Starting with Le Guin
dulac3
Earthsea_ which I remember enjoying. Where would be the best place to
start with her non-Earthsea stuff?
Brenda Clough
THE LATHE OF HEAVEN is grand. For a very different read you could try
her recnet LAVINIA.
Brenda
Szymon Sokół
These four:
Rocannon's World
Planet of Exile
City of Illusions
The Left Hand of Darkness
preferably in this order. But if you like The Wizard of Earthsea, why don't
you continue the Earthsea series?
--
Szymon Sokół (SS316-RIPE) -- Network Manager B
Computer Center, AGH - University of Science and Technology, Cracow, Poland O
http://home.agh.edu.pl/szymon/ PGP key id: RSA: 0x2ABE016B, DSS: 0xF9289982 F
Free speech includes the right not to listen, if not interested -- Heinlein H
DouhetSukd
I remember enjoying Left Hand of Darkness's political overtones of
dictatorship. Later on, I got to hearing that Le Guin had communist
tendencies. So I found the exploration of totalitarian themes rather
un(?)-wittingly ironic coming from someone with that (rumored)
background.
In case the above is not clear: that _is_ a recommendation, though I
remember little of the book by now. Re-reading wikipedia's entry
makes me think I should give another read one of these days.
Jack Tingle
In sci-fi, I'd go with some of her earlier Hainish stuff. The omnibus
"Worlds of Exile and Illusion", 1996, is a good place to start.
Wikipedia has a nice summary. "The Eye of the Heron" is also interesting.
I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
"The Word for World is Forest". Read those later, if you decide you like
her. If you want to know what the brouhaha is about, just start a thread
here entitled something like "The Disposessed, Obama's Blueprint for
Eurocentric Surrender" and stand back while the usual suspects begin the
battle. :)
Regards,
Jack Tingle
Will in New Haven
Will in New Haven
That's an odd combination. I mean they are both political but TD is
very deep and, in my opinion, honest. LeGuin doesn't sugar-coat the
society she prefers and, in fact, it is a rather unattractive society.
Her viewpoint character is very real, at least to me. tWftWiF is
predictable garbage, by comparison. Or even not by comparison.
While I disagree with most of LeGuin's PoV, the LeGuin who wrote _The
Dispossessed_ was at the top of her game and tWftWiF was not one of
her better books.
--
Will in New Haven
Peter Huebner
30g2000vbj.googlegroups.com>, dul...@yahoo.com says...
>
> The only thing by Ursula Le Guin that I've read was _The Wizard of
> Earthsea_ which I remember enjoying. Where would be the best place to
> start with her non-Earthsea stuff?
Apart from what the others have already recommended, LeGuin also has a
new series out that contains the titles "Powers" and "Voices" and
"Gifts".
These are also in a quasi fantasy setting although with a faint post
apocalyptic flavour, and there are elements of psi sewn through them.
I thought them a very enjoyable, at times gripping, read.
-P.
aaron
"Will in New Haven" <bill....@taylorandfrancis.com> wrote in message
news:f16f1966-4cd5-49a5...@l19g2000yqb.googlegroups.com...
On Jan 31, 4:31 pm, Jack Tingle <wjtin...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
>> "The Word for World is Forest". Read those later, if you decide you like
>> her. If you want to know what the brouhaha is about, just start a thread
>> here entitled something like "The Disposessed, Obama's Blueprint for
>> Eurocentric Surrender" and stand back while the usual suspects begin the
>> battle. :)
>That's an odd combination. I mean they are both political but TD is
>very deep and, in my opinion, honest. LeGuin doesn't sugar-coat the
>society she prefers and, in fact, it is a rather unattractive society.
First a caveat. It has been years - nay, eons - since I read TD so my
memory may be faulty.
Notwitstanding the subtitle of; 'An Ambiguous Utopia' my recall is that
while the two 'Earth' societies representing the NATO/Warsaw Pact cold war
alignments was pretty much described as 'a pox on both their houses'
negatively, the moon's anarchy society's negative traits were based solely -
or at least mostly - on the resource poor nature of the moon. It was a
struggle because the moon did have the wealth of resources of the primary
planet.
Moriarty
Read the short story collection _The Wind's Twelve Quarters_. As well
as having two Earthsea stories in there, it's got such a good mixture
of other stuff that you're sure to find something in there you'll
like.
