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Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (; October 21, 1929 – January 22, 2018) was an American author best known for her works of
speculative fiction Speculative fiction is a term that has been used with a variety of (sometimes contradictory) meanings. The broadest interpretation is as a category of fiction encompassing genres with elements that do not exist in reality, recorded history, nat ...
, including
science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
works set in her Hainish universe, and the '' Earthsea''
fantasy Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy literature and d ...
series. She was first published in 1959, and her literary career spanned nearly sixty years, producing more than twenty novels and over a hundred short stories, in addition to poetry,
literary criticism Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. ...
, translations, and children's books. Frequently described as an author of science fiction, Le Guin has also been called a "major voice in American Letters". Le Guin said she would prefer to be known as an "American novelist". Le Guin was born in
Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...
, to author Theodora Kroeber and anthropologist
Alfred Louis Kroeber Alfred Louis Kroeber (June 11, 1876 – October 5, 1960) was an American Cultural anthropology, cultural anthropologist. He received his PhD under Franz Boas at Columbia University in 1901, the first doctorate in anthropology awarded by Columbia. ...
. Having earned a master's degree in French, Le Guin began doctoral studies but abandoned these after her marriage in 1953 to historian Charles Le Guin. She began writing full-time in the late 1950s and achieved major critical and commercial success with '' A Wizard of Earthsea'' (1968) and ''
The Left Hand of Darkness ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' is a science fiction novel by U.S. writer Ursula K. Le Guin. Published in 1969, it became immensely popular, and established Le Guin's status as a major author of science fiction. The novel is set in the fictional ...
'' (1969), which have been described by
Harold Bloom Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was described as "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking worl ...
as her masterpieces. For the latter volume, Le Guin won both the Hugo and Nebula awards for best novel, becoming the first woman to do so. Several more works set in Earthsea or the Hainish universe followed; others included books set in the fictional country of Orsinia, several works for children, and many anthologies.
Cultural anthropology Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans. It is in contrast to social anthropology, which perceives cultural variation as a subset of a posited anthropological constant. The portma ...
,
Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
,
feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
, and the writings of
Carl Jung Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, ph ...
all had a strong influence on Le Guin's work. Many of her stories used anthropologists or cultural observers as protagonists, and Taoist ideas about balance and equilibrium have been identified in several writings. Le Guin often subverted typical speculative fiction tropes, such as through her use of dark-skinned protagonists in Earthsea, and also used unusual stylistic or structural devices in books such as the experimental work '' Always Coming Home'' (1985). Social and political themes, including race, gender, sexuality, and
coming of age Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can ...
were prominent in her writing. She explored alternative political structures in many stories, such as in the philosophical short story "
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a 1973 work of short philosophical fiction by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. With deliberately both vague and vivid descriptions, the narrator depicts a summer festival in the utopian city of Omelas, ...
" (1973) and the anarchist utopian novel '' The Dispossessed'' (1974). Le Guin's writing was enormously influential in the field of speculative fiction, and has been the subject of intense critical attention. She received numerous accolades, including eight Hugos, six Nebulas, and twenty-two Locus Awards, and in 2003 became the second woman honored as a Grand Master of the
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, doing business as Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, commonly known as SFWA ( or ) is a Non-profit organization, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization of professional science fiction an ...
. The U.S.
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...
named her a Living Legend in 2000, and in 2014, she won the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. Le Guin influenced many other authors, including
Booker Prize The Booker Prize, formerly known as the Booker Prize for Fiction (1969–2001) and the Man Booker Prize (2002–2019), is a literary prize awarded each year for the best novel written in English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland. ...
winner
Salman Rushdie Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie (; born 19 June 1947) is an Indian-born British-American novelist. His work often combines magic realism with historical fiction and primarily deals with connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and ...
, David Mitchell,
Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon GaimanBorn as Neil Richard Gaiman, with "MacKinnon" added on the occasion of his marriage to Amanda Palmer. ; ( Neil Richard Gaiman; born 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, gra ...
, and Iain Banks. After her death in 2018, critic
John Clute John Frederick Clute (born 12 September 1940) is a Canadian-born author and critic specializing in science fiction and fantasy literature who has lived in both England and the United States since 1969. He has been described as "an integral part ...
wrote that Le Guin had "presided over American science fiction for nearly half a century", while author
Michael Chabon Michael Chabon ( ; born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, gr ...
referred to her as the "greatest American writer of her generation".


