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Question 11 pts

In the middle of the 1923 International Conference, Stevens is given an important task involving Mr. Cardinal (the son of one of the important guests at the conference). What is Stevens asked to do?

Group of answer choicesTeach Mr. Cardinal how to shoot a rifle

Teach Mr. Cardinal how to polish silver

Teach Mr. Cardinal about sex

Teach Mr. Cardinal how to drive

Question 2

Despite insisting that “Lord Darlington was a gentleman of great moral stature…and I will readily vouch that he remained that to the last” (126), Stevens lies to Mr. Farraday’s friend, Mrs. Wakefield, and tells her that he didn’t actually work for Lord Darlington. Why does Stevens lie?

Question 3

Which of the following correctly distinguishes between an unreliable narrator and a discordant narrator?

Group of answer choicesUnreliable Narrator = a narrator whose facts (about story events, characters, the storyworld) raise doubts or are not to be trusted / Discordant Narrator = a narrator whom we believe provides accurate story facts, but whose interpretation of those facts we question or distrust

Unreliable Narrator = a narrator whose facts (about story events, characters, the storyworld) raise doubts or are not to be trusted  /  Discordant Narrator = a narrator whom we believe provides accurate story facts, but whose interpretation of those facts we question or distrust

Question 4

In one of Stevens’ father’s favorite anecdotes about composure and professionalism, a butler must confront a wild animal lurking in a dining room before the meal can be served. What kind of animal was it? 

Group of answer choicesA Hawk

A Bear

A Snake

A Tiger

Question 5

True or False: At the time Stevens receives her letter, Miss Kenton has not worked at Darlington Hall for 20 years.

Group of answer choicesTrue

False

Question 6

Having a staff that’s too small is just one of challenges Stevens faces as he tries to adjust to working for Mr. Farraday. Which of the following is a “duty” that Stevens really struggles to fulfill? 

Group of answer choicesDrive a car

Play the piano

Make small talk / banter

Do laundry

Question 7

How does Stevens respond when Miss Kenton brings him a vase of flowers for his butler’s pantry (office)?

Group of answer choicesHe tells her he doesn’t like flowers in his office

He kisses her

He writes her a thank-you note

He smashes the vase on the floor

Question 8

At the risk of stating the obvious, novels are usually longer and more complex than short stories. Setting aside the issue of time management–unlike short stories, novels aren’t easily read in one sitting–how has the shift from short stories to novels affected your reading practices/strategies and what you’re getting out of the reading experience? Provide a brief description of two noticeable differences in your reading experience since we began reading novels,

Lesson 10: Framing Narratives & Embedded Narratives

“The process most like the process of life is that of observing events through a convincing, human mind, not a godlike mind unattached to the human condition” (Booth, The Rhetoric of Fiction, 45).

In the first week of our course, we started to think about how literary narratives cultivate the feeling that through the act of reading we actually access to the consciousness and point of view of characters. The concept of perspective (recall focalization and voice) helps us describe how a narrative uses language to create the effect that we can see through characters’ eyes or even hear their thoughts being voiced inside their head. Unlike third-person narration, which can involve shifts among different characters’ perspectives, first-person narration usually maintains a fixed perspective. As we observe in The Remains of the Day as well as in Salvage the Bones, first-person narration may limit our view and perception of story events and the storyworld by only offering the narrator’s perspective, but in doing so, it can also create an extraordinarily immersive experience by allowing us readers to occupy the narrator’s consciousness in sustained, uninterrupted, and extremely intimate ways. Part of this immersive sensation comes from the way in which first-person narrators decide where, when, how, and why the narrative will go in the directions it goes. In other words, the narrator’s consciousness organizes and arranges the representation of story events in ways that we readers can perceive.

In Salvage the Bones, Esch narrates the story events as they unfold, while contemplating the significance of what’s happening and occasionally reflecting upon past experiences and situations that resonate with what’s currently before her. Though Esch might daydream from time to time, she remains primarily focused on the present. Consequently, the narrative’s chronological plot doesn’t really feel like something Esch is actively controlling or arranging as narrator. Indeed, our proximity to Esch’s consciousness is so close that we may not sense that she’s actively narrating at all.

