Never Let Me Go 2

Souls:
I enjoyed the cloning for/against discussion that we had in class. I think it brought up two important questions: do clones have souls, and what is human? There are several dictionary definitions of what 'soul' means: a) the immaterial essence, animating principle, or actuating cause of an individual life, b) the spiritual principle embodied in human beings, all rational and spiritual beings, or the universe; c) the moral and emotional nature of human beings (1). In the strict sense of the word, the characters in the novel obviously demonstrate emotionality and human-ness in the way they act and think. I also found an interesting review on the topic, which made a valuable comment saying, "Certainly in the Western tradition religion has pretty much accepted, even required, the existence of a 'soul,' though its precise nature or function remains often marvelously, even elegantly, ambiguous" (2). It seems to me that Ishiguro does not try to make an outwardly convincing argument that clones have souls; instead, he slowly weaves the reader into the very essence of the characters in the novel. He subtly and subconsciously demonstrates that they do have souls by showing and involving the reader. The fact that the novel does not contain violence or any challenge to this world that has created a "socially organized and approved system of murder" (2) is all the more alarming to the reader.

Sources:
1)Merriam Webster Online Dictionary - http://www.merriam-webster.com/netdict/soul
2)Marvin Mirsky Review - http://muse.jhu.edu.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/journals/perspectives_in_biology_and_medicine/v049/49.4mirsky.html

Dystopian Literature:
I have encountered Dystopian novels before without being introduced to the concept itself, so when the topic of Dystopian literature was brought up in class, the first novel that came to mind was The Road by Cormac McCarthy. Never Let Me Go and The Road are similar in that the narration makes the book very "real" and involves the reader. Whereas Never Let Me Go seems to be contained in proper English and a typical or accepted form of grammatical structure, perhaps as a reflection of the containment of the clones and theme of socially accepted norms, The Road has a loss of punctuation that reflects that all that exists is the mind as there is nothing else left.

"Special":
The way that none of the characters challenged or questioned the way things were bothered me (as seen in my other post). What interests me is the way the students are told "they are special" over and over. Is this the downfall of humanity? In order to brainwash them all they need to do is to give them a sense of belonging, of reason, of purpose for their lives. This tie is strong enough to suppress individuality, imprison them in their predestined life, and prevent them from questioning. Is this really a fundamental quality of humans? - of the humans that created these clones and are given meaning in their superiority/importance of existence, of humans in real life (think of gangs and cults, or even social groupings in schools or society's hierarchies). Anyways, I digress...