Life


Childhood and education

Ursula K. Le Guin was born Ursula Kroeber in
Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...
, on October 21, 1929. Her father,
Alfred Louis Kroeber Alfred Louis Kroeber (June 11, 1876 – October 5, 1960) was an American Cultural anthropology, cultural anthropologist. He received his PhD under Franz Boas at Columbia University in 1901, the first doctorate in anthropology awarded by Columbia. ...
, was an
anthropologist An anthropologist is a person engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropology is the study of aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms an ...
at the
University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant un ...
. Le Guin's mother, Theodora Kroeber (born Theodora Covel Kracaw), had a graduate degree in psychology, but turned to writing in her sixties, developing a successful career as an author. Among her works was '' Ishi in Two Worlds'' (1961), a biographical volume about
Ishi Ishi ( – March 25, 1916) was the last known member of the Native Americans in the United States, Native American Yana people#Yahi, Yahi people from the present-day state of California in the United States. The rest of the Yahi (as well as ...
, an Indigenous American who became the last known member of the Yahi tribe after the rest of its members were killed by white colonizers. Le Guin had three older brothers:
Karl Karl may refer to: People * Karl (given name), including a list of people and characters with the name * Karl der Große, commonly known in English as Charlemagne * Karl Marx, German philosopher and political writer * Karl of Austria, last Austri ...
, who became a literary scholar, Theodore, and Clifton. The family had a large book collection, and the siblings all became interested in reading while they were young. The Kroeber family had a number of visitors, including well-known academics such as Robert Oppenheimer; Le Guin would later use Oppenheimer as the model for Shevek, the physicist protagonist of '' The Dispossessed''. The family divided its time between a summer home in the Napa Valley, and a house in Berkeley during the academic year. Le Guin's reading included science fiction and fantasy: she and her siblings frequently read issues of ''
Thrilling Wonder Stories ''Wonder Stories'' was an early American science fiction magazine which was published under several titles from 1929 to 1955. It was founded by Hugo Gernsback in 1929 after he had lost control of his first science fiction magazine, ''Amazing St ...
'' and ''
Astounding Science Fiction ''Analog Science Fiction and Fact'' is an American science fiction magazine published under various titles since 1930. Originally titled ''Astounding Stories of Super-Science'', the first issue was dated January 1930, published by William C ...
''. She was fond of myths and legends, particularly
Norse mythology Norse, Nordic, or Scandinavian mythology is the body of myths belonging to the North Germanic peoples, stemming from Old Norse religion and continuing after the Christianization of Scandinavia, and into the Nordic folklore of the modern per ...
, and of Native American legends that her father would narrate. Other authors she enjoyed were
Lord Dunsany Edward John Moreton Drax Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany (; 24 July 1878 – 25 October 1957, usually Lord Dunsany) was an Anglo-Irish writer and dramatist. Over 90 volumes of fiction, essays, poems and plays appeared in his lifetime.Lanham, M ...
and
Lewis Padgett Lewis Padgett was the joint pseudonym of the science fiction authors and spouses Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore,Nicholls 1979, p. 445. taken from their mothers' maiden names. They also used the pseudonyms Lawrence O'Donnell and C. H. Liddell, as wel ...
. Le Guin also developed an early interest in writing; she wrote a short story when she was nine, and submitted her first short story to ''Astounding Science Fiction'' when she was eleven. The piece was rejected, and she did not submit anything else for another ten years. Le Guin attended Berkeley High School. She received her
Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...
degree in Renaissance French and Italian literature from
Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and h ...
of
Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of highe ...
in 1951, and graduated as a member of the
Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal ...
honor society. As a child she had been interested in biology and poetry, but had been limited in her choice of career by her difficulties with mathematics. Le Guin undertook graduate studies at
Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
, and earned a
Master of Arts A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. Tho ...
degree in French in 1952. Soon after, she began working towards a
PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * '' Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. al ...
, and won a
Fulbright The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright–Hays Program, is one of several United States Cultural Exchange Programs with the goal of improving intercultural relations, cultural diplomacy, and intercultural competence between the people ...
grant to continue her studies in France from 1953 to 1954.