In The Remains of the Day, however, Stevens proves to be a much different type of first-person narrator. Though we readers certainly gain tremendous access to his consciousness, we encounter Stevens from a distance. Esch’s voice gives us readers the feeling that we’re overhearing her as she thinks to herself. By comparison, Stevens’ voice sounds different, as though he’s actually talking to us.

Is Stevens “talking” to us?

“I should say…” “I should point out…”

“But let me make it immediately clear what I mean by this…”

“But you will no doubt agree…” “You may be amazed…” “but then you will agree…”

“I hope you do not think me unduly vain with regard to this last matter…”

“Incidentally, now that I come to think further about it, it is not quite true to say…”

“What I should have said…”

“Perhaps you might be persuaded…” “But you may think me merely biased…”

The habits, tendencies, and ornamental turns of phrase that adorn his sentences give a rich, distinctive quality of voice to his narration. In effect, Stevens’ narration draws attention to itself in a way that Esch’s simply does not. And as expected, Stevens’ idiosyncratic voice and his almost constant efforts to clarify what he’s trying to say and to manage our reception underscore the active role he plays in telling us his story. Stevens’ self-consciousness, which almost approaches insecurity, enhances the feeling that the narrative is being crafted and conveyed by a complex, motivated, and “real” person.

Framing the Past

Stevens’ unique voice and the way he seems to possess a consciousness that’s self-aware—even aware of the storytelling he’s doing—not only affects how we engage with him and feel about the story events he relays, but it also affects what we engage with and when. That Stevens appears to be candidly constructing the narrative (something we don’t get so much from Esch’s narration) helps to elucidate how the narrative’s complex plot works.

Like Salvage the Bones, The Remains of the Day uses chapter titles that include timestamps that help us keep track of the steady, linear progression of time as it moves forward over the course of the novel. The chapter titles map out, day by day, Stevens’ trip to meet Miss Kenton. And each chapter begins and ends with some account of story events that occur while Stevens is on the road. However, the chapters readily leave Stevens’ present storyworld (the English countryside, July 1956) behind and devote their pages to storyworlds and story events from the past (usually Darlington Hall at different points during the 1920s to 1940s).

We know that a plot can freely arrange the order of story events, and we’ve encountered flashbacks before. However, the concept of flashback provides a rather inadequate description of what’s happening in The Remains of the Day. While the overarching narrative moves back and forth in time, it jumps so far back in time and for such extended durations that we readers aren’t temporarily transported to a scene or story event that took place in the past. Instead, we get move to other, fully-realized storyworlds in which sophisticated and multifaceted narratives—complete with their own plots, story events, characters, conflicts, etc.—play out. More than just a series of flashbacks, what we have here is a rather complex interplay between a frame narrative and multiple embedded narratives.

Embedded Narrative: a narrative within a narrative; a narrative which tells a story within the space of/during the course of another narrative

Framing Narrative: a narrative that contains another (embedded) narrative

The novel begins with a Prologue set in the present storyworld with Stevens and Mr. Farraday at Darlington Hall in July 1956, and then starting with “Day One – Evening – Salisbury,” moves forward day-by-day, chapter-by-chapter for six days. The accumulating segments of these chapters in which Stevens describes the goings-on of his six-day road trip constitute the frame narrative. This frame narrative includes the storyworld from which Stevens narrates everything. Of course, Stevens’ rarely keeps his (and our) attention on the present storyworld and story events.

“But I see I am becoming preoccupied with these memories, and this is perhaps a little foolish […] In fact, I notice I have yet to record here anything of my journey to this city – aside from mentioning briefly that halt on the hillside road at the very start of it.” (67)

While Stevens might help us place him on early morning walk about Salisbury or gazing out over Mortimer’s Pond, he spends the majority of his time narrating various embedded narratives. Oddly, (magically?) when Stevens shifts from the frame narrative to one of his embedded narratives (most of which are meticulously told stories that recall episodes from his past) we arguably remain, somehow, simultaneously in the present storyworld from which the embedded narrative is being told or remembered. In other words, these plot shifts don’t simply relocate the frame narrative to other spaces and times in the same storyworld. Instead, we remain with Stevens in the present storyworld where he provides the various embedded narratives that tell the stories of his most important memories. The significance of this distinction cannot be understated, even if it’s really weird and hard to grasp at first. We readers are not just getting backstory and flashbacks that a third-person narrator uses to fill in gaps and create the illusion of cause and effect (recall “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber”). We’re getting even more intense and more intimate access to the protagonist’s interiority and consciousness. Plot isn’t merely a mechanism for structuring narrative information; in the case of The Remains of the Day, it’s an apparatus for deepening our emotional connection with the narrator-protagonist. Indeed, memory, and the ways in which memories of the past influence or haunt present will prove to be an increasingly important structural and thematic element as the novel progresses.

