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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Rotting Melancholy: The False Utopia of Kazuo Ishiguro's "The Buried Giant"

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Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Buried Giant (2015) constitutes an interesting contemporary reworking of the motif of melancholy. In the universe of the book – a combination of Arthurian setting with the elements of fantasy – people experience the peculiar state of melancholic oblivion brought upon them by the mysterious fog. Although this fog enables a peaceful coexistence of previous enemies, it also causes the feelings of overwhelming uneasiness and unidentified menace. In this context, Ishiguro’s vision appears to be the representation of the false utopia where memory is sacrificed to achieve ostensible perfection. This paper discusses the approaches to melancholy, both ancient and more contemporary ones, as well as their Ishigurian reinterpretation in the form of melancholy-like amnesia. It also attempts to demonstrate the dependencies between melancholy and utopia that enable the perception of the novel as a deliberately failed utopian project.