Married life and death

In 1953, while traveling to France aboard the '' Queen Mary'', Ursula met historian Charles Le Guin. They married in Paris in December 1953. According to Le Guin, the marriage signaled the "end of the doctorate" for her. While her husband finished his doctorate at
Emory University Emory University is a private research university in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1836 as "Emory College" by the Methodist Episcopal Church and named in honor of Methodist bishop John Emory, Emory is the second-oldest private institution of ...
in Georgia, and later at the
University of Idaho The University of Idaho (U of I, or UIdaho) is a public land-grant research university in Moscow, Idaho. It is the state's land-grant and primary research university,, and the lead university in the Idaho Space Grant Consortium. The Universit ...
, Le Guin taught French and worked as a secretary until the birth of her daughter Elisabeth in 1957. A second daughter, Caroline, was born in 1959. Also in that year, Charles became an instructor in history at
Portland State University Portland State University (PSU) is a public research university in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1946 as a post-secondary educational institution for World War II veterans. It evolved into a four-year college over the following two dec ...
, and the couple moved to
Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous ...
, where their son Theodore was born in 1964. They would live in Portland for the rest of their lives, although Le Guin received further Fulbright grants to travel to London in 1968 and 1975. Le Guin's writing career began in the late 1950s, but the time she spent caring for her children constrained her writing schedule. She would continue writing and publishing for nearly 60 years. She also worked as an editor, and taught undergraduate classes. She served on the editorial boards of the journals ''Paradoxa'' and '' Science Fiction Studies'', in addition to writing literary criticism herself. She taught courses at
Tulane University Tulane University, officially the Tulane University of Louisiana, is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by seven young medical doctors, it turned into a comprehensive pub ...
, Bennington College, and
Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...
, among others. In May 1983 she delivered a
commencement speech A commencement speech or commencement address is a speech given to graduating students, generally at a university, although the term is also used for secondary education institutions and in similar institutions around the world. The commencement ...
entitled "A Left-handed Commencement Address" at
Mills College Mills College at Northeastern University is a private college in Oakland, California and part of Northeastern University's global university system. Mills College was founded as the Young Ladies Seminary in 1852 in Benicia, California; it w ...
in
Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third largest city overall in the ...
. It is listed as in ''American Rhetoric''s Top 100 Speeches of the 20th Century, and was included in her nonfiction collection '' Dancing at the Edge of the World''. Le Guin died on January 22, 2018, at her home in Portland, at the age of 88. Her son said that she had been in poor health for several months, and stated that it was likely she had had a
heart attack A myocardial infarction (MI), commonly known as a heart attack, occurs when blood flow decreases or stops to the coronary artery of the heart, causing damage to the heart muscle. The most common symptom is chest pain or discomfort which ma ...
. Private memorial services for her were held in Portland. A public memorial service, which included speeches by the writers
Margaret Atwood Margaret Eleanor Atwood (born November 18, 1939) is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, teacher, environmental activist, and inventor. Since 1961, she has published 18 books of poetry, 18 novels, 11 books of non-fiction, ...
, Molly Gloss, and
Walidah Imarisha Walidah Imarisha ( am, ወሊዳ ኢማሪሻ) is an American writer, activist, educator and spoken word artist. Career Writing Imarisha is co-editor, with adrienne maree brown, of ''Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories From Social Justice ...
, was held in Portland on June 13, 2018.


Views and advocacy

Le Guin refused a
Nebula Award The Nebula Awards annually recognize the best works of science fiction or fantasy published in the United States. The awards are organized and awarded by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), a nonprofit association of prof ...
for her story "
The Diary of the Rose "The Diary of the Rose" is a 1976 dystopian science fiction novelette by Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in the ''Future Power'' collection. The tale is set in a totalitarian society which uses brainwashing by "electroshocks" to eradicate any k ...
" in 1977, in protest at the
Science Fiction Writers of America The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, doing business as Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, commonly known as SFWA ( or ) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization of professional science fiction and fantasy Fantas ...
's revocation of Stanisław Lem's membership. Le Guin attributed the revocation to Lem's criticism of American science fiction and willingness to live in the
Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...
, and said she felt reluctant to receive an award "for a story about political intolerance from a group that had just displayed political intolerance". Le Guin once said she was "raised as
irreligious Irreligion or nonreligion is the absence or rejection of religion, or indifference to it. Irreligion takes many forms, ranging from the casual and unaware to full-fledged philosophies such as atheism and agnosticism, secular humanism and anti ...
as a jackrabbit". She expressed a deep interest in
Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
and
Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
, saying that Taoism gave her a "handle on how to look at life" during her adolescent years. In 1997, she published a translation of the ''
Tao Te Ching The ''Tao Te Ching'' (, ; ) is a Chinese classic text written around 400 BC and traditionally credited to the sage Laozi, though the text's authorship, date of composition and date of compilation are debated. The oldest excavated portion ...
.'' In December 2009, Le Guin resigned from the
Authors Guild The Authors Guild is America's oldest and largest professional organization for writers and provides advocacy on issues of free expression and copyright protection. Since its founding in 1912 as the Authors League of America, it has counted among ...
in protest over its endorsement of Google's book digitization project. "You decided to deal with the devil", she wrote in her resignation letter. "There are principles involved, above all the whole concept of
copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educatio ...
; and these you have seen fit to abandon to a corporation, on their terms, without a struggle." In a speech at the 2014
National Book Award The National Book Awards are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. The Nat ...
s, Le Guin criticized
Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
and the control it exerted over the publishing industry, specifically referencing Amazon's treatment of the
Hachette Book Group Hachette Book Group (HBG) is a publishing company owned by Hachette Livre, the largest publishing company in France, and the third largest trade and educational publisher in the world. Hachette Livre is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lagardère Gr ...
during a dispute over ebook publication. Her speech received widespread media attention within and outside the US, and was broadcast twice by
National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other n ...
.


