"She said we weren't being taught enough, something like that."
"Taught enough? You mean she thinks we should be studying even harder than we are?"
"No, I don't think she meant that. What she was talking about was, you know, about us. What's going to happen to us one day. Donations and all that."
"But we have been taught about all that," I said. "I wonder what she meant. Does she think there are things we haven't been told yet?" (3.28-31)
This is the first we hear about Miss Lucy's desire to tell the students the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Tommy and Kathy think they've already learned everything there is to know about their futures. But notice Tommy's ambiguous language when he says "Donations and all that." What does "all that" refer to? Or does Tommy not know yet?
Quote 2
Tommy thought it possible the guardians had, throughout all our years at Hailsham, timed very carefully and deliberately everything they told us, so that we were always just too young to understand properly the latest piece of information. But of course we'd take it in at some level, so that before long all this stuff was there in our heads without us ever having examined it properly. (7.26)
Tommy has come up with quite the conspiracy theory. The guardians at Hailsham seem to be masters at slipping information into the students' heads without the students even knowing about it. Is this effective parenting? Or good teaching? Or is it just plain old brainwashing?
Quote 3
Then as we were going down a particularly dark lane in the back of nowhere, he said suddenly: "I think Miss Lucy was right. Not Miss Emily." (22.88-89)
Here, Tommy hops on the Team Miss Lucy train. It's curious that he has this epiphany in the middle of a dark lane. Is that symbolic somehow?
"It's not worth getting upset about," Tommy went on. […] "Our models, what they were like, that's nothing to do with us, Kath. It's just not worth getting upset about." (15.4)
It shouldn't surprise us that Tommy has a unique perspective. While most of the characters really want to know who their "possible" might be, Tommy is different. He sees himself as entirely separate from his clone model. Clearly Tommy values his independence.
Quote 5
"She told Roy that things like pictures, poetry, all that kind of stuff, she said they revealed what you were like inside. She said they revealed your soul." (15.61)
Tommy remembers when Miss Emily finally told Roy why their artwork matters so much: because it has soul-revealing properties. Do you agree with Miss Emily? Is art a window into your soul? Or into your mind? Or maybe your heart?
Quote 6
"The thing is, I'm doing them really small. Tiny. I'd never thought of that at Hailsham. I think maybe that's where I went wrong. If you make them tiny, and you have to because the pages are only about this big, then everything changes. It's like they come to life by themselves. Then you have to draw in all these different details for them." (15.89)
Tommy wants to make his imaginary animals "come to life" and he thinks he's found the secret ingredient: making them teeny tiny. Well, we guess we won't ask Tommy to paint a life-sized mural any time soon.
"I mean, don't you ever get tired of being a carer? All the rest of us, we became donors ages ago. You've been doing it for years. Don't you sometimes wish, Kath, they'd hurry up and send you your notice?"
I shrugged. "I don't mind. Anyway, it's important there are good carers. And I'm a good carer."
"But is it really that important? Okay, it's really nice to have a good carer. But in the end, is it really so important? The donors will all donate, just the same, and then they'll complete." (23.24-26)
Tommy's being quite the killjoy here. The way he figures it, everyone donates and completes, so why bother working so hard to be a carer? Do you think Tommy is being pessimistic? Or is he just being realistic?
Then he said: "I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end it's just too much. The current's too strong. They've got to let go, drift apart. That's how I think it is with us. It's a shame, Kath, because we've loved each other all our lives. But in the end, we can't stay together forever." (23.30)
Gosh that's a powerful image, and a mighty sad one. There's something so final in the way Tommy talks about letting Kathy go. To Tommy, there's nothing they can do to change their fate. It just is what it is, so they may as well give in.