Negotiating forms, experimenting genres : a study of Kazuo Ishiguro in three novels: the remains of the day, never let me go & the buried giant

This dissertation aims to interrogate the genre conventions and stereotypes as employed by British novelist, Kazuo Ishiguro, particularly in the post-war novel of manners, The Remains of the Day, the dystopian sci-fi narrative, Never Let Me Go, and finally, the medieval fantasy romance, The Buried Giant as literary devices. Arguing that instead of simply conforming to the genre-specific stylistic stereotypes of the aforementioned genres, Ishiguro first draws his readers into his stories with the use of these familiar genre cues, and then transgresses them both to create narrative tension and negotiate with his readers his unique viewpoints and beliefs regarding some of his recurring ideas surrounding the human condition: loss, the fragility of human memory and how we cope with them. Ultimately, I hope to demonstrate that as a writer, Ishiguro aims to interrogate the boundaries of not just what he considers to be genres but also fictional narratives.Master of Arts (HSS