Remains of the Day. by ISHIGURO, Kazuo - 1989

1989. London: Faber and Faber, 1989. 8vo. Original black cloth, spine lettered in white; pp. [vi], 245, [v]; a fine copy in a very good dust-jacket; Booker Prize shortlist sticker to front of jacket, a little sunned on the spine. First edition, signed by the author on the title-page. The 1989 Booker Prize Winner. The book was highly regarded among post-war British novels and describes, from the perspective of the Butler, the events at Darlington Hall in the 1920s and 1930s. The theme of the decline of the British aristocracy can be linked to the 1911 Parliament Act, which reduced their power, and to inheritance tax increases imposed after World War I, and which forced the break-up of many estates that had been passed down for generations. The film adaptation of the novel, made in 1993 and starring Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson, was nominated for eight Academy Awards.