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28 March 2011

Wow, how 'bout that Ursula Le Guin! [More:]

I know I'm like, 40 years after the fact, but those Earthsea books just blew me away! I've been reading them to my daughter and just finished The Farthest Shore. I think it is one of the most beautiful and satisfying books I've ever read! I'm kind of not wanting to read the later ones in fear that they'll ruin the Earthsea universe for me because it is right now so perfect I can't imagine adding to it!

Read the Dispossessed years ago and liked it OK but was not blown away.

Should I try Always Coming Home?

Isn't she awesome?
Yes! She is awesome!

I liked Always Coming Home, but it was the first thing of hers that I read and I think I would have liked it better had I had a better sense of where she was coming from. Which probably means I should reread it.

The Earthsea books left me very sad when they ended, just because they ended.

I really really loved Lavinia, too.
posted by occhiblu 29 March | 00:23
Ooh, I'll try Lavinia. But maybe I should read the Virgil first...
posted by serazin 29 March | 00:45
I never have, and I still loved it. But it did make me want to read the Aeneid. Which was not an urge I'd ever had before.
posted by occhiblu 29 March | 00:56
Maybe I can find it on tape. I have been working through some more difficult classics that way. Although even on tape I didn't get half through Ulysses.
posted by serazin 29 March | 01:05
I loved the original Earthsea trilogy from the seventies and was all excited when she came out with a fourth book in a nineties, Tehanu, but found it painfully boring. There seems to be a fifth book but I'm not really interested. I remember liking the novels Left Hand of Darkness and Dispossessed when I read them thirty five years ago but don't remember much about them.
posted by octothorpe 29 March | 02:06
I was introduced to her work by the little-seen PBS TV movie of "The Lathe of Heaven" in 1980, which is burned into my memory even today. I got the book and raced through it, then tried to get into her other books, but "Lathe" seemed so different, being anchored in Contemporary or Near-Future Earth (Portland, Oregon, I recall) yet taking off into alternative realities. I have a love/hate relationship with Multiverse SciFi, the love for "Lathe of Heaven", the hate for some self-indulgent later Heinlein. Still trying to get up the nerve to get into "Fringe" now that it's been renewed for another season. I did make the mistake of starting my exploration of LeGuin's Hainish Cycle with "The Word for World Is Forest"... I should've done "Left Hand of Darkness" first, right?

And one of the things I most vividly remember about one of my failed relationships prior to my future ex-wife was how she had a collection of penguin dolls and figurines that she called her "Ursula K. LeGuins"... I know, I'm weird. But so was she.
posted by oneswellfoop 29 March | 04:35
I actually liked the latter 3 earthsea books better than the first 3. they are different though. To me, the later books seemed warmer and richer.

Le Guin's "The Birthday of the World" is one of my favorite books ever. The short stories in it are amazing.

I have Always Coming Home on my bookshelf, but I've never made it through.
posted by DarkForest 29 March | 06:53
Oh, Lathe of Heaven and the original TV movie are amazing. The recent remake is terrible, don't watch it. onewell, I seem to remember from an interview that LeGuin wrote Lathe as an attempt to write in Philip Dick's style instead of her own but I can't find a reference to that now.
posted by octothorpe 29 March | 07:40
I got into her sci-fi first, but I've recently started trying to amass a collection of the Earthsea books (used bookstores and random sidewalk book boxes FTW!). I've probably actually read most of them, but years apart and out of any kind of order, so I can't actually say much about them, other than I love them.
posted by EvaDestruction 29 March | 09:21
Yes, she is amazing. And I think so often of the (first) Earthsea Trilogy, one of the best allegories of learning to know and accept your own worst side I've ever read.

I've also never thought the same way about gender since reading The Left Hand of Darkness.

Le Guin is just so smart. Her insights are profound and they stay with you.
posted by bearwife 29 March | 11:50
And don't forget the Catwings books. Simply delightful.
posted by alibee 29 March | 21:10
Oh, I forgot about Catwings. My kid read the first one - I haven't tried it.
posted by serazin 29 March | 21:39
The Daily Grind, this afternoon on my commute home, in front of Bubba's Place. || AskMe Crosspost

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