Lesson 11: Considering Themes

From the outset of this course, our lessons have primarily stressed things we tend to overlook when we read or otherwise engage with fictional narratives. The emphasis these lessons have placed on “underlying mechanisms” and “how narratives operate” responds to the basic assumption that when we read novels or watch films for pleasure and enjoyment, we often find ourselves excited by and invested in the effects these narratives have on us more so than the causes of these effects. For example, a flashback that suddenly clears up a key ambiguity about a character that we’ve previously come to dislike isn’t satisfying or moving because we can say ‘oh look, the narrative used a flashback to interject past story events into the present.’ Put simply, we don’t always need (or want!) to know how the sleight-of-hand works to enjoy the magic. If we’re moved—amused, frightened, saddened, perplexed, awed, romanced, angered, enlightened—then the narrative machinery worked, even if we haven’t taken it apart for closer inspection. However, while most of us may not read a novel or watch a film for the sake of examining its underlying structure or technique, we may still look to a narrative for more than entertainment alone. Indeed, we may be drawn to literature’s or film’s capacity to convey big or important ideas through storytelling.

What Is It About?

It’s fairly commonplace when someone to mentions an unfamiliar film or tv show or a literary text to ask: what’s it about? When we ask this question, we may actually be asking one of two different questions: 1) who are the main characters and what are they up to (i.e., what’s the story?); 2) what are the overarching ideas and themes, the takeaways? Often, we find ourselves reading on both levels. On the level of plot, character, and storyworld, reading might name our efforts to make sense of who, what, why, where, when, and how. At the same time, we’re also reading in pursuit of another type of comprehension—on the level of ideas. Even when we consume for entertainment’s sake, we’re often aware of persistent clues, questions, issues, images, etc. that repeat or recur throughout the narrative. Sometimes these repetitions are overt; sometimes they’re subtle or even implicit. Either way, we get the sense that the narrative isn’t merely telling us the story events and crafting a storyworld, but that it’s also saying something or raising a question we should contemplate. We may even go so far as to suggest that literary narratives have the power to capture or convey truths that resonate with our own circumstances and world. If we’re especially keen on this notion, then we may even believe that literary narratives can teach us something of value or provide lessons worth knowing.

Theme: a generalized or abstract concept, issue, or question that repeatedly surfaces implicitly or explicitly in a narrative[1]

Our ability to extrapolate a big idea, a concept, or a pressing set of questions from a narrative stems from our ability to take notice of patterns, repetition, and duration. Novels and short stories aren’t bumper stickers; they don’t just tell you whom to vote for or which sports team the driver roots for. But even if literary narratives tend to communicate indirectly and/or figuratively and symbolically, we can often take notice of how much time a narrator dwells on something or how frequently something comes up. Hence, the familiar concept of theme.

Themes To Watch For

• Passing Time: Old vs. New, Traditions & Customs vs. Modernization & Novelty
• Self-Awareness / Self-Knowledge
• Moral Codes: Dignity, Greatness, Dedication
• Professional Life vs. Personal Life

To say that The Remains of the Day is about an English butler pondering his career as both his professional life and his traditional profession come to a close seriously undersells the novel. One of the most disarming, surprising, and—I hope for your sake—rewarding aspects of Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel springs from the way in which “what it’s about” doesn’t really capture “what it’s about.” As we will have discovered by now, the narrative centers our attention on one, Mr. Stevens, an English butler living and working in a former “great house,” Darlington Hall, during the mid-20th century. For those of us perplexed by or suspicious of an entire novel about a butler—and a butler, who as we observe early on is more than ready to devote significant stretches of time to musing such “hot” topics as the challenges of defining and assessing a butler’s legacy—we just might find that the profundity of the novel stems from not from themes which transcend their otherwise unassuming narrative package. 