Chronology of writings


Early work

Le Guin's first published work was the poem "Folksong from the Montayna Province" in 1959, while her first published short story was "An die Musik", in 1961; both were set in her fictional country of Orsinia. Between 1951 and 1961 she also wrote five novels, all set in Orsinia, which were rejected by publishers on the grounds that they were inaccessible. Some of her poetry from this period was published in 1975 in the volume ''Wild Angels''. Le Guin turned her attention to science fiction after a lengthy period of receiving rejections from publishers, knowing that there was a market for writing that could be readily classified as such. Her first professional publication was the short story "April in Paris" in 1962 in ''
Fantastic Science Fiction ''Fantastic'' was an American digest-size fantasy and science fiction magazine, published from 1952 to 1980. It was founded by the publishing company Ziff Davis as a fantasy companion to ''Amazing Stories''. Early sales were good, and the com ...
'', and seven other stories followed in the next few years, in ''Fantastic'' or ''
Amazing Stories ''Amazing Stories'' is an American science fiction magazine launched in April 1926 by Hugo Gernsback's Experimenter Publishing. It was the first magazine devoted solely to science fiction. Science fiction stories had made regular appearances ...
''. Among them were "
The Dowry of Angyar "The Dowry of Angyar" is a science fiction short story by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in 1964. It is the first work of the '' Hainish Cycle''. The story is set on a fictional planet of the star Fomalhaut, and follows a highb ...
", which introduced the fictional Hainish universe, and " The Rule of Names" and "
The Word of Unbinding "The Word of Unbinding" is a short story by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in the January 1964 issue of ''Fantastic'', and reprinted in collections such as '' The Wind's Twelve Quarters''. In this story, the Earthsea realm, whic ...
", which introduced the world of Earthsea. These stories were largely ignored by critics.
Ace Books Ace Books is a publisher of science fiction (SF) and fantasy books founded in New York City in 1952 by Aaron A. Wyn. It began as a genre publisher of mysteries and westerns, and soon branched out into other genres, publishing its first scien ...
released '' Rocannon's World'', Le Guin's first published novel, in 1966. Two more Hainish novels, '' Planet of Exile'' and ''
City of Illusions ''City of Illusions'' is a 1967 science fiction novel by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. It is set on Earth in the distant future, and is part of her Hainish Cycle. ''City of Illusions'' lays the foundation for the Hainish cycle which is a fic ...
'' were published in 1966 and 1967, respectively, and the three books together would come to be known as the Hainish trilogy. The first two were each published as half of an "Ace Double": two novels bound into a paperback and sold as a single low-cost volume. ''City of Illusions'' was published as a standalone volume, indicating Le Guin's growing name recognition. These books received more critical attention than Le Guin's short stories, with reviews being published in several science fiction magazines, but the critical response was still muted. The books contained many themes and ideas also present in Le Guin's better known later works, including the "archetypal journey" of a protagonist who undertakes both a physical journey and one of self-discovery, cultural contact and communication, the search for identity, and the reconciliation of opposing forces. When publishing her story "Nine Lives" in 1968, ''
Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's Lifestyle magazine, lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from H ...
'' magazine asked Le Guin whether they could run the story without her full first name, to which Le Guin agreed: the story was published under the name "U. K. Le Guin". She later wrote that it was the first and only time she had experienced prejudice against her as a woman writer from an editor or publisher, and reflected that "it seemed so silly, so grotesque, that I failed to see that it was also important." In subsequent printings, the story was published under her full name.


