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Someone asked me my opinion of LeGuin. I thought my reply deserved its own entry.
I think Ursula K LeGuin is very nearly a perfect writer. I cannot wade through the feminist tripe of her more recent books, unfortunately, but I think everyone should read A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA, THE FARTHEST SHORE, THE DISPOSSESSED and LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS. But even in her recent books, her power as a storyteller, if anything, has grown beyond her earlier and more famous works. Read FOUR WAYS TO FORGIVENESS to see a potent and subtle narrative.
As for her literary quality, she has a clean and luminous prose, a simple way of putting across striking characters and scenes and memorable images that a writer of my humble talents cannot even approach, much less imitate. No sentence is confused, no words are jarring, and yet there is a real fire of poetry, a divine fire, in what she writes. Compare her sentences to the bland journalistic style of Robert Heinlein or the tepid intellectual style of Isaac Asimov: you cannot because there is no comparison. The closest comparison one can make is to Ray Bradbury, and even there, she is the superior, because Bradbury often pauses to indulge in strange metaphors or intrusive description.
Her male characters never seem girlish, which is the plague of talentless female authors. Her characters are whole.
She is a mistress of the understatement. Le Guin can draw a tear from your eye merely by describing a scene where an old woman gets out of bed, and the gray light is coming in through the farmhouse windows.
Reading Ursula Le Guin at her best is like watching a ballet: it is so graceful, so seemingly effortless, you forget that you are looking at hard-working female athletes, and you think you are looking at swans.
It is merely a pity that she places her muse in the service of feminism, which is, after all, a rather peevish, unjoyful, and self-centered religion. Like the other members of her religion, she has to periodically interrupt her narrative to genuflect to her gods, and to scorn mine: but since she is a true craftsman of the first water, her interruptions are nigh unnoticeable. It is not like reading Ayn Rand or Bob Heinlein. Le Guin never preaches: she has strong opinions, but she shows, not tells.
Her silence is louder than all the thunder and hellfire of preachers like Ayn Rand. Her sermons are in stones and sunsets, the human souls and distant stars and the other things her quiet pen creates.
July 19 2007, 17:39:31 UTC 4 years ago
I wrote a rather scathing revies of The Dispossessed, first on Usenet and later reproducing it here on Livejournal. Still, I think it's a great science fiction novel, and I've read it more than once ... good writing, characterization and an ambitious theme made it enjoyable despite some obvious illogicalities. I think much the same of Frank Herbert's Dune novels, for similar reasons.
July 19 2007, 18:46:40 UTC 4 years ago
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July 19 2007, 17:56:07 UTC 4 years ago
- omninaif
July 19 2007, 18:09:08 UTC 4 years ago
The kind of faux-Miltonian tales I tell are like the epics sung by flattering bards to the kings in their cold stone halls, lit by candles thick as stars, where scholars will nod and smile over the clever word-play, the allusion, the dignity of the verse. Milton? Say, rather, William Morris, for mine is a nostalgic look back to a world I never lived in. But LeGuin is from an older and more honest place: of old the place where tales were born is around a campfire, and her world is hers.
Anonymous
July 19 2007, 18:16:07 UTC 4 years ago
Her work reminds me of the Cyclaedic sculptures(do a google image search for these, they're great): almost excessively simple, yet powerful and evocative. I was deeply moved by both Wizard of Earthsea and Tombs of Atuan.
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July 19 2007, 18:39:30 UTC 4 years ago
July 19 2007, 19:22:27 UTC 4 years ago
Contrarian
Her style didn't do it for me: I actually prefer the more unadorned/journalistic style (some might call it "Hemmingway-esque") myself. Admittedly, I haven't read much of her work, but I didn't care for either the Wizard of Earthsea or the Left Hand of Darkness.As far as female SF authors go, what do you think of Butler or Tiptree?
