THE UNRELIABLE NARRATOR AS A DOMINANT ELEMENT OF POSTMODERN POETICS IN KAZUO ISHIGURO'S CONFESSIONAL NOVEL

Abstract

The article investigates the phenomenon of the unreliable narrator as a central structural and thematic element in the prose of Kazuo Ishiguro, particularly in his most renowned confessional novels: The Remains of the Day and An Artist of the Floating World. The study analyzes how the author employs a first-person narrative characterized by a persistent and obsessive distortion of truth (manifested as self-deception and selective memory) to create an ironic dissonance between the subjective perception of reality and objective reality. Special attention is paid to the psychological and ethical dimensions of this unreliability, as Ishiguro’s narrators often seek to shield themselves from traumatic memories, moral guilt, and the painful recognition of personal failure by constructing protective narrative frameworks. Furthermore, the paper explores the specific plot and structural functions of this narrative device, arguing that it serves as a tool for the deconstruction of historical and social metanarratives—such as myths of imperial dignity or national moral righteousness—and, simultaneously, as a means of profound psychological analysis of individual and collective trauma. In doing so, the author’s technique situates his prose within the paradigm of postmodern psychological realism, where formal innovation is closely intertwined with emotional authenticity. The article also outlines the multicultural and intercultural dimensions of Ishiguro’s writing, demonstrating how the unstable, unreliable voice of the narrator reflects the crisis of identity and the fluidity of memory in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, thus turning his novels into subtle parables about responsibility, remembrance, and self-knowledge.