Demob Happy

Elementary

6/10

Ishiguro’s When We Were Orphans revisits the classically English detective novel, mimicking and deliberately undermining the style of authors like Agatha Christie. It uses this simple subtext to show how the global catastrophe of the second world war finally destroyed the quaint notion that evil and criminality could be overcome by logic and reason. Whereas America had Superman, Ishiguro might argue, England had Miss Marple and Poirot, and in the same way that America has had its heros brutally examined, Ishiguro tries to do something similar here. Christopher Banks, the frustratingly stiff narrator, embodies many of the English class stereotypes that are perpetuated by the novels of Agatha Christie and their televisual adaptations. Hardly a sympathetic voice, he is by turns haughty and superior, but most often laughably naive. Orphaned as a boy when his parents disappear from the international settlement in Shanghai, he resolves to become a ‘great detective’. His apparent elevation to this status is described in the most simplistic and perfunctary manner, and the facile (elementary even) account of his investigative abilities continues as he tries to uncover the mystery of his parent’s kidnapping. Many readers have pointed out that this is a deliberate parody that sets the the narrator and reader up for the jarring realities of the final third of the book. I would argue that Ishiguro is incapable of creating a convincing detective mystery with the clues, red herrings and ingenious deductions necessary to evoke the genre. He attempts to satirise the genre, but is impatient to undermine it before he has created any kind of puzzle or suspense to the narrative. A far-greater novel could have been made if he had mastered some of the principles of Agatha Christie’s books first, before pulling the rug out from under the readers’ feet. Narrational changes are hinged upon things as basic as someone ’suddenly remembering’, making for a clumsily facile first two thirds, incredulous and difficult to invest in emotionally.

The protagonist’s subsequent descent into the chaos of the Japanese invasion of Shanghai, and the decadence and despondency of the international community there, is more intriguing. The seedy underbelly of Shanghai is exposed in a series of increasingly sordid revelations, from elicit gambling dens to the factions vying for control of the opium trade devestating China. But Banks’s naivety becomes increasingly implausible as he staggers around front line Shanghai armed with only a magnifying glass to aid his search for his parents - who he bewilderingly believes to be still held captive decades after their disapperance. There is a heavy dose of irony in this, but to the expense of real dramatic tension or feeling. In the ultimate revelation concerning the fate of his parents, Banks is confronted by his nemesis: “A detective! What good is that to anyone? Stolen jewels, aristocrats murdered for their inheritance. Do you suppose that’s all there is to contend with?” It is here Ishiguro’s intentions become explicit, but by this point I was past caring. Too much weak plotting and insincerity had conspired to make this no more than an average novel.