July 19 2007, 19:41:38 UTC 4 years ago
Re: Contrarian
I am not familiar with their work. There are some embarrassing gaps in my reading.4 years ago
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July 19 2007, 19:25:48 UTC 4 years ago
Maybe I'm missing something or maybe I just prefer more explosions. I dunno.
July 19 2007, 19:56:35 UTC 4 years ago
July 19 2007, 20:33:32 UTC 4 years ago
The Other Wind
LeGuin, in EARTHSEA, was the first to introduce a Toaist religious sentiment into occidental fantasy stories, the first to have oriental dragons (good guys) rather than occidental (bad guys), she invented the idea that magicians might have a school where they study and learn their art, and she used 'real' magic, by which i mean 'the Rule of True Names' is just what anthropologists identify as underlying the magical theory of primitive tribes. Compare and contrast this to the magic of Jack Vance's THE DYING EARTH (which every D&D player is familiar with, whether he knows it or not). Vance is a mannered and artificial system, invented merely for the purpose of creating dramatic tension. Icunno the Laughing Magician is not real. Sparrowhowk of Roke is real. She also was progressive enough -- unheard of in her era -- to include non-whites as the main characters. The only other person who did anything of the kind in those days was Robert Heinlein (Mr. Rico in STARSHIP TROOPERS is Tagolog).THE OTHER WIND and TEHANU I thought were minor efforts, not capturing the grace and magic of the original. In effect, she was like Asimov writing the fourth FOUNDATION book, or Zelazny writing his 'Merlin' chronicles. Someone hit her with a bag of money, and readers wanting a jolt of nostalgia bought her book, and were perhaps disappointed.
Nonetheless, I thought her ability to evoke a realistic character with a few well-crafted words was stronger and clearer than in the original stories; the graciousness of the courtiers of Arren, now the restored High King, for example, sticks in my memory. The middle-aged Tenar in TEHANU is more real than the young Arha in TOMBS OF ATUAN.
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July 19 2007, 20:18:22 UTC 4 years ago
I do think Ayn Rand does have legitimate literary talent. I understand what you're saying about Heinlein and Asimov but I feel Atlas Shrugged does a great deal of showing in addition to the lengthy sections of telling (which could be one reason why the book is 1,100 pages long!)
July 19 2007, 20:51:21 UTC 4 years ago
Nonetheless, she is preachy. She halts the action to make speeches, many speeches.
Some of her speeches are pretty good. Better than Thomas Sowell, better than Anne Coulter. Ayn Rand rivets her words in place with red-hot passion and conviction. However, no one not of her congregation will want to hear her preach her theology. A rightwinger can read Ursula Le Guin with pleasure, even if he disagrees with her Marx-flavored feminism. Even an ardent pro-Capitalist cannot read Ayn Rand for pleasure if his disagrees with her pagan-flavored Reason-worship. Her invective is too intrusive.
This is not a bug, it is a feature. ATLAS SHRUGGED was meant to be the manifesto and bible for a new generation of radicals for capitalism, men who objected to any imposition on human reason or human freedom no matter how small. She glows with the fire of a reformer, the heat of a prophetess, and she smiteth the quailing nations with the two-edged sword that proceedeth from her mouth. Who shall stand on the Day of Her Wrath? It is not a novel meant to be read by a general audience. It is meant for her followers.
I mean no disrespect toward Ayn Rand, or, I should say, I mean only moderate disrespect. She is an ally of mine in the Culture War, almost.
Certainly I would rather have a hero like Ragnar Danneskjold in a foxhole next to me than a nonhuman nonentity like Shevek.
Ragnar Danneskjold is almost as cool as Britt Reid, the GREEN HORNET! The Black Beauty, that supercar that can top 250 miles per hour, might as well have been made of Reardon Metal, and powered with a John Galt atmospheric-electricity generator. (alert readers will notice Aton Pendrake's car in one of my books is a cross between this, and the battle-limousine of super Slan Jommy Cross.)
