"... despite the overwhelming evidence against his own misperceptions, Stevens emerges as a somewhat compassionate character."[Wong, 2000] Do you agree with this assessment of Ishiguro's representation of Stevens?

‘I hope I’ve been a good father to you.’

I laughed a little and said: ‘I’m so glad you’re feeling better now.’ [pg 101]

Stevens’ commitment to his work means that even at the end he is unable to show any emotion towards his own father.  His belief that his persona must remain intact at all times wins out.

In his relationship with Miss Kenton, it is not only Stevens’ professionalism that comes between them, but also his misreading of their relationship.  He rejects any intimacy that has sprung up between them:

things between Kiss Kenton and myself had reached…an inappropriate footing…I recall resolving to set about re-establishing our professional relationship on a more proper basis. [pg 178]

When one night, she cancels their evening meeting because she is tired, he takes this to mean that she wants them to come to an end, which is clearly not her intention.  He suggests leaving “written messages at one another’s doors” [pg 184] to replace their more intimate meetings, another sign of Stevens’ avoidance of intimacy.  He cannot understand Miss Kenton’s desire to avoid ending up alone until he realises that it is he who is alone.  In a similar way, he is even unable to recognise that he is in love:

I had been struck by the conviction that behind that very door, just a few yards from me, Miss Kenton was crying.  As I say, this moment has remained firmly embedded in my mind, as has the memory of the peculiar feeling I felt rising within me. [pg 222]

He cannot acknowledge his feelings for Miss Kenton until he realises that “at that moment, my heart was breaking” [pg 252].  Even when Miss Kenton informs him of her marriage proposal, he cannot allow the personal to override the professional.  He cannot ask her to reject Mr Benn and to stay with him, and he will not leave Lord Darlington’s side to comfort her, even though he has been dismissed for the night.  Indeed, he claims proudly that “I had managed to preserve a ‘dignity in keeping with my position’” [pg 238], which is more important to him than the loss of the woman he loves.

However, Stevens does correct some of his misperceptions during the course of the novel.  This is shown in his attitudes towards the letter from Miss Kenton that prompted his trip.  At first he is adamant that the letter contains “distinct hints of her desire to return [to Darlington Hall]” [pg 10], projecting his own desires to be reunited with Miss Kenton onto her.  He imagines that “the thought of returning to Darlington Hall would be a great comfort to her” [pg 50] when it is Stevens who is most comforted by the thought.  Eventually he realises his over-optimism when he admits:

one may have previously…exaggerated what evidence there was regarding such a desire on her part…I was a little surprised…at how difficult it was actually to point to any passage which clearly demonstrated her wish to return. [pg 149]

Although he stops short of admitting he was wrong, this shows how Stevens reconsiders his thoughts and beliefs as his journey progresses.  In the above passage, Stevens refers to himself in the third person, as if by using ‘one’ instead of ‘I’ he can distance himself from his mistake, a technique used throughout the novel with similar effects.

Perhaps Stevens’ most important misperception is his view of Lord Darlington.  He placed his trust completely in his employer, and abandoned his own moral views in order to carry out Darlington’s wishes.  For example, when Darlington decides to dismiss the two Jewish maids, Stevens is determined to do so.  Even though Miss Kenton tells him “it will be wrong, a sin” [pg 157] Stevens is still unwavering, reminding her:

our professional duty is not to our own foibles and sentiments, but to the wishes of our employer. [pg 157]

Stevens knows that what he is doing is wrong, what Lord Darlington doing is wrong, but he cannot disobey him.  Despite Stevens’ loyalty, and his claims that “I am today nothing but proud and grateful to have been given such a privilege” [pg 133], he clearly isn’t.  He twice rejects any association with Lord Darlington, and although he denies that he is ashamed of his previous employer and claims that he “chose to tell white lies in both instances as the simplest means of avoiding unpleasantness” [pg 132], it does not quite ring true.  Stevens is very defensive of Lord Darlington, trying to clear his employer’s tarnished name, but even he can’t deny the facts.  He tries to redeem Darlington by saying he did not have a “close association with…the British Union of Fascists” and that “Lord Darlington came to abhor anti-Semitism” [pg 145], but he cannot disguise the fact that Darlington did have fascist tendencies.

Towards the end of the novel, Stevens’ defence of Lord Darlington becomes a defence of himself.  Because he has aligned himself so closely with Darlington and his morals, Stevens, despite his protestations that “it is quite illogical that I should feel any regret or shame on my own account” [pg 211], is in fact deeply ashamed of his actions.  He tries to distance himself from his mistakes by claiming that he was simply doing his job:

How can one possibly be held to blame in any sense because…Lord Darlington’s efforts were misguided, even foolish?  Throughout the years I served him…I simply confined myself…to affairs within my own professional realm. [pg 211]

Again, by using ‘one’, as opposed to ‘I’, Stevens is disassociating himself with his misjudgements and mistakes of the past.  For some, Stevens’ assertion that he was ‘just obeying orders’ is no excuse; he still knew what Darlington was doing, although the butler asserts he did not know what was happening.  