Critical attention

Le Guin's next two books brought her sudden and widespread critical acclaim. '' A Wizard of Earthsea'', published in 1968, was a fantasy novel written initially for teenagers. Le Guin had not planned to write for young adults, but was asked to write a novel targeted at this group by the editor of Parnassus Press, who saw it as a market with great potential. A
coming of age story In genre studies, a coming-of-age story is a genre of literature, theatre, film, and video game that focuses on the growth of a protagonist from childhood to adulthood, or "coming of age". Coming-of-age stories tend to emphasize dialogue or internal ...
set in the fictional archipelago of Earthsea, the book received a positive reception in both the U.S. and Britain. Her next novel, ''
The Left Hand of Darkness ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' is a science fiction novel by U.S. writer Ursula K. Le Guin. Published in 1969, it became immensely popular, and established Le Guin's status as a major author of science fiction. The novel is set in the fictional ...
'', was a Hainish universe story exploring themes of gender and sexuality on a fictional planet where humans have no fixed sex. The book was Le Guin's first to address feminist issues, and according to scholar Donna White, it "stunned the science fiction critics"; it won both the Hugo and the Nebula Awards for best novel, making Le Guin the first woman to win these awards, and a number of other accolades. ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' and ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' have been described by critic
Harold Bloom Harold Bloom (July 11, 1930 – October 14, 2019) was an American literary critic and the Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale University. In 2017, Bloom was described as "probably the most famous literary critic in the English-speaking worl ...
as Le Guin's masterpieces. She won the Hugo Award again in 1973 for '' The Word for World is Forest''. The book was influenced by Le Guin's anger over the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
, and explored themes of
colonialism Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose their reli ...
and
militarism Militarism is the belief or the desire of a government or a people that a state should maintain a strong military capability and to use it aggressively to expand national interests and/or values. It may also imply the glorification of the mili ...
: Le Guin later described it as the "most overt political statement" she had made in a fictional work. Le Guin continued to develop themes of equilibrium and coming-of-age in the next two installments of the ''Earthsea'' series, '' The Tombs of Atuan'' and '' The Farthest Shore'', published in 1971 and 1972, respectively. Both books were praised for their writing, while the exploration of death as a theme in ''The Farthest Shore'' also drew praise. Her 1974 novel '' The Dispossessed'' again won both the Hugo and the Nebula awards for best novel, making her the first person to win both awards for each of two books. Also set in the Hainish universe, the story explored
anarchism Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not neces ...
and
utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book '' Utopia'', describing a fictional island soc ...
nism. Scholar Charlotte Spivack described it as representing a shift in Le Guin's science fiction towards discussing political ideas. Several of her
speculative fiction Speculative fiction is a term that has been used with a variety of (sometimes contradictory) meanings. The broadest interpretation is as a category of fiction encompassing genres with elements that do not exist in reality, recorded history, nat ...
short stories from the period, including her first published story, were later anthologized in the 1975 collection ''
The Wind's Twelve Quarters ''The Wind's Twelve Quarters'' is a collection of short stories by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, named after a line from A. E. Housman's ''A Shropshire Lad'' and first published by Harper & Row in 1975. Described by Le Guin as a retrospective ...
''. The fiction of the period 1966 to 1974, which also included ''
The Lathe of Heaven ''The Lathe of Heaven'' is a 1971 science fiction novel by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. The plot concerns a character whose dreams alter past and present reality. The story was serialized in the American science fiction magazine ''Amazing ...
'', the Hugo Award-winning "
The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a 1973 work of short philosophical fiction by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. With deliberately both vague and vivid descriptions, the narrator depicts a summer festival in the utopian city of Omelas, ...
" and the Nebula Award-winning "
The Day Before the Revolution "The Day Before the Revolution" is a science fiction short story by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in 1974. It is considered a short story prologue to ''The Dispossessed'' and represents an idealized anarchy by following the ...
", constitutes Le Guin's best-known body of work.


