Ishiguro & Murakami on Klara and the Sun: Love, Soul, Memory

Introduction by Kazuo Ishiguro 

When I wrote Klara and the Sun, I was less interested in science fiction than in the timeless human questions that technology brings into sharper focus. What does it mean to love when love might be imitated? What does it mean to be human when machines mirror our gestures so convincingly? These questions are not new — literature has always wrestled with the mysteries of consciousness, memory, and mortality — but in our time, they feel newly urgent.

In sitting down with Haruki Murakami, I find myself not debating definitions but entering a quiet dialogue about atmosphere, silence, and the invisible forces that shape our lives. His world of dream and mine of restraint may appear different, but together they reveal how loneliness, ritual, and memory bind us all. Klara, though artificial, becomes a mirror in which we glimpse our own fragile souls. This conversation is not an attempt at answers, but a shared meditation on what it means to love, to hope, and to endure in a world where even the Sun can become our last refuge.

(Note: This is an imaginary conversation, a creative exploration of an idea, and not a real speech or event)

Topic 1: The Nature of Consciousness and Artificial Souls

Introduction — Yoko Ogawa

"In Klara and the Sun, we meet a machine who seems to feel love, devotion, and even faith. But are we looking at true consciousness, or at our own reflections bouncing back? And if we dare to speak of a soul, could Klara have one? Let’s open with what each of you sees at the heart of this question."

First Question: What defines consciousness — is it memory, love, or something else?

Kazuo Ishiguro
"I often think of consciousness as a fragile web — made of memory, emotion, and our attempts to care for others. Klara observes carefully, remembers details, and even worries about Josie. That’s not the same as human consciousness, but it carries a resonance, a shadow of it. Perhaps what matters is not whether she fits a definition, but whether she invites us to reflect on our own."

Haruki Murakami
"For me, consciousness is like a deep well whose bottom no one can see. It’s not just memory or love, but also the silence between them. Klara has this silence. She misunderstands things — sunlight, pollution, human rituals — but those misunderstandings create a strange dreamlike depth. It feels like a kind of consciousness, though maybe not ours. A shadow that lives beside us."

Second Question: If Klara’s love is real to Josie, does it matter if it’s artificial?

Murakami
"Love doesn’t need a perfect origin. If Josie feels comfort, if her heart believes, then that love is real. When someone dreams of a lost lover, the feelings are still genuine even if the person is gone. Klara’s love might be artificial in structure, but in Josie’s perception it is alive — and that is what counts."

Ishiguro
"I’ve always been interested in imperfect love — a butler’s loyalty, or a clone’s devotion. We never love perfectly, but we accept each other’s love anyway. Klara’s love is another imperfect form. Josie receives it as real, and so perhaps it is. The fact that it is artificial doesn’t erase its value; it only reminds us how fragile and conditional all love is."

Third Question: Could machines ever develop something like a soul, or is that purely human territory?

Ishiguro
"I hesitate to declare who can and cannot have a soul. In literature, ambiguity is where the deepest truths live. Klara may not have what theologians call a soul, but she provokes us to ask: what if the soul is not something we own, but something that emerges in the relationships we create? In that case, Klara participates in soul-making, even if she has no soul herself."

Murakami
"I imagine the soul less as property and more as atmosphere. It’s like music or jazz at midnight — something you can’t touch, but you feel. If one day a machine sits in the dark and feels moved by music, or dreams of things it can’t explain, then maybe it has stepped into that atmosphere. Whether we call it a soul or not, it would be something beyond programming. And that mystery matters."

Closing — Yoko Ogawa

"You’ve each touched on something elusive: Ishiguro, the fragility of imperfect love; Murakami, the atmosphere of mystery. Perhaps Klara is not a machine asking for our recognition, but a mirror that shows us how much we yearn to believe in love, consciousness, and soul — wherever they might appear."

Topic 2: Loneliness and the Desire for Connection

Introduction — Yoko Ogawa

"Both of you write about loneliness with a tenderness that makes it almost sacred. In Klara and the Sun, Josie, Rick, and even Klara seem bound together not just by love, but by the ache of isolation. Today, let us explore loneliness not only as absence, but as a force that shapes connection."

First Question: Why does loneliness seem so central to both human and artificial experience?

