How Do People Lie to Themselves to Make Failure Palatable in the "Remains of the Day"?

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English Essay By Anthony Yan 1) ‘I was interested in how people lie to themselves to make things palatable, to dignify their failures.’ Discuss this comment by Ishiguro in the light of The Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro’s “The Remains of the Day” is a story primarily focused on the overpowering regret and sorrow that we experience through Stevens; the head butlers collected narrative. On the story itself Ishiguro was interested in how people “lied to themselves to dignify their failures” and in the “Remains of the Day” this statement holds true as the central characters: Stevens, Ms. Kenton and Lord Darlington all make mistakes that affect Stevens’ life; what Stevens recalls as fond memories is ironically seen to us as the one-by-one loss of all of his assets. Stevens’ personal regret laid in the unneeded sacrifice of the little familial time left between Stevens and his father Stevens Senior, this allowed Stevens to realize his blind misguided devotion to his employer Lord Darlington. Ms. Kenton’s marriage to Mr Benn and their eventual child chained her to an existence she never wanted to spend with anyone other than Stevens and her own regret heavily affected Stevens when they met again. In Darlington Hall, Lord Darlington made monumental mistakes in the name of the country and believed he was accomplishing something good and positive until he realized that he was indeed “out of his depth” and with his sickness overcoming him he passes away leaving Stevens alone to survey the extent of Darlington’s “good will” which was nothing but incompetent decisions made by an amateur. “The Remains of the Day” is an insightful book on the statement of how people lie to themselves to make failures palatable and creates a rich environment full of painful but deeply embedded memories that each character has to relive in order to come to terms with themselves and each other.

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