When We Were Orphans (OME)

by Kazuo Ishiguro | Other |
ISBN: 0571205623 Global Overview for this book
Registered by manuma of Herisau, Appenzell Ausserrhoden Switzerland on 8/20/2009
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3 journalers for this copy...
Journal Entry 1 by manuma from Herisau, Appenzell Ausserrhoden Switzerland on Thursday, August 20, 2009
Very moving.

Journal Entry 2 by wingOBCZ-TeddysDenwing at Café Gloria (OBCZ) in Zürich, Zürich Switzerland on Thursday, February 21, 2019

Released 5 yrs ago (2/21/2019 UTC) at Café Gloria (OBCZ) in Zürich, Zürich Switzerland

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Journal Entry 3 by spy-there at Zürich, Zürich Switzerland on Thursday, February 21, 2019
I know just the Buried Giant by Ishiguro. Now I'm curious to read something "modern* by this author. Well, as modern as 1930.

Journal Entry 4 by spy-there at Zürich, Zürich Switzerland on Friday, April 5, 2019
This is one most strange novel. Foremost, Ishiguro, the first-person narrator of Japanese origin, writes as if he'd be an English man, which is confusing of course, but probably deliberately so. Could also be that he splits his hero, since there is the English boy Christopher Banks and his Japanese friend Akira.
Both grow up in the Shanghai International Settlement in the early 20th century. When Christopher is about ten, his father, an opium trader, suddenly disappears, shortly after, his mother too. The police is not able to find them. Christopher is sent to England to live with his aunt. He is so traumatised by his parents' disappearance that he wants to become a detective. This is all told in retrospective. 1937, Christopher is a succesful detective and found his place in the London society. However, the case about his parents is still unsolved, and one day he goes back to Shanghai to definitely find them ...
It is not a detective story, "the case" remains vague, is never explained. Christopher "solved" it now, he believes. He knows exactly, where his parents are kept captive. But he never tells nor hints how he came to his conclusions.
What starts out as a warbled memory of childhood, turns into a strangely stiff affair of attraction (or love?) to a married woman and finally becomes a nightmare of war. On his obscure search for the certain house which contains his parents, Christopher stumbles through the front lines of the Second Sino-Japanese War and finds his old friend Akira again who is now a Japanese soldier. He drags the severly wounded Akira along and demands that he'd help him search for that house. The story gets more and more disconnected, at the end it feels like playing a video game, one of these horrid ego-shooters.
I don't know what to make of this. I've read on because I wanted to know how he would pull the story out again from this muddled plot. But it was mostly like a bad dream. Maybe also due Christopher's utter selfishness, as he is mostly oblivious to things happening around him, simply follows this stubborn notion of his "case" (over dead bodies if needed) which turns out as a big delusion. Not really a likeable figure.

Journal Entry 5 by spy-there at Café Gloria (OBCZ) in Zürich, Zürich Switzerland on Friday, April 19, 2019

Released 4 yrs ago (4/18/2019 UTC) at Café Gloria (OBCZ) in Zürich, Zürich Switzerland

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came to the meetup

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