Critical Reception
Brooke Allen, from the Wall Street Journal, observes that the world of this novel is a place "where you must live your life by the inexplicable logic and ever changing rules imposed by the dream itself" (Allen). She concludes that in comparison to his other work, Ishiguros' "subject continues to be, as it has always been, character and emotion"(Allen).
Vince Passaro, from Harper's Magazine, acknowledges the "severe dreamlike quality; but merely to call it dreamlike is insufficient to the anxiety and fascination it evokes" (Passaro 5). He also insists that "readers will find it difficult, especially at first, to live in this world of drifting reality and constant inappropriateness" (Passaro 9).
James Wood, from The New Republic, agrees that it is a "composed dream narrative" but contends that "it's decipherment could only be meaningless since a dream's significance is that it is not intended, not artistic, not written"(Wood).
Bruce Robbins, writing for Contemporary Literature, discussed the theme of being too busy, where Ryder is in constant conflist with his schedule, "The Unconsoled seems to elevate harriedness into a sort of ontological principle, a description of Being itself" (Robbins 5).
Critiquing the Critics
There is a consensus here that the form is dream-like. Passaro's mention of difficulty in reading suggests a challenge to the reader and he does imply a payoff when he grants that "one accepts" that the framework is unusual and "the effect is...stronger than the sum of it's parts, a rope would together from strands of dreaminess, dislocation and loss (Passaro 9). This suggests the link between form and content. Yet Wood seems not to accept the dream as a form but discusses it more like a literal dream. When Wood asks "what to make, say, of Mr.Brodsky, the old conductor", he seems to be completely unaware of ideas about condensation and imagos (Dream theory in the Novel). He misses that Brodsky, the failed drunken composer who the town is placing their hopes in, is also a representation of Ryder as an old man. Robbins tackles the issue of the philosophy of this novel. He asserts that if the moral of the novel is exposing a character who unwisely chooses work obligations over his family, then it would be "disappointingly simplistic" (Robbins 434). He instead interprets Ryder's attempts to accomodate Sophie and Boris, Gustav, Brodsky, Stephan, his parents and the townspeople, as someone trying to not have a limit to his sympathizing with and helping others.
Read more:
Writing in the Language of Dream
Dream Theory in the Novel
Characteristics of Dreaming / Elements of this Novel (I)
Characteristics of Dreaming / Elements of this Novel (II)
How Dream Elements Link to Themes
Critical Reception
Suggested Reading
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