abuout family and Kazuo Ishiguro

Haven’t been here for a while! I was in Italy for a week and then busy before and busy after my trip.

In Italy was great as my sister had two days off from work so adding the weekend we had whole 4 days together!

I’m going to Poland on Saturday and after what is happening in Poland it’s the right time to go. There are problems with my grandma. My aunt called us when I was in Italy saying that grandma has possibly had a small stroke and to the shock of everybody refused to be taken to the hospital! The ambulance came and had to leave as she said she is not going anywhere, they asked my aunt to sign something and left. My grandmother has always been afraid of hospitals and doctors, well so do I, but in her case it can get worse and the results can be awful.

I’m glad I’m going to Poland with my parents, I hope my mum will push her to check or at least take some med! Her blood pressure is very, very high and she also refuses to take pills… I’m afraid of that trip as I can’t imagine the situation. My aunt says as much as she can but we all know that her mum (grandma) told her not to say anything to us. When we spoke to grandma she said what has happened but she sounded surprised that we knew. I’m also worried about my aunt, she looks after my grandma but she is emotionally worn out as my grandma can be very, very difficult. Ohh…anyway I’m just worried about what is happening in there!

On he brighter sight! Yesterday I went to the meeting with Kazuo Ishiguro. I went there out of curiosity and because it was for free at my previous university. I wasn’t very much into it as I didn’t read any of his books, mainly because I didn’t enjoy the movie ‘Never Let Me Go’ I have set an image of this author in my head as a bit depressing etc and decided not to waste my time on his books. And then I’ve listened to him and I was really moved by what he was saying, to the extend that when after a meeting (huge hall full of people) he agreed to sign the books I run out of the building to the nearest bookstore (it was quite a run) to buy a copy of Never Let Me Go just to be back in time to get my copy signed. The queue was soooooo long that he was signing the books for an hour!

He said that he thought about Never Let Me Go as quite a cheerful book, and he was surprised when he heard it sounded depressing to many, his idea about this book was to concentrate on the human relationships…in fact he said when he writes he mainly concentrates on the relationships between the character, and then the character in itself grows out of this relationship and form as a character. He didn’t say it exactly same way but it was something like this. I liked it as I always thought that in writing you need to concentrate a lot on a single character as the individual…but his explanation gave a very different approach and I think he is right.

When I thought about this I’ve realised that our real nature and individualism can only come out through the relationships with other person/people, as a single character without any relationships I can only imagine who I am and believe in this…for example I’ve never thought of myself as a person who can easily loose control over my anger before I started to live with my parents for a while..then I saw it…if not for the relationship (a stromy one)with my mum, I wouldn’t know that I can get that angry. I will live in my bubble judging others who loose control and think of myself as a stable and wonderfull character. I think relationships show a truth about us, maybe it sounds depressing sometimes because often they show this darker truth about us, and this is what Kazuo has said to explain why his novel might has appeared depressing to some. Oh not sure how clear it all sounds and if it makes sense 😉 hope it does! I will read it once I’m done with Jodi Picoult ‘Keeping Faith’ (another great book!)

the book and the movie