July 19 2007, 20:59:07 UTC 4 years ago
I'm not entirely sure Atlas Shrugged is meant to be pleasurable. Certainly it is to some extent but I think your comparison of her to a reformer is apt. She is a great novelist in the same way that Jonathan Edwards was a great preacher.
Actually Atlas Shrugged as a great deal in common with fire and brimstone theology. It really is an end of the world/apocalypse novel straight out of Revelation except with John Galt playing the role of Jesus and the Unification Board as the Beast and False Prophet.
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July 20 2007, 08:18:25 UTC 4 years ago
There were two things that struck me. The honesty that her characters deal with each other. They don't treat each other like slaves, or to be taken advantage of. This, quite frankly, astonished me to no end. Secondly, was her appraisal of inventors, etc... There is no other thinker that I can think of, who places so high a regard for inventors, engineers, scientists, etc...
I find that I like reading her works more than that of her followers. I read capmag.com for a long time, until it started getting predictable, and everything was rehashed.
I've been meaning to write up an essay comparing and contrasting Galt's Gulch and "Beauty and the Beast"'s tunnel community (yeah, my journal has been BatB heavy lately, but it's like meeting a best friend that you haven't seen in 20 years ;)). Both are hidden from the madness of the world, but the underlying philosophies are virtual polar opposites.
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July 19 2007, 22:46:12 UTC 4 years ago
McKillip
I prefer Patricia McKillip to LeGuin. At least I find her stories more memorable than LeGuin's. More visually evocative. The Riddle-Master trilogy, The Cignet and the Firebird, The Changeling Sea. Alphabet of Thorn. Wonderful stuff. LeGuin seems less a sci-fi fantasy writer and more of an anthropology essayist. Interesting to be sure, but not as memorable. McKillip takes you to more interesting places and people/creatures.Anonymous
July 20 2007, 02:16:58 UTC 4 years ago
Re: McKillip
I loved the first three EARTHSEA books, too, (I've just finished rereading them for about the thousandth time in my life) although I didn't really much like the others in the series. They lacked the charm of the first three because one can only take so much feminist bilge, even elegantly written. I agree, though, in LeGuin's ability to develop the story and characters with such an economy of words is astonishing and beautiful. Her style is so gorgeous, even if some of her stories often are not.I also like McKillip, although I find the climax of the story sometimes becomes a blur and whirlwind of words and I have no idea what just happened when the chapter ends, although it didn't happen with the FORGOTTEN BEASTS OF ELD.
A fantasy author I dearly love is Robin McKinley. Her worlds live, her characters breathe with life and feel so real that it seems impossible that they are not. After I read the Blue Sword for the first time, I wept because it had ended. I had only done that one other time, when I read that Coll died and Taran Wanderer would become the High King of Prydain and I would soon be turning the final pages of the last book of Prydain. (I have to get a new set of the Prydain books, as my Yearling editions are 30 some years old, brown, brittle and missing a few vital pages here & there.)
Another series I enjoy, and read frequently, is John Christpher's Tripod series. Man! What an amazing, beautifully told adventure! That is another series that is well told and uses so few words to get the character so far in both distance and maturity. I did not like his SPIRITS Trilogy at all, though. - no that isn't true. I enjoyed the story and then the end was so unhappy. The TRIPODS ending was realistic - the reunion of political men and European bickering is what would logically happen, even if it isn't satisfying. But SPIRITS ends with such a feeling of - I don't know what - pointlessness? The end hangs there, tired, unhappy and needing something big to fill it up...
..maybe a bag of oreos would help...
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July 20 2007, 00:02:00 UTC 4 years ago
I would prefer to duel Aycharaych with Dominic Flandry and Chives, attack Ploor with the Children of the Lens, walk the pattern with Corwin in Amber, visit the World of Tiers with Wolf and Kickaha, cruise the Gaean Reach with Kirth Gersen, nuke a slaver with Thorby on the Sisu, be totally confused by Gilbert Gosseyn, or even rock out with Colin (I will get him a better guitar). In another genre, I could cross the Rubicon with Caesar and gossip with Suetonius (can you believe the painting Tiberius keeps over his bed?)