Perhaps the most obvious and important theme in the novel concerns Stevens’s relationship to the passing of time and the corresponding—even startling—changes to his professional life and the world he inhabits. Structurally speaking, there’s a clear temporal demarcation that separates the world before and the world after World War II, and for Stevens, this before and after, this old versus new, is manifested by the change in ownership of Darlington Hall. Lord Darlington, his prior employer and the aristocratic tradition he maintained has been replaced by the American, Mr. Farraday, and all the changes and modifications that accompany his arrival at Darlington Hall. Traditions and customs which seem to provide the very foundation and principle of Stevens’ profession struggle to retain their prominence and relevance in a rapidly modernizing postwar world. We as read, we can take note of the awkwardness and difficulty Stevens experiences as he tries to preserve and even resuscitate some of the old traditions and customs of “great houses” in the mid-1950s. We might also note that while travelling through the English countryside en route to Miss Kenton’s residence in Cornwall, Stevens navigates the world with the aid of an out-of-date, prewar “travel guide”: Mrs. Jane Symons’ The Wonder of England. Stevens isn’t merely out of touch; he operates with a devout belief in the permanence and the enduing relevance of traditions and institutions. Consider, too, how much of Steven’s narration focuses our attention on his memories, rather than current story events.

Amusingly, Stevens fancies himself more progressive and adaptable than his actions ultimately demonstrate:

“Now naturally, like many of us, I have a reluctance to change too much of the old ways. But there is not virtue at all in clinging as some do to tradition merely for its own sake.” (7)

Though the significance of this quote and the longer passage from which it comes aren’t immediately evident, they provide an early indication of Stevens’ concern for traditions and customs losing out to modernization. Additionally, this quote and passage hint at another theme that develops over the course of the novel: self-awareness. As we quickly discover, Stevens not only reflects on bygone days, but he also regularly reviews and assesses his past performances as a butler. We never likely to believe Stevens’ discussion of the credentials and criteria associated with great butlers is simply disinterested “academic” musing; Stevens is surely trying to take stock of his legacy and historical standing among the best of his profession. Though we may not doubt his professional accomplishments, per se, we should begin to notice, especially in the case of the 1923 International Conference at Darlington Hall and throughout much of the second half of the novel, that Stevens may not see himself as clearly or accurately as he assumes. On a thematic level, the narrative increasing raises questions about our capacity to know ourselves, our roles in the lives of others, and our place in the broader world.

Two other prominent themes that emerge early on in the narrative should continue to attract our attention for the duration of the novel. The first rather explicitly conveyed theme orbits a cluster of concepts: dignity, greatness, and dedication. While Stevens addresses these ideas head-on early in the first half of the novel, they serve as an underlying current for the entirety of the novel (sometimes even as a motivation or justification for questionable actions). Another theme that much like the themes related to passing time (old vs. new, tradition vs. modernization) often reveals itself through the narrative’s central conflict concerns the opposition between the professional and personal (private) life. As Stevens puts it:

“Lesser butlers will abandon their professional being for the private one at the least provocation […] The great butlers are great by virtue of their ability to inhabit their professional role and inhabit it to the utmost […] They wear their professionalism as a decent gentleman will wear his suit […] he will discard it when, and only when, he wills to do so, and this will invariably be when he is entirely alone.” (42-43)

Lesson 12: The Case of the Discordant Narrator

As we’ve reiterated throughout this course, how a narrative tells or represents to us the story events, the characters, and the story world steers almost all of our interests, our understanding, our reactions, and our overall experience. Earlier in the course, lessons on this narrative vs. story distinction aimed to call attention to the simple fact that there’s a lot more going in a literary narrative than we sometimes realize and that even literary narratives that we find gripping and enjoyable on the basis of their content are structured and crafted in specific and nuanced ways. And so, we have tried to methodically illuminate and scrutinize some of the narrative mechanisms that we wouldn’t necessarily pay attention to if we were reading merely for. In Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day, we encounter a narrative in which the matter of “how the story gets told” is on full display, front and center, and actually contributes to the novel’s entertainment. Arguably, the pleasure we get from reading The Remains of the Day flows directly from its manner of narration and its one-of-a-kind first-person narrator-protagonist. With this in mind, this lesson inspects some key nuances of Stevens’ “performance” as narrator in order to better understand how he goes about telling the story of his life as butler at Darlington Hall and what we might make of it.

