“And I saw a little girl, her eyes tightly closed, holding to her breast the old kind world, one that she knew in her heart could not remain, and she was holding it and pleading, never to let her go.”

Through his exquisite lines in Never Let Me Go, published in 2005, Ishiguro presented us with a novel dystopian world with the existence of clones. Unlike what people typically expect of the clones' lives, devoid of passion and the sole meaning of their existence is for their organs, they possess emotions, love, hope, resentment, and most importantly, a soul. 

The story reveals through the narrator, Kathy, constantly moving back and forth in time, going on with her life, and continually reminiscing her past: her life at Hailsham and her two prominent friends, Tommy and Ruth. Kathy lives in the era where medical advancements in the 1950s and 1960s led to a breakthrough in human cloning. In this society, clones are created to be raised in special institutions like Hailsham, where they are educated but are also isolated from the outside world. They have been destined for a pre-determined bleak fate since they came into existence, serving as organ donors to real humans in the brightest years of their life. After several rounds of donation, they ultimately come to their “completion” — the early death of the clones.

“We took away your art because we thought it would reveal your souls. Or to put it more finely, we did it to prove you had souls at all.” The omnipresent issue of ethics and morality flows between the lines throughout the novel. Though Ms. Emily, the Head of the Guardians, claims that all the students should be grateful since they are literate and had a pleasant childhood protected from the public’s odium, she keeps emphasizing how the clones' lives were way more harrowing and gruesome than theirs and how she has tried her best to create a better environment for the clones. However, it is pretty ironic that though Ms. Emily does, in the end, prove that the clones have a sense of identity and are just like typical humans by collecting their artworks, so what? She still feels revulsion when giving lessons to the students, prompting the deep-rooted alienation and bias in her, suggesting she still does not accept these students as normal. Ms. Emily cannot even convince herself; she still considers all the students she brings up to be means of organ storage and that they should be proud to die for humans and be satisfied that they can at least die in an educated manner. She tries to portray herself as someone on the clones’ side, but she never truly helps the clones to get the right to decide their own future. Nevertheless, isn’t it even more cruel to educate the clones, inspire their exploration of feelings, give them a false deception that they are just like naturally born humans, then tell them they have to tread the path designed for them, that their fate will never alter even if they are just like real humans? The closer the clones feel they were approaching the idyllic life, the more painful they feel when realizing they will be forever stuck in the abyss. The portrayal of Kathy’s childhood, their little fights, and everything growing up all seem so realistic and so close to a typical childhood, making it even more heartbreaking when it reaches the turning point, the time that the inevitable faith kicks in. All the ruthless actions of the actual humans, cultivating clones for their own benefit, really insists that readers contemplate where the boundaries should be set for scientific advancement and how to balance its implications.

As indicated in the title and the nostalgia Kathy displays in her retrospective voice, the desire to hold on is another vital component in the story, like a thread that stitches everything together. Talking from the actual humans’ perspective, they are trying to cling onto their lives in the face of cancer, trying to elongate their lifetime as long as they possibly can, inferring their reluctance to leave their loved ones behind and the yearning for not losing control of their own life. From Kathy’s point of view, she is trying to hold on to all the meager amount of possessions she owns: her little collection of memorable items, her tape, her friends, and her memories. Kathy knows that it is inevitable that everything will fade out of her life, just like how her own life is diminishing every second and every day. Since others treat her distinctively, she yearns for a sense of belonging by picking patients from Hailsham and keeps on recalling the precious moments when she was in Hailsham. Although Kathy may find that her childhood is full of lies and concealment, which is unpleasant after all, she doesn’t mind. She tries to hold onto her only friends, Ruth and Tommy, through her expertise as a carer, but she still cannot fight against the strong currents. As if the world goes against her, the power of losing is like a scissor, severing all the tenuous stitches created by the desire to hold on. Everything and everyone all abandon her and leave her behind, all alone by herself. Though she knows how silly she is, she still goes to Norfolk — the lost corner with rumors in Hailsham that it is the destiny where you can find all the things you’ve lost — in an attempt to find Tommy back by imagining him approaching her from the horizon, but she knows that is no use. Just like Tommy said, “And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end, it's just too much. The current’s too strong. They’ve got to let go, drift apart.” In the end, Kathy still does not let go of her memories; instead just accepts the reality and carries on with the rest of her life that lies in countdowns. 

Overall, Ishiguro delicately explored how humans are multifaceted when encountering their own benefits at the cost of others and their reactions toward real technological breakthroughs. At the same time, the description of the tranquil past that lives eternally in the protagonist's mind triggers grief and sorrow from the bottom of the readers' hearts. The emotional quest of humanity in Never Let Me Go raises profound questions about life, death, love, science methodologies, and destiny, prompting readers to contemplate the intrinsic values of life, choices, and responsibilities as individuals and in society.