-Moriarty
Bill Patterson
>
> - Show quoted text -
I tend to agree; I first encountered LeGuin with Word for World and
started it, oh, maybe five or six times. For reasons I still don't
understand, her prose went straight through me like neutrinos, never
stopping to make contact. I finally did manage to read it much later,
but agree, it didn't strike me she was at the top of her game -- about
where I would place Rocannon's World. [1]
The Dispossessed, however -- irrespective of one's opinions about
anarchist syndicalism -- was very affecting, beautifully written,
highly controlled, thoroughly imagined -- a proud achievement for a
novelist of any stripe, and in my opinion one of the great
achievements of modern SF. It is also one of those books that
performs the very difficult feat of being a novel in the classical
Jamesian sense, while also being science fiction of the first water.
[1] I had much the same experience, with a very different outcome,
with "Riders of the Purple Wage." For years I just couldn't get
through the dream sequence that starts it. Then one day I forced
myself to get through it and was very moved by the story.
Peter Huebner
>
> Notwitstanding the subtitle of; 'An Ambiguous Utopia' my recall is that
> while the two 'Earth' societies representing the NATO/Warsaw Pact cold war
> alignments was pretty much described as 'a pox on both their houses'
> negatively, the moon's anarchy society's negative traits were based solely -
> or at least mostly - on the resource poor nature of the moon. It was a
> struggle because the moon did have the wealth of resources of the primary
> planet.
>
Seriously, I think The Disposessed has Nothing Whatever to do with Nato
or the Warsaw Pact. It was an exploration of a fictional idealistic
utopian society -- and the point of where utopia can become oppressive
-- if you want to draw any Earth references at all, you can see Odo as
Ghandi, but even that doesn't wash, not really. She, as I recall her,
was an eminently pragmatic and practical person of high moral standards,
the fubar was, as usual, done by zealous disciples. At least that's what
I remember. My mental picture of Odo is also coloured by reading one or
two short stories featuring her, that are not part of TD.
Come to think of it, it's been eons since I have read the book, must
dust it off again some time soon :)
-P.
Bill Patterson
Aaron
> �Notwitstanding the subtitle of; 'An Ambiguous Utopia' my recall is that
> while the two 'Earth' societies representing the NATO/Warsaw Pact cold war
> alignments was pretty much described as 'a pox on both their houses'
> negatively, the moon's anarchy society's negative traits were based solely -
> or at least mostly - on the resource poor nature of the moon. It was a
> struggle because the moon did have the wealth of resources of the primary
> planet.
Not quite. She also deals with the general cultural evolution that
turns commonsense pragmaics into empty normatives and how selfishness
and petty power-weilding can hide in the burreaucracy of empty
normatives.
aaron
"Peter Huebner" <no....@this.address> wrote in message
news:MPG.25d0ebaee...@news.individual.net...
> In article <hk53b3$ntg$1...@news.datemas.de>, aa...@night.com says...
>>
>> Notwitstanding the subtitle of; 'An Ambiguous Utopia' my recall is that
>> while the two 'Earth' societies representing the NATO/Warsaw Pact cold
>> war
>> alignments was pretty much described as 'a pox on both their houses'
>> negatively, the moon's anarchy society's negative traits were based
>> solely -
>> or at least mostly - on the resource poor nature of the moon. It was a
>> struggle because the moon did have the wealth of resources of the primary
>> planet.
>>
>
> Seriously, I think The Disposessed has Nothing Whatever to do with Nato
> or the Warsaw Pact.
That may have been a poor choice of words. Would you accept
Capitalist/Communist? Or Capitalist/Socialist?
David Librik
>"Peter Huebner" <no....@this.address> wrote in message
>news:MPG.25d0ebaee...@news.individual.net...
>> or the Warsaw Pact.
>That may have been a poor choice of words. Would you accept
>Capitalist/Communist? Or Capitalist/Socialist?
The two sides on the planet Urras are Capitalist (A-Io, kind of 19th
century capitalist like Victorian England) and Communist (Thu, [which
kind of sounds like "SU" for Soviet Union], totalitarian). They are
portrayed as Bad and Worse.
The planet Anarres is based on freedom plus co-operation, so it looks
like an attempt at socialism carried out by anarchists. Despite being
founded in opposition to the Urras societies, it is developing a lot of
their problems.
Shevek from Anarres especially hates the Thuvian Communists because
they take their rhetoric from Odo, the founder of Anarres. For all
their current troubles, the Anarresti have built a society on Odo's
principles without killing and enslaving millions of people.