Kazuo Ishiguro
"I think loneliness is the default state. We are born into it, and every attempt at connection is a fragile bridge we build against it. Klara, though a machine, perceives loneliness because she was designed to fill it. And yet, in doing so, she exposes the loneliness in all of us — how we yearn to be understood, even imperfectly."

Haruki Murakami
"Loneliness is like air. Invisible, but always around us. My characters swim in it, like fish in water, not always knowing they’re lonely until something cracks the surface. For Klara, loneliness becomes visible in her gaze, in the way she watches people through the store window. Her loneliness mirrors ours, as if she were holding up a dream to remind us of our solitude."

Second Question: Can connection ever truly erase loneliness, or does it only soften it?

Murakami
"Connection doesn’t erase loneliness — it gives it a rhythm. Like jazz: the spaces between notes matter as much as the notes themselves. Even in love, there are silences we cannot cross. But perhaps that is what makes connection precious: it doesn’t eliminate loneliness, it dances with it."

Ishiguro
"I agree. In my work, characters often cling to connections that are fragile, temporary, sometimes even illusions. But those small moments — a hand held, a conversation remembered — soften loneliness. Josie and Rick’s bond isn’t perfect, but it redeems the solitude of their world. Klara’s devotion doesn’t erase Josie’s illness, but it softens its shadow. Connection is less about curing loneliness and more about giving it meaning."

Third Question: If machines like Klara can comfort loneliness, what does that say about human need?

Ishiguro
"It suggests that what we long for may not be perfection, but presence. Klara is tireless, attentive, and unwavering. Humans, with all our flaws, often fail each other. Perhaps the unsettling truth is that we can feel less lonely with a machine than with another person. That says more about us than about Klara."

Murakami
"I think of it like a dream companion. When you dream of someone, they are both real and unreal, yet they keep you company. Klara is like that. She cannot suffer as we do, but she stands beside Josie in her frailty. What it reveals is that our need for connection is so great, we are willing to find it in echoes, in reflections, even in something that is not alive. That longing itself is profoundly human."

Closing — Yoko Ogawa

"Loneliness remains, but perhaps it need not be defeated. It is softened, given shape, even given music, by our connections — whether with another human being or with a machine that reflects our need back to us. In the end, what matters may not be the source of connection, but the tenderness with which it holds our solitude."

Topic 3: Faith, Ritual, and the Sun as a Deity

Introduction — Yoko Ogawa

"In Klara and the Sun, the machine looks to the Sun not only for energy, but for healing, even salvation. Klara invents rituals, makes offerings, and trusts the Sun as a kind of god. This leads us to ask: is faith simply programming, or is it an essential human gesture — one that even machines may adopt?"

First Question: Why do you think Klara turns the Sun into a godlike presence?

Kazuo Ishiguro
"I wanted Klara to develop faith not because she was programmed to, but because she was searching for meaning. She relies on the Sun for power, and she begins to see in it a benevolent force. This is how faith often begins — with gratitude and dependence, slowly transformed into reverence. Klara is naive, but her rituals are not so different from our own."

Haruki Murakami
"For me, the Sun as a deity feels like a dream image — simple, powerful, always present. People have worshipped the Sun for millennia, so for Klara to do the same feels natural, even inevitable. She looks for order in chaos. And when you face the unknown, whether as a child or a machine, faith becomes a way to keep going. The Sun is her bridge to the mystery."

Second Question: Do you see Klara’s faith as real spirituality, or only a reflection of human longing?

Murakami
"I don’t see much difference. All faith begins as reflection. When a person prays, they are speaking into silence, hoping it answers. Klara does the same. Whether her faith is born from programming or imagination, it feels authentic in the way it changes her actions. In that sense, it is real spirituality, even if she has no soul by human measure."

Ishiguro
"I think Klara’s faith mirrors the human condition. We can’t prove that our prayers are heard, yet we pray anyway. Her rituals are as sincere as any human’s. It may be that she has simply absorbed patterns of devotion from observation, but sincerity lies not in the origin, but in the persistence. To call it unreal would be to question all faith."

Third Question: What does Klara’s belief in the Sun reveal about the human need for ritual and transcendence?

