In awarding Ishiguro the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2017, the Academy said that their decision was due partly to the great emotional force in his novels. How does The Buried Giant meet this criteria?

Readers also move from a state of innocence to awareness as the couple's journey continues. At the beginning of the novel, they believe that Axl is simply a soft spoken elderly man and Beatrice is his loyal wife. By the end, they know that Axl worked for King Arthur and that Beatrice hadn't always been loyal to Axl. In fact, it was her disloyalty that caused their son to run away. Readers also find out that the couple's son is dead and that the couple had fought about visiting his grave.

Along with Axl and Beatrice readers become aware of the reason for the mist and the opposing goals of Master Winston and Sir Gawain. In essence, Axl, Beatrice, and readers walk out of the mist together.