Hailsham vs. The Cottages

Something which struck me as odd upon reaching Part Two of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go is the difference between the graduates from Hailsham and the veterans. Kathy talks about Hailsham’s immaturity, about how lunch is spent gossiping about who is having sex with whom, and other things of the sort; such actions, however, seem very common and natural for teenagers. Shortly after arriving at Hailsham, Kathy talks about the couples there. She notices that, “so many of [the veteran couples’] mannerisms were copied from the television (p. 120)”. She compares how couples said good bye at the Cottages to how they were done at Hailsham; Hailsham good byes consisted of hugs and kisses, but good byes at the Cottages involved what I imagined as a friendly tap on the elbow. It struck me as odd that the veterans pulled so much of their intimate interactions off of television.

Other interactions and minor comments Kathy makes also struck me as odd. Her comment about sex at the Cottages being “a bit functional (p. 127),” seemed unusual, as did the behaviors some of the other veterans engaged in. It led me to wonder how differently those raised at Hailsham are from the others at the Cottages who were raised in other places. I have to wonder whether Hailsham raises the students in a more “natural” manner; while they are being bred for some other purpose, they’re interactions (especially in terms of intimacy) seem more natural than those copied from tv shows. Whatever the case is, I think it may be too early to judge whether this due to a difference in how the characters were brought up or not.