Similarities and Differences:
Each cover focuses on elements of the story that play a significant role. The top left cover portrays a girl sitting by herself, so the reader will probably assume that the girl is the main character of the story. The top right cover also appears to portray a girl who could be the main character. However the top left portrays an older girl in a sulking manner and the top right cover has a little girl on it as if the author wants the reader to realize that the characters childhood plays a large role in the storyline. These two covers are different from the top two because instead of portraying humans on the cover, which humans and humanistic qualities are important features of the story, they portray object that have a significant meaning to the plot of the story. The boat on the bottom left presents the idea of loneliness and not letting go of the things or people who mean something in your life. This is seen in the story with Kathy missing Tommy and Ruth after they both completed. The bottom right directly portrays one of the most important ideas in the story, the idea that when Kathy and her friends reach middle to older adulthood, they will go through a series of donations where they will lose their vital organs and ultimately die. This cover is most effective to me because it focuses on the part of the story that impacts the reader significantly once they discover the purpose of the donations and what Kathy and her friends really are.
When I first glance at the first cover, I automatically think about flashbacks and how much they contribute to the storyline and how Kathy uses them to not only narrate the story but also characterize her friends and establish the relationship she has with her friends throughout the novel. When I look at the other cover I think of donations and how important they are in the story. The donations are important because they let the reader know that Kathy and her friends are different than everybody else and that they have a specific purpose that requires them to sacrifice something that means so much to them. If I had seen the first cover without any prior knowledge of the novel, I would have thought that the story was about a young girl who had lost her family or something important in her life that changed the way she viewed the world as an adult. If I had seen the second cover I probably thought that the novel would be about someone who was sick and their family struggling to come to terms that they are going to lose them in the end (like
My Sister's Keeper). Now that I have read the novel however, I see that both of these images strategically focus on elements of the story that greatly affect Kathy's life. The first image alludes to how meaningful her child hood was and the second gives the reader insight on the process of donations and what they actually mean. From looking at the first cover it seems that the little girl on the front makes it look as if Kathy is portrayed because she uses flashbacks to tell her story so it makes sense that a little girl would be portrayed on the cover because the audience is seeing all of these event unfold through Kathy's perspective. The second cover doesn't show a specific person but reinforces the idea of donations and how important they are to the idea that Kathy and the students at Hailsham are different than everyone else and that their purpose in life has already been determined for them. This is the viewpoint of the reader because we do not have any idea of who we are looking at, and by the end of the novel the reader will view the donation process as it is presented on the second cover, that its just a process of losing all major organs. The second cover suggests that this book was constructed to portray a controversial topic, and knowing that cloning was a hot topic in the science field at this time, Ishiguro is able to portray this controversial topic knowing that people would have mixed feelings about cloning and him concluding that the cloning that was happening then would lead to the cloning of humans. Based on the first cover the people who would read this book would be people who realize that when you get older you realize that certain aspects of your childhood shaped the way you view the world today and the relationships you have with other people. The target audience of the second book would be people interested in science an maybe even interested in the controversy that can arise from the introduction of new theories or topics.
