쓰레기가 되는 존재들의 시선: 가즈오 이시구로의 『클라라와 태양』

Abstract

In Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun, the fates many people and AI robots face are strikingly similar. Like humans whose skills become quickly “outdated” with society’s rapid changes, AI robots marketed as the latest models soon become obsolete. Bringing together Zygmunt Bauman’s theory of the “wasted lives” of modernity and the discourse on obsolescence in environmental theory, this article analyzes Klara and the Sun as a novel that reveals the processes of becoming disposable across the human and nonhuman distinction. Ishiguro’s novel asks pertinent questions, including what makes a being discardable, whether the new can save us from becoming obsolete, and where we can locate values and meanings in the wasted beings, if there are any. This article argues that Klara and the Sun introduces moments of “slow time,” which are rapidly disappearing in today’s society, by foregrounding places such as the store window, where Klara is placed to be seen by customers, and the Yard, where Klara stays after being thrown away. Turning the otherwise highly visible and invisible spaces into places of waiting and hope for reunion for wasted beings, the novel not only critiques the society of constant mobility but also opens up an alternative possibility of meaning-making and solidarity for the wasted beings, who look at each other and the world a little differently.