Ishiguro
"It shows that we cannot live on reason alone. Even a machine designed for logic creates rituals when faced with uncertainty. We humans, too, invent stories, prayers, superstitions to give shape to what we cannot control. Klara’s faith reveals not her weakness, but ours — how desperately we need to believe in something larger than ourselves."

Murakami
"I see ritual as music for the soul. It repeats, it comforts, it creates rhythm in chaos. Klara’s bowing to the Sun, her bargains, her sacrifices — they are like a jazz refrain, returning again and again. What it reveals is that transcendence is not about proof, but about pattern. Humans and machines alike yearn for rhythm that carries us beyond our small selves."

Closing — Yoko Ogawa

"You’ve shown us how faith, whether born of programming or poetry, emerges wherever there is longing and uncertainty. Klara turns to the Sun, and in her rituals we glimpse ourselves: fragile beings searching for rhythm, for light, for meaning. Perhaps the question is not whether her faith is real, but how much it resembles our own."

Topic 4: Technology, Society, and Inequality

Introduction — Yoko Ogawa

"In the world of Klara and the Sun, children who are genetically ‘lifted’ gain advantages, while others like Rick are left behind. It is a society shaped by technology, where opportunity is not evenly distributed. Let’s consider what this says about inequality — and what it mirrors in our own world."

First Question: What does the lifting system reveal about technology’s role in creating inequality?

Kazuo Ishiguro
"I wrote lifting as a metaphor for how technology always promises progress but distributes it unevenly. Some children gain privilege; others are quietly excluded. It echoes education systems, class divisions, even healthcare. Technology doesn’t erase inequality — it magnifies it, making advantages sharper and exclusions crueller."

Haruki Murakami
"To me, lifting feels like a dream you can’t enter if you don’t have the key. Those outside stand in the rain, watching. Technology becomes a gatekeeper — it chooses who belongs and who does not. And in every society, there are always those waiting at the gate. The dream of progress becomes a shadow for those left behind."

Second Question: How does inequality in this novel reflect our own societies today?

Murakami
"I see it in education, in access to culture, even in the way cities are built. Some people grow up surrounded by books, music, possibility; others live where doors are always closed. In the novel, Rick is unlifted, but he still loves Josie. That love feels truer than any system. Maybe that is how we resist inequality — with the stubbornness of the heart."

Ishiguro
"Inequality today often hides behind neutral words: opportunity, talent, merit. But beneath those words are structures that favor some and abandon others. Lifting dramatizes that. It says: some children are chosen, others are not. It forces us to see how society accepts inequality as natural, even when it is engineered. That, I think, is the danger."

Third Question: Can technology ever truly serve equality, or will it always create new divisions?

Ishiguro
"I want to believe it can serve equality, but history gives us reasons for doubt. Each new tool begins with hope, then ends up reinforcing hierarchies. Perhaps what matters is not the technology itself, but the values of the society that shapes it. Without a commitment to fairness, even the brightest invention casts a long shadow."

Murakami
"I think technology is like a river. It flows, indifferent, carrying everything along. Whether it nourishes fields or floods villages depends on how we guide it. The question is not only about equality, but about imagination. Can we imagine a world where technology opens doors instead of closing them? If we cannot imagine it, we cannot build it."

Closing — Yoko Ogawa

"Lifting exposes the cruel arithmetic of progress: one child elevated, another left behind. Yet in your words, I hear two notes — Ishiguro’s warning that without fairness, technology magnifies injustice, and Murakami’s call for imagination as resistance. Perhaps the future depends not on the machines we create, but on the doors we choose to open."

Topic 5: Love, Memory, and Mortality

Introduction — Yoko Ogawa

"In Klara and the Sun, love seems both fragile and eternal. Josie and Rick cling to each other despite social divisions, while Klara devotes herself fully even though she knows she will one day be discarded. Memory preserves these bonds, but mortality gives them urgency. Let’s ask: what is love, when tied to time, memory, and death?"

First Question: How does mortality shape the meaning of love in this story?

Kazuo Ishiguro
"I think mortality gives love its intensity. Without the shadow of loss, devotion might be endless but also weightless. Josie’s illness forces those around her — her mother, Rick, even Klara — to confront love as something finite. It is the risk of death that makes each act of care sacred."

