The subaltern, the superior race and the artificial friends: Ishiguro’s postcolonial perspective in <i>Klara and the Sun</i>

Although set in a posthuman and predominantly metropolitan setting, Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun deeply engages in postcolonial narrative discourse and its implications. This paper examines Ishiguro’s postcolonial stance in the novel. It argues that Ishiguro, in Klara and the Sun, combines postcolonial and posthuman narratives and themes to introduce the ‘subaltern’ and the ‘superior race’ of a futuristic posthuman society. In doing so, the narrative highlights the dangers and risks of the insufficiently examined advancement of technology which has led to such a phenomenon and significantly impacted human relationships. The story ostensibly describes a futuristic posthuman society, where only ‘genetically modified’ kids are at the top. The non-lifted kids, conversely, represent the subaltern, the inferior ‘others’ who are marginalized and deprived of most social and educational rights. Notably, the ‘interaction meeting’ at Josie’s house has been intricately developed as a narrative technique to highlight the social divide and discrimination based on genetic modification. As such, at this gathering, Rick appears to be the one who does not belong there as he is not a ‘lifted’ kid like the rest of them. Thus, he is being oppressed and treated as a subaltern. Later, we learn that Rick was unable to enter the university to pursue his studies due to his social status. Thus, by combining postcolonial and posthuman narratives Ishiguro ingeniously highlights genetic modification and its social implications, and by extension unpacks the dangers of unchecked technology that might dominate and alter the hierarchical social system in the long run.