On the subject of endings: I have a theory that the ending of a novel does not have to resolve the novel's central conflict but it has to resolve the novel's central question. These are different things. The conflict can remain — the situation can be unresolved, the characters can be damaged — but the question that the novel has been asking should have received an answer.

The Remains of the Day resolves nothing about Stevens' practical situation. He's still in the same job, still serving a man who may or may not be a fascist sympathizer, still unable to recover what he sacrificed. But the question — was it worth it? — receives an answer. And Stevens' acceptance of that answer, in the famous scene looking out over the evening, is the ending the novel needed.

A plot resolution is easy. A thematic resolution is what lasts.