Who Knew Numbers Could Be So Exciting? (Chapter 11/ Pages 126-137)

"She was struggling to become someone else, and maybe felt the pressure more than the rest of us because, as I say, she'd somehow taken on the responsibility for all of us... I never appreciated in those days the sheer effort Ruth was making to move on, to grow up and leave Hailsham behind."

~ Never Let Me Go, page 130

In this chapter, Kathy and her friends find it difficult to adapt to their new home. All they've known is Hailsham, and now they are thrown out into the real world to start working. It's always hard to move away; many people experience this in their lives somehow or another, and they have problems adjusting to their new lives. The characters in Never Let Me Go struggle to assume their new responsibilities.

A similar situation occurs in the book-turned-movie I Am Number Four by Pittacus Lore. The novel is about Four, a boy from another planet with special abilities who is being hunted down by a rival alien group. They kill each person in succession according to his or her number. Once One, Two, and Three are killed, Four must relocate from Florida to Paradise, Ohio and take on a new identity, John Smith. He has difficulty adjusting to his new life like Kathy and her friends.

Some Theories and Speculation/Foreshadowing (Chapter 4/ Pages 37-48)

"That's why that afternoon by the pond, when Tommy was telling me about his talk with Miss Lucy, about how she'd said to him we weren't being "taught enough" about some things, the memory of that time in the library - along with maybe one or two other little episodes like that - started tugging at my mind."

~ Never Let Me Go, page 41

Remember the "other things" I mentioned in my last blog? Well, I have some theories about them now. I feel that Kathy's emphasis on Miss Lucy's seemingly unimportant ramblings is foreshadowing something quite important. So what aren't the students taught enough about? I believe it's the donations. I have this idea that the students are going to this school (Hailsham) to grow up to be donors or carers. At the beginning of the book, Kathy talked about her experiences as a carer and the "donations" that her patients had to make. This wouldn't be such a big deal, except that they had to make a large number of donations (the largest I remember was four which seems like a lot); I'm thinking organs, but there does reach a point where one must stop so his own body can function. (You could donate a kidney, blood, a spline, part of a liver, or an eye, but what else?) Anyway, I think that students go to Hailsham and other similar institutions with a very controlled environment to be taught proper behavior and social etiquette - along with academics, of course - so they can one day become a donor without opposition. I think that, as children, they are taught to be creative and to contribute their artwork to the school so that they are conditioned to give to society without question. Maybe this isn't the main goal of the school, but I think it definitely has significance.