Poul Anderson used to say that he was competing for our beer money. Considering that the price of two hardbacks would buy a decent cabernet, I truly regret owning VARIABLE STAR and FOR US THE LIVING. I just do not have the time or energy for smug Isaac, boring Arthur, dopey Robert (post STRANGER) or even poetic Ray.
July 20 2007, 07:50:18 UTC 4 years ago
Hey now! On the cover of FUGITIVES it looks like Colin is holding a Flying V. Now, I happen to think those are pretty awesome guitar's. Haha. Purely opinion though. :)
July 20 2007, 12:13:47 UTC 4 years ago
Colin's Tele from Texas
Colin’s Tele from TexasColin’s guitar begins life in 1953 in Fullerton California, where Leo Fender assembled an experimental version of his new guitar, first called the Broadcaster, later renamed the Telecaster. This instrument was taken by a mysterious hard-to-see stranger to John D’Angelico in New York City for final setup. The instrument has never been refinished, but refretted about 20 times and rewired once by the Krell. The instrument was taken to Texas, where it was played (and abused) by Freddie King, T-Bone Walker, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Vince Gill, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Billy Gibbons, and Eric Johnson. In the 60’s, this guitar made the England tour with Jeff Beck and “Keef” Richards. Later it was played by Clarence White with the Byrds, and Don Rich with Buck Owens. Returned to Texas, the instrument was set-up by Bill Collings in Austin for Eric Clapton, who swapped it for a stinking Flying V owned by Colin. Over the years, the finish on this guitar has been totally worn away and has absorbed the perspiration and inspiration of all these musicians. Mojo barely describes it!
If you want to see this guitar, google “Fender Custom Shop Jeff Beck Tribute Esquire”
If you want to see Colin play guitar, check out Eric Johnson on Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival DVD.
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July 20 2007, 17:33:20 UTC 4 years ago
July 20 2007, 17:37:44 UTC 4 years ago
The writer formerly known as Harlan
I created it for Harlan Ellison, in case he lost his trademark rights and couldn't use his own name. Notice the capital I in the middle. But then I decided to keep it for myself.July 20 2007, 11:08:56 UTC 4 years ago
LeQuin
I have not read much of her lately. Most likely 'cause of her obvious leftist leanings. She is greatly revered here in the People's Republic of Portland and the great commune of Oregon. The later is only applicable to the western side of the state. East of the Cascades is more red than blue.I did greatly enjoy her early works however. But then I was unformed and uninformed and suspended disbelief quite easily. I still can suspend disbelief, but in many cases it is difficult. Had no trouble with Titans of Chaos. Thought the times I laughed out loud did tend to take me out of the story. Sorry I can not remember the specific instances. I will reread once I have my own copy and perhaps laugh once again.
These days I tend more to space opera (the Honor Harrington universe is well beloved) and mystery writers (usually as an audio book - Jonathan Kellerman is tops, though I did like Michael Connelly's Lincoln Lawyer).
Now I need to find time to read our hosts' great Space Opera.
July 20 2007, 21:17:33 UTC 4 years ago
Rand's Anti-Mysticism
Rand's anti-mysticism struck me as essentially the same as Popper's variety- an opposition to a half-understood version of German Idealism popular with the pseudointellectuals of her time. Kantian, Hegelian and Heideggerean thinkers (and, occasionally, pop-religionists) were her "mystics of spirit", vs. the Marxist "mystics of muscle".Rand's definition of "mysticism" was basically that of "fuzzy thinking", not mystical practice in, for example, the Neoplatonic sense. Not that Rand would have likely approved of actual mysticism, either, but the point still stands.
(That, and like nearly everyone in the Anglosphere up until the latter part of the 20th century, she really had no grasp of Hegel to begin with. But that's another story...)