Utopian Desire and Critical Dystopia in Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go and Cormac McCarthy’s The Road
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Abstract
This paper examines McCarthy’s The Road and Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go and argues that the two novels exhibit crucial characteristics of critical dystopia and utopian desire as conceptualized by Lyman Tower Sargent and Ildney Cavalcanti. Key characteristics of critical dystopia as discerned in the two works include the attempt to critique conditions of our contemporary world as well as offer better alternatives, the utilization of genre mixing, and the embodiment of open-endedness or the resistance to closure that aims at critically engaging the reader. The investigation reveals that in both novels utopia manifests itself as a desire that triggers a process towards better ways of being and the exploration of alternatives, rather than a blueprint for an ideal society. Significantly, utopianism in both novels is intrinsically a mode of writing that seeks to transform our way of thinking, as the reader is encouraged to become a desiring or a dissatisfied subject who has to formulate her/his utopia. The act of reading is thus crucial to the utopianism of both novels and a great deal of faith is placed on storytelling as a means to trigger the utopian desire and process.
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