Wider exploration

Le Guin published a variety of work in the second half of the 1970s. This included
speculative fiction Speculative fiction is a term that has been used with a variety of (sometimes contradictory) meanings. The broadest interpretation is as a category of fiction encompassing genres with elements that do not exist in reality, recorded history, nat ...
in the form of the novel '' The Eye of the Heron'', which, according to Le Guin, may be a part of the Hainish universe. She also published ''
Very Far Away from Anywhere Else Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018) was an American author of speculative fiction, realistic fiction, non-fiction, screenplays, librettos, essays, poetry, speeches, translations, literary critiques, chapbooks, and children's fiction. She was prim ...
'', a realistic novel for adolescents, as well as the collection ''
Orsinian Tales ''Orsinian Tales'' is a collection of eleven short stories by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, most of them set in the imaginary country of Orsinia. Themes The stories share few links except those derived from the use of a common geographical s ...
'' and the novel '' Malafrena'' in 1976 and 1979, respectively. Though the latter two were set in the fictional country of Orsinia, the stories were realistic fiction rather than fantasy or science fiction. '' The Language of the Night'', a collection of essays, was released in 1979, and Le Guin also published ''Wild Angels'', a volume of poetry, in 1975. Between 1979, when she published ''Malafrena'', and 1994, when the collection ''
A Fisherman of the Inland Sea ''A Fisherman of the Inland Sea'' is a 1994 collection of short stories and novellas by the American author Ursula K. Le Guin. The collection was second in the 1995 Locus Award poll in the collection category.Always Coming Home''. She wrote 11 children's picture books, including the '' Catwings'' series, between 1979 and 1994, along with '' The Beginning Place'', an adolescent fantasy novel, released in 1980. Four more poetry collections were also published in this period, all of which were positively received. She also revisited Earthsea, publishing '' Tehanu'' in 1990: coming eighteen years after ''The Farthest Shore'', during which Le Guin's views had developed considerably, the book was grimmer in tone than the earlier works in the series, and challenged some ideas presented therein. It received critical praise, won Le Guin a third Nebula Award for Best Novel, and led to the series being recognized among adult literature.


Later writings

Le Guin returned to the Hainish Cycle in the 1990s after a lengthy hiatus with the publication of a series of short stories, beginning with "
The Shobies' Story "The Shobies' Story" is a 1990 science fiction novella by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, describing the story of the first human crew to participate in a newly invented faster-than-light mode of space travel. It was first published in the ant ...
" in 1990. These stories included " Coming of Age in Karhide" (1995), which explored growing into adulthood and was set on the same planet as ''The Left Hand of Darkness''. It was described by scholar Sandra Lindow as "so transgressively sexual and so morally courageous" that Le Guin "could not have written it in the '60s". In the same year she published the story suite '' Four Ways to Forgiveness'', and followed it up with " Old Music and the Slave Women", a fifth, connected, story in 1999. All five of the stories explored freedom and rebellion within a slave society. In 2000 she published ''
The Telling ''The Telling'' is a 2000 science fiction novel by Ursula K. Le Guin set in her fictional universe of ''Hainish Cycle''. ''The Telling'' is Le Guin's first follow-up novel set in the ''Hainish Cycle'' since her 1974 novel '' The Dispossessed''. ...
'', which would be her final Hainish novel, and the next year released '' Tales from Earthsea'' and '' The Other Wind'', the last two ''Earthsea'' books. The latter won the
World Fantasy Award The World Fantasy Awards are a set of awards given each year for the best fantasy fiction published during the previous calendar year. Organized and overseen by the World Fantasy Convention, the awards are given each year at the eponymous ann ...
for Best Novel in 2002. From 2002 onwards several collections and anthologies of Le Guin's work were published. A series of her stories from the period 1994–2002 was released in 2002 in the collection '' The Birthday of the World and Other Stories'', along with the novella '' Paradises Lost''. The volume examined unconventional ideas about gender, as well as anarchist themes. Other collections included '' Changing Planes'', also released in 2002, while the anthologies included ''
The Unreal and the Real Ursula Kroeber Le Guin (; October 21, 1929 – January 22, 2018) was an American author best known for her works of speculative fiction, including science fiction works set in her Hainish universe, and the ''Earthsea'' fantasy series. She wa ...
'' (2012), and ''The Hainish Novels and Stories'', a two-volume set of works from the Hainish universe released by the
Library of America The Library of America (LOA) is a nonprofit publisher of classic American literature. Founded in 1979 with seed money from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Foundation, the LOA has published over 300 volumes by authors ran ...
. Other works from this period included ''
Lavinia In Roman mythology, Lavinia ( ; ) is the daughter of Latinus and Amata, and the last wife of Aeneas. Creation It has been proposed that the character was in part intended to represent Servilia Isaurica, Emperor Augustus's first fiancée. Sto ...
'' (2008), based on a character from
Virgil Publius Vergilius Maro (; traditional dates 15 October 7021 September 19 BC), usually called Virgil or Vergil ( ) in English, was an ancient Roman poet of the Augustan period. He composed three of the most famous poems in Latin literature: th ...
's ''
Aeneid The ''Aeneid'' ( ; la, Aenē̆is or ) is a Latin epic poem, written by Virgil between 29 and 19 BC, that tells the legendary story of Aeneas, a Trojan who fled the fall of Troy and travelled to Italy, where he became the ancestor of ...
'', and the '' Annals of the Western Shore'' trilogy, consisting of '' Gifts'' (2004), '' Voices'' (2006), and '' Powers'' (2007). Although ''Annals of the Western Shore'' was written for an adolescent audience, the third volume, ''Powers'', received the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 2009. In her final years, Le Guin largely turned away from fiction, and produced a number of essays, poems, and some translation. Her final publications included the non-fiction collections ''Dreams Must Explain Themselves'' and ''Ursula K Le Guin: Conversations on Writing'', and the poetry volume ''So Far So Good: Final Poems 2014–2018'', all of which were released after her death.