We are never quite sure just how ignorant of Darlington’s actions Stevens was.  Early on, Stevens tells the reader “Lord Darlington never made any effort to conceal things from my own eyes and ears” [pg 77], which makes his later pleas of ignorance sound false.  Later, Reginald Cardinal spells out Darlington’s involvement with the Nazis to Stevens:

His lordship is…out of his depth…He’s being manoeuvred.  The Nazis are manoeuvring him like a pawn. [pgs 232-233]

Again, Stevens declares that he has “failed to notice any such development” [pg 233], and even though Cardinal has shown the butler the true extent of Darlington’s intrigue, he still insists “I have every trust in his lordship’s judgement” [pg 236].  Even when the evidence is placed in front of him, Stevens still cannot bring himself to recognise that Darlington was wrong and that his own life has not been as worthy and well-spent as he thought.  However, if Darlington had been a better man, if he had worked to destroy, rather than encourage, the Nazis, chances are Stevens would probably feel his life to have been less of a waste, less empty, even if his actions and beliefs had been the same.

Despite his many faults, many readers feel a certain amount of compassion for Stevens.  Ultimately, he has suffered for his actions, realising that events have rendered “whole dreams forever irredeemable” [pg 189], and at the end of the novel he is facing a life alone.  He has recognised his love for Miss Kenton far too late, and comes across as a sad and unloved man.  The moment when he finally admits “at that moment, my heart was breaking” [pg 252] is a moment when the reader feels genuine sorrow for the butler.  Stevens also has to come to terms with the truth about Lord Darlington, a truth that he has been avoiding for years.  When he announces:

I gave my best to Lord Darlington, I gave him the very best I had to give, and now – well – I find I do not have a great deal more left to give. [pg 255]

we are presented with a broken man filled with a quiet desperation because he has to reconcile himself to the fact that his life’s work has not been as worthy or as important has he had thought it to be.  He is overcome with the shame and emotion that he has suppressed throughout the novel, especially when he acknowledges that he did not even achieve the one thing that he strived for more than any other – dignity:

I trusted…All those years I served him, I trusted I was doing something worthwhile.  I can’t even say I made my own mistakes…what dignity is there in that? [pg 256]

However, in order for us to feel truly sympathetic towards Stevens, we would expect him to learn from his mistakes.  It is not entirely convincing as to whether he does.  He still cannot acknowledge his feelings, so just as when he denied crying after his father’s death, he still has difficultly admitting to crying on the pier:

‘Oh dear, mate.  Here, you want a hankie?’

‘Oh dear, no, thank you, it’s quite all right.  I’m very sorry, I’m afraid the travelling has tired me.  I’m very sorry.’ [pg 255]

Despite realising how unhappy his butler’s ‘mask’ or suit has made him, he cannot let it drop.  Stevens resolves to “adopt a more positive outlook and to try and make the best of what remains of my day” [pg 256] yet he immediately starts thinking about his work and how best to please his employer, not himself.  It’s as if he has swept aside his discoveries and returning to his old ways.  Perhaps his renewed commitment to his job is because he has realised that it is too late for him to do anything else, and it is too late for him to change as fundamentally as the reader would like.  Probably the main reason why at the close of the novel the reader is perhaps less sympathetic towards Stevens is the way that he, having finally admitted the truth about Darlington and that his own life has been wasted, he then tries to let himself off the hook:

what can we ever gain in forever looking back and blaming ourselves if our lives have not turned out quite as we might have wished? [pg 256]

He does not blame himself for the way his life has unfolded, but, in some respects, it was his fault: he was unable to tell Miss Kenton of his love for her and he was blind to Lord Darlington’s true activities.  Because he is so easily able to forget the part he played in his own unhappiness, as well the other important truths he had discovered, at the close of the novel, Stevens is no longer as compassionate a character as he had been.

Throughout the novel, Stevens is not a particularly sympathetic character.  To a modern reader, his repression of his emotions, his ‘stiff upper lip’ and his unquestioning devotion to his master are incomprehensible and alien to us.  However, he is simply conforming to what is expected of him.  Stevens really was doing his job, and doing it well.  Instead of condemning him for his inability to express his feelings for Miss Kenton, we should pity him.  The way Stevens tells his story is distorted and the facts are revealed in a roundabout manner.  We can tell, from what Stevens is not telling us, that he is ashamed of his behaviour – and ashamed to admit it – before he tells us himself.  Because of this, and because of the way he absolves himself of any blame at the end of the novel, it is difficult to see Stevens as he portrays himself – that is as the victim of forces beyond his control.  However, the intimacy of the narrative entices the reader to sympathise with Stevens because we are able to see the story from Stevens (albeit biased) point of view.  No matter how unpleasant his actions may have been, he still emerges as a compassionate character because of Ishiguro’s narrative technique and pity.

Bibliography:

Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day, Faber and Faber, 1990

Cynthia F Wong, Kazuo Ishiguro, Northcote House, 2000

Barry Lewis, Kazuo Ishiguro, Manchester University Press, 2000