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Kazuo Ishiguro

Mark Lawson talks to the Booker Prize-winning writer Kazuo Ishiguro about his life and career.

Mark Lawson talks to the Booker Prize-winning writer Kazuo Ishiguro about his life and career.

Ishiguro, who was born in Nagasaki in 1954, discusses the influence of Japan on his early novels A Pale View of Hills and An Artist's View of the Floating World, and the impact of American cowboy series and Victorian novels on his grasp of English as a child.

The author reflects on the book that made his literary reputation, The Remains of the Day, which won him the UK's leading prize for fiction and was made into an Oscar-winning film starring Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson. He talks about the importance of first-person narrators and why he is drawn to writing about the past rather than the present.

Ishiguro also reflects on the influence of the pioneering Professor Malcolm Bradbury, who founded the University of East Anglia's MA course in Creative Writing, talks about his early days as a singer-songwriter and explains why his novel The Buried Giant was his first in almost ten years.

Featuring readings from The Buried Giant and from some of the author's previous books.

58 minutes

Credits

Role Contributor
Presenter Mark Lawson
Interviewed Guest Kazuo Ishiguro
Executive Producer Pauline Law
Producer Kath Pick
Director Kath Pick

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