Dwelling on the past?

“I have never in all these years thought of the matter in quite this way; but then it is perhaps in the nature of coming away on a trip such as this that one is prompted towards such surprising new perspectives on topics one imagined one had long ago thought through thoroughly.” (117)

One of the most important aspects of The Remains of the Day noted in previous lessons is its multivalent investment in time and the tremendous concern for the “meaning” of the past. As the second chapter, “Day One – Evening – Salisbury,” makes certain, Stevens struggles to stay focused on the present and instead, devotes most of his energy and most of our time to recalling signatures events, characters, and experiences from bygones days. The allure of the English countryside through which he’s presently travelling seems no match for the contast tug of personal history and reminiscence. But how does this happen and why does this happen? Stevens himself provides some clues as to why he is dizzied by all of these churning memories. For one, the road trip itself affords Stevens a rare opportunity to be both “off-duty” and alone with his thoughts. We also come to recognize that Stevens is highly observant of and deeply affected by change as it pertains to his professional and personal (to the extent that he has one) life. His identity and sense of self—after 35+ years of sustained tradition, customs, and values associated with the work of a master butler “connected with a great house”—have recently been impacted by radical change. England has been transformed in the postwar era, and so many of the resultant changes to the socio-economic structure and aristocratic culture have inevitably trickled down to Darlington Hall. Thus, work life for Stevens under his new American employer Mr. Farraday barely resembles his former life under Lord Darlington. It may be reasonable to suggest that such dramatic change precipitates his turn to the past—something akin to, but perhaps more potent than, nostalgia. On one level, we sense the reassuring, comfort Stevens finds as he “walks down memory lane,” so to speak. Revisiting signature life moments from an era that has all but ended certainly smacks of good-old fashioned longing and nostalgia—a perfectly quaint “those were the days” sentimentality. Stevens’ longing and fondness for the past doubles as a longing and fondness for a clear sense of place and purpose, a sense of command and self-assurance, etc.

“‘If this is a painful memory, forgive me. But I will never forget that time we both watched your father’ […] It is something of a revelation that this memory from over thirty years ago should have remained with Miss Kenton as it has done with me.” (50)

Undoubtedly, the arrival of Miss Kenton’s letter, which intersects with Farraday’s suggestion of a road trip and initiates the story action, provides a “blast from the past,” if you will. While Miss Kenton, whom Stevens hasn’t heard from in years, hasn’t explicitly invited Stevens to visit her in person, her letter nonetheless serves as an invitation to recall a time some 30 years prior when they worked together in close proximity. What might have started as mere reminiscence slowly evolves over the course of the narrative into robust retrospection. What we readers encounter isn’t just a nostalgic potpourri of Stevens’ memories and recollections, but rather a retrospective evaluation of his professional life as it now winds down. He is taking stock of his experiences, his relationships, and his accomplishments, and he’s often making the case that his career amounted to something dignified and worthwhile. But why? And to whom is he making this case? Us readers? Himself?

Who are You?

“You will no doubt agree that the hardest of situations as regards dinner-waiting is when there are just two diners present” (72).

“…and it may be that you are under the impression I am somehow embarrassed or ashamed of my association with his lordship…” (125).

As suggested in Lesson 10, Stevens’ narration is made all-the-more intriguing by frequent conversational turns of phrase and quirky expressions that signal his desire to clarify or qualify what’s he recently reported. Occasionally, Stevens voices information as well as his personal perspective to an imagined reader through direct address using second person. Important rhetorical gestures are being made here: first, the direct address shortens the distance between Stevens and the imagined reader to whom the story is being told. While it’s hard to believe this “you” is “us” (it’s more likely that this reader to whom Stevens is “speaking” is a figment of his imagination), we readers are nonetheless being drawn in and implicated in the act of interpreting and making meaning out of his stories of the past. Whether or not we do indeed agree that “the hardest of situations as regards dinner waiting is when there are just two diners present,” we readers certainly feel that our opinion is being solicited and that our worldview is somehow relevant to Stevens’ efforts as narrator. Rhetorically speaking, Stevens’ imagined reader/listener is not invited to be a detached, passive observation, but an actively engaged and receptive audience that Steven’s is, at least some of the time, trying to convince or persuade (more on this topic in a future lesson). All of Stevens’ efforts to clarify, underscore, reiterate, and so forth appear to be made on behalf of getting things right and making certain that this imagined reader (you), comprehends and appreciates, rather than misreads, his story.

