Never Let Me Go: 19

DEAD METAPHOR (CLICHE)

"All these things contributed, contributed to the turning of the tide." p. 264

In this excerpt, the cliche used is "turning of the tide". I know in one of my past English classes, a teacher told me to always stray from cliches. While I do see her point, I think they can be rather useful. If they are well enough known, then they sort of flow with everything else. You don't have to sit there and think about it. You don't have to try to relate it or decipher it. You just read over it because you simply know it. This particular use of it is very much a turning of the tide. Miss Emily is explaining why exactly Hailsham closed. And the closing of the school -if one could call it that- was a major turning point in the entire book itself. Now, all clones (yes, I finally figured out what they were) are most likely going to be raised in terrible conditions. This is kind of sad because at the end of the story, there is nothing to counteract this sadness. No other place was formed with the same intentions as Hailsham's.