Quote

Because maybe, in a way, we didn't leave it behind nearly as much as we might once have thought. Because somewhere underneath, a part of us stayed like that: fearful of the world around us, and no matter how much we despised ourselves for it--unable quite to let each other go.

Kazuo Ishiguro

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Kazuo Ishiguro
Age: 70
Born: 1954
Born: November 8
Author
Lyricist
Novelist
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
Songwriter
Writer
Ishiguro Kazuo
Sir Kazuo Ishiguro
Matter
Leave
Underneath
Much
Quite
Stayed
Way
Maybe
Unable
Like
Didn
Fearful
World
Around
Nearly
Thought
Somewhere
Part
Behinds
Might
Behind
Despised

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It is one of the enjoyments of retirement that you are able to drift through the day at your own pace, easy in the knowledge that you have put hard work and achievement behind you.
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I quizzed him a lot on this point and i suspect the truth was that it was like a lot of things at that age: you don't have any clear reason, you just do it. You do it because you think it might get a laugh, or because you want to see if it'll cause a stir. And when you're asked to explain afterwards, it doesn't seem to make any sense.
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People were incredibly kind to our family and went out of their way to help.
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There was a time you saw me once, one afternoon, in the dormitories. There was no one else around, and I was playing this tape, this music. I was sort of dancing with my eyes closed and you saw me.' '...yes, I remember that occasion. I still think about it from time to time.' 'That's funny, so do I.
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I took one glance at her in that hospital bed under the dull light and recognised the look on her face, which I'd seen on donors often enough before. It was like she was willing her eyes to see right inside herself, so she could patrol and marshal all the better the separate areas of pain in her body.
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It didn't hurt, did it? When I hit you? Sure. Fractured skull. Concussion, the lot... But seriously, Kath. No hard feelings, right? I'm awfully sorry. I honestly am.
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It was like being given a maths problem when your brain's exhausted, and you know there's some far-off solution, but you can't work up the energy even to give it a go. Something in me just gave up.
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We all live inside bodies that will deteriorate. But when you look at human beings, they're capable of very decent things: love, loyalty. When time is running out, they don't care about possessions or status. They want to put things right if they've done wrong.
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What interests me is the surprising enormous extent to which most people accept the fate that's been given to them, and find some dignity.
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When I was younger, I didn't read that much. I was more interested in film and music. Now I'm curious. I want to know what it's all about.
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There was another life that I might have had, but I am having this one.
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What do you think dignity's all about?' The directness of the inquiry did, I admit, take me rather by surprise. 'It's rather a hard thing to explain in a few words, sir,' I said. 'But I suspect it comes down to not removing one's clothing in public.
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As I say, I have never in all these years thought of the matter in quite this way but then it is perhaps in the nature of coming away on a trip such as this that one is prompted towards such surprising new perspectives on topics one imagined one had long ago thought throughly.
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I couldn't speak Japanese very well, passport regulations were changing, I felt British and my future was in Britain. And it would also make me eligible for literary awards. But I still think I'm regarded as one of their own in Japan.
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Even at the time, I realised this couldn't be right, that this interpretation didn't fit with the rest of the lyrics. But that wasn't an issue with me. The song was about what I said, and I used to listen to it again and again, on my own, whenever I got the chance.
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We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.
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The world is crawling with authors touring now. They're like performance artists.
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I like the fact that by mimicking the way memory works, a writer can actually write in a fluid way - one solid scene doesn't have to fall on another solid scene, you can just have a fragment that then dovetails into another one that took place 30 years apart from it.
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