Fickle or Forgetful?

As you’ve spent more time “hearing” Stevens’ rather eloquent and conversational voice, you may have noticed that he periodically changes his mind and revises what he has narrated or how he’s portrayed it. The entirety of the chapter “Day Two –Afternoon – Mortimer’s Pond, Dorset” provides an occasion for Stevens to retract, or at least modify, his prior claims establishing the greatness of a butler in view of his associations with a so-called “distinguished household”:

“It would seem that there is a whole dimension to the question ‘what is a “great” butler?’ I have hitherto not properly considered […] it strikes me that I may have been a little hasty before in dismissing certain of the Hayes Society’s criteria for membership. I have no wish, let me make clear, to retract any of my ideas and “dignity” and its crucial link with “greatness” But I have been thinking a little more…” (113)

Rehearsing and ruminating on the subject of great butlers has an air of scholarly contemplation to it, and so we might not be too concerned that while Stevens is working through what amounts to his thesis on the matter, he tweaks, revises, and refines his argument. But what are we supposed to do with the fact that he also tweaks, revises, and refines his accounts of how certain story events may have transpired and what things certain characters may or may not have said at one time or another?

In one of the most awkwardly amusing passages of the narrative, Stevens portrays Miss Kenton as a sassy, bold person ready to clapback whenever Stevens criticizes her job performance. A few paragraphs later, he reconsiders and then radically revises what happened:

“But now that I think further about it, I am not sure Miss Kenton spoke quite so boldly that day […] I am not sure she could have actually gone so far as to say things like: ‘these errors may be trivial in themselves, but you must yourself realize their larger significance’. In fact, now that I come to think of it, I have a feeling it may have been Lord Darlington himself who made that particular remark…” (60)

Is Stevens forgetful? Or is he being fickle about how he wants to frame and portray certain things for his imagined reader? It’s hard to say, but it’s worth noting that even if he is guilty of overstating or overdramatizing things, he is also capable of acknowledging and correcting that behavior: “It is hard for me now to recall precisely what I overheard […] I did not gain a fairly clear impression” (95). In effect, we readers may find that Stevens’ fallibility as narrator makes him more lifelike and real. He is at once extremely detail-oriented, observant, and exceptionally concerned about the subtleties and nuances of his profession, for instance, and he’s also sort of clumsy, a little unsure of himself, and seemingly unreliable when it comes to delivering an accurate account of story events in his own story.

The Case of the Discordant Narrator

Paradoxically, Stevens’ occasionally error-prone and revisionist storytelling makes him a) more believable and compelling as a character, and b) less reliable as a narrator. Authentic? Yes! Accurate? Perhaps not so much. While reading The Remains of the Day, we come face-to-face with one of the great unreliable narrators of contemporary literary fiction. Typically, the notion of an unreliable narrator refers to cases in which information the narrator provides about story events, characters, aspects of the storyworld, etc. may not be accurate or entirely accurate. The actual or whole truth may be withheld or unknown. The narrator’s “take” on the story may not be entirely objective or without bias. An unreliable narrator may even be motivated to actively misrepresent story events. Or more simply, they may lack complete information. Or more innocently, they may misunderstand or inadequately decipher what’s happening or why.

By now we know that one of the driving forces of any literary narrative is the emergence of tension and conflict and our corresponding desire for resolution or closure. Typically, we expect the conflict and tension to emerge between the characters themselves or between characters and some set of challenges they face in the storyworld. For example, we can see quite clearly the growing conflict between Esch and Manny in Salvage the Bones. In the same novel, we also recognize the tension building between the Batiste family and the environment or natural world and its threat to their survival. As readers, we primarily concentrate on the conflicts and tensions as they play out in the storyworld. Encountering an unreliable narrator, however, complicates our position as readers relative to narrative conflict. We still pay attention to character conflicts and drama playing out in the storyworld, but we also face a kind of conflict or tension that develops between us and the unreliable narrator. Once we have reason to doubt, mistrust, or dispute the story as the narrator tells it, we readers find ourselves involved in something of a conflict over the story events themselves. How do we determine what’s going on? How should we interpret the meaning of story events when the narrator cannot be counted on to reliably guide us or fill us in? While character conflicts within the storyworld cause us to ask questions about how the story might unfold and how characters might react, the presence of an unreliable narrator has us questioning what we know and how that will ultimately come to affect our understanding and reactions to story events.

