Booker Prize winning author Kazuo Ishiguro visits Liverpool, 2 June 2007

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A BOOKER Prize-winning, celebrity writer whose work was turned into a Hollywood blockbuster is to make a rare public appearance in Liverpool.

Kazuo Ishiguro, author of The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go, will discuss and read from his work during a public event part of a conference at Liverpool Hope University in June.

The reading by Ishiguro, which takes place at 6pm on June 2 2007 in the Great Hall at Hope’s Cornerstone Campus in Everton, is open to the public.

Tickets cost £6/£4 and can be booked on 0151 291 3578.

The conference, entitled Kazuo Ishiguro and the International Novel, will welcome scores of academics from across the globe including America, Shanghai, Japan, South Africa and Australia as well as Europe.

The event will include a talk with Ishiguro’s Japanese and Italian translators.

Among the issues being discussed are the transnationalism of Ishiguro’s work and his earlier Japanese novels such as An Artist of the Floating World.

To stimulate reading amongst Liverpool’s young, some 50 local A Level students are due to attend a public reading by Ishiguro during the conference. They will be given free copies of The Remains of the Day and do workshops based on the novel.

Ishiguro has enjoyed a glittering writing career, which began the the University of East Anglia’s famous Creative Writing school. Ishiguro went on, winning the Cheltenham prize for his novel The Unconsoled and was awarded an OBE for services to literature in 1995.

Ishiguro’s work appeal to people across the globe. The author has described himself as an international author: ‘My novels contain a vision of life that is of importance to people of varied backgrounds around the world. It may concern characters who jet across continents, but may just as easily be set firmly in one small locality.'

His best-known work, Booker Prize-winning novel The Remains of the Day, was turned into an award-winning Hollywood film starring Emma Thompson, Anthony Hopkins and Christopher Reeve which was nominated for eight Oscars.

Ishiguro has also been nominated for the Whitbread Prize and his work has been translated into over 30 languages.

He also wrote the screenplay for a film, The White Countess, which starred Ralph Fiennes and Natasha Richardson.

His latest, best-selling novel, Never Let Me Go, tells the story of a group of students who find out that a sinister fate lies behind the ideal world they grow up in. Ishiguro: ‘The book is about how we face the knowledge that our time on earth is limited and how we decide what things are the really worthwhile things.’

Professor Gerald Pillay, Vice Chancellor and Rector of Hope University, said: “This is a real coup for us at the university and we’re delighted to welcome Mr Ishiguro to Liverpool.

“We believe it is a unique event that will contribute greatly to Liverpool’s cultural and academic life and will help us build towards our Capital of Cultural celebrations in 2008.

“Hope is obviously well-known locally for its expertise in such things as teacher training but an event of this kind indicates the strength of our broader academic offering.

“It is testament to how well respected Hope is worldwide and also to the appeal of Liverpool to have conferences and speakers of this calibre at the university.�

COMPETITION

Art in Liverpool is giving away three copies of Never Let Me Go and three free tickets to the reading of Ishiguro.

Please answer the following question and send it to: info@artinliverpool.com with your postal address or phone number.
Closing date for entries: Sunday May 27 2007. Three winners will be drawn from the correct entries

Who played the butler Mr Stevens in the film adaptation of The Remains of the Day?