the Floating world,as the starting point,and putting “death” into the historical context that after the World WarⅡ.It explores that Ishiguro’s “death” writing is not only limited to the physiological death of the characters in the novels,but also contains that Ishiguro thoughts on the relationship between Japanese traditional culture and Western culture.And that Kazuo Ishiguro’s thinking and writing comes from Japanese-British identity and his pursuit of international writing goal.In the first chapter,the author takes Kenji Ono,an executive of the enterprise,Yukio Noguchi,in An Artist of the Floating,and keiko in A Pale View of Hills as the analysis objects.The cause of death of the deceased are not only the traditional spirit of Bushido of Japan,but also the guilt culture of the western.At the same time,it also implies the collision between traditional culture and modern culture.The second chapter puts the living in the historical and cultural context after the Second World War,analyzing the attitude and the influence of death on them.And that reveal the repentance of the living,the generation gap of ideas,the evasion of war responsibility,and the reflection on culture.Ono’s attitude towards the dead in The Aritist of the Floating world shows the generation gap between him and the young,and reveals his shirking of war responsibilities.In A Pale View of the Hills,Etsuko expresses her repentance for her daughter Keiko through memory,meanwhile,reflecting her prejudice against traditional culture.The third chapter compares the two works of Ishiguro in the world literature,probing into his reflection on the Eastern and Western culture in his creation.First of all,kazuo Ishiguro made it clear in the novel that the emperor and the elite should be responsible for the war by writing "death".At the same time,he also eliminated the responsibility to some extent by expressing sympathy,which are the same and different with many post-war Japanese writers.In addition,by comparing the image of Keiko with that of the "The Angry Young Man" and Characters of "rogue" writers,kazuo Ishiguro pays attention to the confused situation of the post-war generation of youth in the East and the West.The fourth chapter mainly discusses the identity background and international writingstrategies of Ishiguro,which reflect the content of the previous three chapters.“Death”characteristics in two works are derived from the complex cultural background of Ishiguro’s expriences,who was born in Japan and grown up in England,and rooted in the strategy of his international writing.The conclusion summarizes the distance between Kazuo Ishiguro,Japanese culture and Western culture,and also reveals the integration of different cultures of two works.It makes clear that the death writing of A Pale View of Hills and An Aritist of the Floating world has dual cultural attributes.There are Kazuo Ishiguro’s reflections on war and life.