Unreliable Narrator: a narrator whose facts (about story events, characters, the storyworld) raise doubts or are not to be trusted

Discordant Narrator: a narrator whom we believe provides accurate story facts, but whose interpretation of those facts we question or distrust[1]

In trying to make sense of Stevens’s reliability, we ought to think of him as a discordant narrator, a subgroup of unreliable narrators. A discordant narrator like Stevens is one whose ability provide facts and tell the truth is actually intact. In other words, we believe what he is telling us is factually true. He isn’t lying or intentionally telling falsehoods. We have reasonable confidence in his ability to provide good information (even if he needs to periodically correct certain details). Stevens become unreliable when his interpretation or understanding of the meaning of story events strike us readers as mistaken or confused. The “discord” or disagreement associated with a discordant narrator emerges between the way a narrator like Stevens perceives and comprehends story events and the way we readers view and comprehend those same story events. Ultimately, we readers become increasingly inclined to interpret story facts conveyed by the narrator differently than the narrator does. To further illustrate and appreciate how a discordant narrator operates, let’s turn to the important case of the 1923 International Conference held at Darlington Hall.

We know from Stevens that Lord Darlington, as an influential member of the English aristocracy, has come to play host to European political leaders and thinkers in the years between World War I and World War II. In particular, Darlington Hall becomes the site of an especially significant summit that by Stevens’ account holds great significance for the direction of global affairs, so much so that fate of Europe seemingly hangs in the balance. For Stevens, the conference demands tremendous preparation, focus, and steadfastness since he is responsible for running the entire household whilst the various meetings, dinners, and so forth take place.

“As this date grew ever nearer […] I was only too aware of the possibility that if any guest were to find his stay at Darlington Hall less than comfortable, this might have repercussions of unimaginable largeness.” (76-77)

While we don’t need to rehearse all of the events and happenings that transpire during the course of the conference, we must remember that while Stevens is fastidiously performing his professional duties—be they tending to Monsieur Dupont’s feet or trying to provide the young Mr. Cardinal with a crash course on the sexual consummation of marriage—the elder Mr. Stevens, our narrator’s father, is having a stroke and dying. Much of the closing action in the chapter that includes the story of the conference swings back and forth between Stevens receiving information about his father decline in health and hurrying back to tend to the guests at Darlington Hall. Even when Stevens manages to visit his father after his stroke, he tells Miss Kenton, “This is most distressing. Nevertheless, I must now return downstairs” (104). Later, he tries to justify his return to work by contending that it’s what his father would have wanted him to do (106). No acknowledgement is made of the fact that during their final conversation his father clearly realizes he is going to die and seeks to make some final peace and amends with his son. “I hope I’ve been a good father to you,” his father says, to which Stevens replies, “I’m afraid we’re extremely busy now, but we can talk again in the morning” (97)

Whether or not we readers are inclined to give Stevens a “pass” for his obliviousness in these moments, we must wonder what to make of Stevens’ final appraisal of the events of the conference. Before he tells us the story, he describes it as “a turning point in my life…the moment in my career when I truly came of age as a butler” (70). Once he wraps up the story, he doubles down on this assessment and declares, “Why should I deny it? For all its sad associations, whenever I recall that evening today, I find I do so with a large sense of triumph” (110).

What emerges over the course of this chapter is growing tension, indeed a gulf in understanding and interpretation between Stevens’ perspective and ours. Stevens seems fully committed to viewing the conference as a professional highpoint, while we readers cannot help but see things differently. Even if we’re willing to give Stevens credit for his dutiful performance as a butler and whatever accomplishment he’s achieved in the process, we must be distressed by the personal loss he so readily downplays. In fact, even though Stevens’ narration mediates our access to these story events, Miss Kenton’s reactions still manage to shine through as more appealing and “correct.” While we “believe” Stevens’ factual account of what has happened, we’re hard pressed to share his judgment and interpretation of what’s was at stake at the time and why it still matters in the present.

[1] Abbott, The Cambridge Introduction to Narrative, 77