The Last Samurai Literary Elements

Bildungsroman / Domestic Fiction

Set in London in the mid-1990s.

Narrated in first-person from the perspective of both Sibylla and Ludo.

Profound, Offbeat, Humorous, Heartbreaking

The protagonists are Ludo and Sibylla. The antagonist is the futile quest for a deserving father figure to the child prodigy.

As the narrative explores human ambition and absent parental figures the young protagonist sought for his father akin to a samurai recruiting fellow warriors. Each of the candidates at his disposal turns out to be flawed as per the criteria Ludo has set for the potential father figure. Most of the men seem to struggle with vanity as they are corrupted by their pursuit of notoriety.

The climax in the story reaches when Red Devlin who struggles with PTSD commits suicide in Ludo’s presence.

“Kambei is samurai 1. He starts to recruit the rest. He picks out a samurai in the street.”

The scene from “The Seven Samurai” foreshadows Ludo’s quest in seeking potential fathers as Kambei sought after the other samurais.

“I sat beside him while the body grew cooler. I thought at one point that if I called a hospital the organs could still be transplanted, but I thought his wife would be upset if she came home to find that even the mortal remains did not remain.”

Ludo has been trained to view suicide as a rational response by his mother, evident through the understatement of Red Devlin’s suicide.

The narrative alludes to Akira Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai as the child prodigy frequently references and watches the film. Moreover, as a precarious child introduced to ancient languages and classic art forms Ludo alludes to Homer and Glenn Gould.

“The valley floor could not be seen. It was covered with a mist as thick and white as cloud. Out of the cloud rose the barren rocks. The sky had cleared above, as if a solution of air and fine rain had separated until the heavier of the two had silted the valley in thick white mist leaving the clear pure air above. The backs of the rocks were in black shadow, and at the edge of the black ran a glittering line of gold, as though each was a moon just past the new. On the summit of each was a little cluster of trees, black against the setting sun, and liquid flame welled through.”

N/A

Through the search to find a parental figure Ludo parallels the five potential fathers including his biological father in regards to their intellect and character flaws.

“The papers published her letters when she wrote letters and they covered the demonstrations…”

Papers are a synecdoche for print media.

“The wind is howling. A cold rain is falling. The brown paper window pane is flapping in the fierce rain and wind”