The real center of The Dispossessed is the truly "alien" setup on the
anarchist planet, though, and that isn't anything like any Earth society
or government.
- David Librik
lib...@panix.com
aaron
"David Librik" <lib...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:hk5agt$8k9$1...@reader1.panix.com...
Of course. When I was making the Capitalist/Communist comparison I meant the
main planet's politics.
Mike Schilling
> On Jan 31, 12:54 pm, dulac3 <dul...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> The only thing by Ursula Le Guin that I've read was _The Wizard of
>> Earthsea_ which I remember enjoying. Where would be the best place to
>> start with her non-Earthsea stuff?
>
> I remember enjoying Left Hand of Darkness's political overtones of
> dictatorship. Later on, I got to hearing that Le Guin had communist
> tendencies.
That's every bit as true as calling Dean Acheson and George Marshall
communists, of course.
Mike Schilling
.
>
> [1] I had much the same experience, with a very different outcome,
> with "Riders of the Purple Wage." For years I just couldn't get
> through the dream sequence that starts it. Then one day I forced
> myself to get through it and was very moved by the story.
It's wonderful, I think. It's the first Farmer I ever read (in DV), and it
took me years to finally stop looking for anything else of his half as
well-written.
James Nicoll
Szymon Sokó� <szy...@bastard.operator.from.hell.pl> wrote:
>On Sun, 31 Jan 2010 12:54:56 -0800 (PST), dulac3 wrote:
>
>> The only thing by Ursula Le Guin that I've read was _The Wizard of
>> Earthsea_ which I remember enjoying. Where would be the best place to
>> start with her non-Earthsea stuff?
>These four:
>Rocannon's World
>Planet of Exile
>City of Illusions
I have these in an SFBC omnibus dating from 19mumble.
--
http://www.livejournal.com/users/james_nicoll
http://www.cafepress.com/jdnicoll (For all your "The problem with
defending the English language [...]" T-shirt, cup and tote-bag needs)
htn963
<snip>
> The Dispossessed, however -- irrespective of one's opinions about
> anarchist syndicalism -- was very affecting, beautifully written,
> highly controlled, thoroughly imagined -- a proud achievement for a
> novelist of any stripe, and in my opinion one of the great
> achievements of modern SF. It is also one of those books that
> performs the very difficult feat of being a novel in the classical
> Jamesian sense, while also being science fiction of the first water.
Well said, and mucho ditto. _The Dispossessed_ is still one of my top
five (perhaps three) sf novels of all time, even though I don't
necessarily take to its political content -- which makes its literary
achievements all the more notable. This would be my recommendation
for anyone wishing to start with Le Guin -- just go straight to an
author's best work. (Otoh, for some reasons, the Leguin book I
started with,_The Left Hand of Darkness_ left me cold.)
--
Ht
Mike Dworetsky
Is that some sort of take on the story, based on a planet where tableware
includes a special tool for breaking the ice that forms on your drink, and a
key part of the action involves a trek across an enormous glacier?
--
Mike Dworetsky
(Remove pants sp*mbl*ck to reply)
erilar
Jack Tingle <wjti...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
> "The Word for World is Forest".
Gee, I really liked the latter 8-)
--
Erilar, biblioholic medievalist
erilar
<e6a002d9-afd9-4d22...@k5g2000pra.googlegroups.com>,
DouhetSukd <douhe...@gmail.com> wrote:
It's far too long since I read Left Hand of Darkness to remember any
detail, but I do remember thinking it was really good, for whatever
reasons.
JimboCat
I second that recommendation. It also includes as a standalone the
first chapter (or is it an "introduction"?) of /Rocannon's World/.
Must mention my favorite story: "The Stars Below". Perhaps my #1 short
story of all time.
I'd also like to add my reaction to a more recent novel of hers, /The
Telling/ (2000). I bounced off it, hard, at the first attempt. Several
years later I tried again, and really liked it. Mysteries are shown,
but never explained: the narrator does not know or understand, and
neither do we. Pretty realistic!
Jim Deutch (JimboCat)
--
"I've noticed that when I use rational analyses of situations that
ignore the emotional aspects, people become hostile. This is because
they are defective." -- James Nicoll
Joseph Nebus
The Lathe Of Heaven's the first Le Guin I remember reading,
though I can't swear there wasn't something preceding it. I think it's
extremely readable.
--
Joseph Nebus
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cryptoengineer
> In article <hk53b3$nt...@news.datemas.de>, aa...@night.com says...