Style and influences


Influences

Le Guin read both classic and speculative fiction widely in her youth. She later said that science fiction did not have much impact on her until she read the works of Theodore Sturgeon and
Cordwainer Smith Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger (July 11, 1913 – August 6, 1966), better known by his pen-name Cordwainer Smith, was an American author known for his science fiction works. Linebarger was a US Army officer, a noted East Asia scholar, and a ...
, and that she had sneered at the genre as a child. Authors Le Guin describes as influential include
Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romantic writer and politician. During a literary career that spanned more than sixty years, he wrote in a variety of genres and forms. He is considered to be one of the great ...
,
William Wordsworth William Wordsworth (7 April 177023 April 1850) was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication '' Lyrical Ballads'' (1798). Wordsworth's ' ...
,
Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian er ...
,
Boris Pasternak Boris Leonidovich Pasternak (; rus, Бори́с Леони́дович Пастерна́к, p=bɐˈrʲis lʲɪɐˈnʲidəvʲɪtɕ pəstɛrˈnak; 30 May 1960) was a Russian poet, novelist, composer and literary translator. Composed in 1917, Pa ...
, and Philip K. Dick. Le Guin and Dick attended the same high-school, but did not know each other; Le Guin later described her novel ''
The Lathe of Heaven ''The Lathe of Heaven'' is a 1971 science fiction novel by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. The plot concerns a character whose dreams alter past and present reality. The story was serialized in the American science fiction magazine ''Amazing ...
'' as an homage to him. She also considered J. R. R. Tolkien and
Leo Tolstoy Count Lev Nikolayevich TolstoyTolstoy pronounced his first name as , which corresponds to the romanization ''Lyov''. () (; russian: link=no, Лев Николаевич Толстой,In Tolstoy's day, his name was written as in pre-refor ...
to be stylistic influences, and preferred reading
Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born ...
and
Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, as well as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known b ...
to well-known science-fiction authors such as Robert Heinlein, whose writing she described as being of the "white man conquers the universe" tradition. Several scholars state that the influence of mythology, which Le Guin enjoyed reading as a child, is also visible in much of her work: for example, the short story "
The Dowry of Angyar "The Dowry of Angyar" is a science fiction short story by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin, first published in 1964. It is the first work of the '' Hainish Cycle''. The story is set on a fictional planet of the star Fomalhaut, and follows a highb ...
" is described as a retelling of a Norse myth. The discipline of
cultural anthropology Cultural anthropology is a branch of anthropology focused on the study of cultural variation among humans. It is in contrast to social anthropology, which perceives cultural variation as a subset of a posited anthropological constant. The portma ...
had a powerful influence on Le Guin's writing. Her father Alfred Kroeber is considered a pioneer in the field, and was a director of the University of California Museum of Anthropology: as a consequence of his research, Le Guin was exposed to anthropology and cultural exploration as a child. In addition to myths and legends, she read such volumes as ''The Leaves of the Golden Bough'' by Lady Frazer, a children's book adapted from ''
The Golden Bough ''The Golden Bough: A Study in Comparative Religion'' (retitled ''The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion'' in its second edition) is a wide-ranging, comparative study of mythology and religion, written by the Scottish anthropologist Sir ...
'', a study of myth and religion by her husband
James George Frazer Sir James George Frazer (; 1 January 1854 – 7 May 1941) was a Scottish social anthropologist and folklorist influential in the early stages of the modern studies of mythology and comparative religion. Personal life He was born on 1 Jan ...
. She described living with her father's friends and acquaintances as giving her the experience of
the other In Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology, the terms the Other and the Constitutive Other identify the other human being, in their differences from the Self, as being a cumulative, constituting factor in the self-image of a person; as acknow ...
. The experiences of Ishi, in particular, were influential on Le Guin, and elements of his story have been identified in works such as ''Planet of Exile'', ''City of Illusions'', and ''The Word for World Is Forest'' and ''The Dispossessed''. Several scholars have commented that Le Guin's writing was influenced by
Carl Jung Carl Gustav Jung ( ; ; 26 July 1875 – 6 June 1961) was a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology. Jung's work has been influential in the fields of psychiatry, anthropology, archaeology, literature, ph ...
, and specifically by the idea of
Jungian archetypes Jungian archetypes are a concept from psychology that refers to a universal, inherited idea, pattern of thought, or image that is present in the collective unconscious of all human beings. The psychic counterpart of instinct, archetypes are thoug ...
. In particular, the shadow in ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' is seen as the Shadow archetype from Jungian psychology, representing Ged's pride, fear, and desire for power. Le Guin discussed her interpretation of this archetype, and her interest in the dark and repressed parts of the psyche, in a 1974 lecture. She stated elsewhere that she had never read Jung before writing the first ''Earthsea'' books. Other archetypes, including the Mother, Animus, and Anima, have also been identified in Le Guin's writing. Philosophical
Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Ta ...
had a large role in Le Guin's world view, and the influence of Taoist thought can be seen in many of her stories. Many of Le Guin's protagonists, including in ''The Lathe of Heaven'', embody the Taoist ideal of leaving things alone. The anthropologists of the Hainish universe try not to meddle with the cultures they encounter, while one of the earliest lessons Ged learns in ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' is not to use magic unless it is absolutely necessary. Taoist influence is evident in Le Guin's depiction of equilibrium in the world of Earthsea: the archipelago is depicted as being based on a delicate balance, which is disrupted by somebody in each of the first three novels. This includes an equilibrium between land and sea, implicit in the name "Earthsea", between people and their natural environment, and a larger cosmic equilibrium, which wizards are tasked with maintaining. Another prominent Taoist idea is the reconciliation of opposites such as light and dark, or good and evil. A number of Hainish novels, ''The Dispossessed'' prominent among them, explored such a process of reconciliation. In the Earthsea universe, it is not the dark powers, but the characters' misunderstanding of the balance of life, that is depicted as evil, in contrast to conventional Western stories in which good and evil are in constant conflict.