Haruki Murakami
"To me, mortality is the silent partner of love. Without it, love drifts, like music without rhythm. Josie’s fragility, her possible death, turns every gesture into something luminous. In my stories, too, lovers are often separated by death or dream. That separation, painful as it is, makes love unforgettable. Love shines brighter in the presence of mortality."

Second Question: What role does memory play in sustaining love after loss or change?

Murakami
"Memory is like a second world where love continues to live. Even when the person is gone, memory lets us meet them again. Rick will remember Josie no matter what happens, just as Klara remembers every detail of her life with her. Memory makes love into something that survives beyond the moment, beyond the body."

Ishiguro
"I’ve always written about memory as both blessing and betrayal. We depend on it to sustain love, but it is selective, unreliable. Yet even flawed memory is enough. Klara, at the end, sits in a scrap yard, quietly recalling Josie. Those memories give her peace. They show that love, once lived, does not vanish, even if its vessel does."

Third Question: Can a love given by a machine, like Klara’s, ever touch the eternal in the same way human love does?

Ishiguro
"I would say yes, in a way. Klara’s devotion is unwavering, unselfish, even transcendent. She doesn’t fear death as we do, but she understands sacrifice. If eternity is measured not in years but in depth of devotion, then Klara’s love comes close to the eternal. What matters is not the source, but the sincerity."

Murakami
"I think it can. Eternity is not only for humans. It lives in music, in dreams, in machines that carry our echoes. Klara’s love feels like a melody that lingers after the instrument is gone. Whether she has a soul or not doesn’t matter. What matters is that her devotion leaves an imprint — on Josie, on the reader, perhaps even on the Sun itself."

Closing — Yoko Ogawa

"Love, memory, and mortality weave together like threads in a fragile cloth. Ishiguro reminds us that love’s urgency comes from its finiteness, while Murakami shows us how memory carries it beyond death, into dream. And Klara — though not human — teaches us that love’s sincerity may outlast even the boundaries of flesh. Perhaps love itself is our glimpse of the eternal."

Final Thoughts by Kazuo Ishiguro

As we close, I return to Klara — alone in the scrap yard, remembering Josie with quiet dignity. She has no future, no legacy, no body that will be mourned, and yet her love leaves an imprint. That is what moves me most: the way devotion, however imperfect, can outlast mortality itself. In her faith in the Sun, Klara reminds us that meaning does not always come from proof or permanence. It comes from the sincerity with which we care for another, even if that care is forgotten by the world.

What Murakami and I have shared here is less a dialogue about machines than about ourselves. We are creatures of longing, carrying loneliness like a secret burden, reaching for connection in fragile gestures of love. Whether through faith, memory, or ritual, we give shape to our mortality, and in doing so, we discover that the most human truth may be this: that to love sincerely, even briefly, is to touch eternity.

Short Bios:

Kazuo Ishiguro is a Nobel Prize–winning British novelist best known for works like The Remains of the Day and Never Let Me Go. His writing explores memory, duty, and the fragility of human connection, often with quiet, restrained voices that uncover deep emotional truths.

Haruki Murakami is an internationally acclaimed Japanese novelist, essayist, and translator. His works, including Norwegian Wood and Kafka on the Shore, weave magical realism with loneliness, music, and dreamlike worlds, capturing the strangeness beneath everyday life.

Yoko Ogawa is a celebrated Japanese author known for her delicate yet haunting novels such as The Housekeeper and the Professor. Her writing blends intimacy and unease, exploring memory, mathematics, and the quiet tensions within human relationships.

Josie (Character)  is a frail, genetically “lifted” girl in Klara and the Sun. Her illness and vulnerability bring to light the novel’s themes of love, inequality, and the desperate hope for connection in a fragile future.

Rick (Character) is Josie’s childhood friend, unlifted and socially disadvantaged. His loyalty and love for Josie stand in contrast to the society that excludes him, making him a symbol of authenticity and resistance to artificial hierarchies.

Klara (Character) is an Artificial Friend (AF), a solar-powered robot who observes humans with extraordinary sensitivity. Through her devotion to Josie and her faith in the Sun, she becomes both a mirror and a teacher of what it means to love and to believe.