Hmmm..... I met LeGuin at a Readercon many years ago, and asked her if
the protagonist of TD was based on Solzhenitzyn (sp). The physical
description seemed to match, and there were parallels in both's
journey from a collectivist to a capitalist society. He was active and
in the news at the time she was writing the book.
She may have been humoring me, but she said, that yes, one was
somewhat based on the other, and I'd been the only person who had
noticed up till then.
pt
Peter Huebner
55192c...@r24g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>, pete...@gmail.com says...
>
> Hmmm..... I met LeGuin at a Readercon many years ago, and asked her if
> the protagonist of TD was based on Solzhenitzyn (sp). The physical
> description seemed to match, and there were parallels in both's
> journey from a collectivist to a capitalist society. He was active and
> in the news at the time she was writing the book.
>
> She may have been humoring me, but she said, that yes, one was
> somewhat based on the other, and I'd been the only person who had
> noticed up till then.
>
> pt
>
>
Yes, that's a much more [er, word eludes me, tip of my tongue] scenario
... the protagonist was an anarchist but a little too big for the mold.
Just like Solzhenitzyn and the East German singer and activist Biermann
were socialists - and too big for the mold. All of them were ostracized
for it.
I never made the connection with S. individually, but the set-up was one
quite familiar from Real Life (tm).
-P.
htn963
wrote:
> htn963 wrote:
<snip>
> (Otoh, for some reasons, the Leguin book I
> > started with,_The Left Hand of Darkness_ left me cold.)
>
> Is that some sort of take on the story, based on a planet where tableware
> includes a special tool for breaking the ice that forms on your drink, and a
> key part of the action involves a trek across an enormous glacier?
The pun was unintended at first -- but I noticed it after I wrote it
and liked the ambiguous effect, so let it stand.
I'm not particularly fond of stories set in freezing climes (no Jack
London for me), but in any case TLHoD's plot just seemed to be one
long journey, and the attempt to depict the philosophy and societal-
mindset of aliens who are double-sexed (or alternatively-sexed or
whatever) -- the real draw of the novel if you will -- just didn't
seem convincing and/or exciting. (Perhaps the book would have been
better served by being written by an actual hermaphrodite.)
--
Ht
erilar
erilar <dra...@chibardun.net.invalid> wrote:
> In article <hk4sri$rkt$1...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Jack Tingle <wjti...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
> > "The Word for World is Forest".
>
> Gee, I really liked the latter 8-)
Come to think of it, what I really liked was "Das Wort fuer Welt ist
Wald". I was studying in Germany at the time it came out in German and
had been on a pretty light sf diet at the time.
That's also the reason two of my Lensman books are in German, right in
the middle of the 6-book string 8-)
Will in New Haven
> In article <drache-693B6F.10285601022...@news.eternal-september.org>,
>
> erilar <dra...@chibardun.net.invalid> wrote:
> > In article <hk4sri$rk...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > Jack Tingle <wjtin...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
> > > "The Word for World is Forest".
>
> > Gee, I really liked the latter 8-)
>
> Come to think of it, what I really liked was "Das Wort fuer Welt ist
> Wald". I was studying in Germany at the time it came out in German and
> had been on a pretty light sf diet at the time.
Was it less predictable in German?
--
Will in New Haven
>
erilar
<b3ed3a7b-9a6d-487f...@b2g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,
Will in New Haven <bill....@taylorandfrancis.com> wrote:
> On Feb 2, 10:31�am, erilar <dra...@chibardun.net.invalid> wrote:
> > In article <drache-693B6F.10285601022...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> >
> > �erilar <dra...@chibardun.net.invalid> wrote:
> > > In article <hk4sri$rk...@news.eternal-september.org>,
> > > �Jack Tingle <wjtin...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > > I'd initially avoid the political live wires like "The Dispossessed" or
> > > > "The Word for World is Forest".
> >
> > > Gee, I really liked the latter 8-)
> >
> > Come to think of it, what I really liked was "Das Wort fuer Welt ist
> > Wald". �I was studying in Germany at the time it came out in German and
> > had been on a pretty light sf diet at the time.
>
> Was it less predictable in German?
Hard to say. I hadn't been reading much to compare it to just then.
William December Starr
erilar <dra...@chibardun.net.invalid> said:
> It's far too long since I read Left Hand of Darkness to remember
> any detail, but I do remember thinking it was really good, for
> whatever reasons.
Just to cast a dissenting vote, I gave up on waiting for something
interesting to happen in that book about eighty or so pages in.
-- wds