Genre and style

Although Le Guin is primarily known for her works of speculative fiction, she also wrote realistic fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and several other literary forms, and as a result her work is difficult to classify. Her writings received critical attention from mainstream critics, critics of children's literature, and critics of speculative fiction. Le Guin herself said that she would prefer to be known as an "American novelist". Le Guin's transgression of conventional boundaries of genre led to literary criticism of Le Guin becoming "
Balkanized Balkanization is the fragmentation of a larger region or state into smaller regions or states, which may be hostile or uncooperative with one another. It is usually caused by differences of ethnicity, culture, and religion and some other factor ...
", particularly between scholars of children's literature and speculative fiction. Commentators have noted that the ''Earthsea'' novels specifically received less critical attention because they were considered children's books. Le Guin herself took exception to this treatment of
children's literature Children's literature or juvenile literature includes stories, books, magazines, and poems that are created for children. Modern children's literature is classified in two different ways: genre or the intended age of the reader. Children's ...
, describing it as "adult chauvinist piggery". In 1976, literature scholar George Slusser criticized the "silly publication classification designating the original series as 'children's literature, while in Barbara Bucknall's opinion Le Guin "can be read, like Tolkien, by ten-year-olds and by adults. These stories are ageless because they deal with problems that confront us at any age." Several of her works have a premise drawn from
sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of empirical investigation an ...
,
psychology Psychology is the science, scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immens ...
, or
philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. ...
. As a result, Le Guin's writing is often described as "soft" science fiction, and she has been described as the "patron saint" of this sub-genre. A number of science fiction authors have objected to the term "soft science fiction", describing it as a potentially pejorative term used to dismiss stories not based on problems in physics, astronomy, or engineering, and also to target the writing of women or other groups under-represented in the genre. Le Guin suggested the term "social science fiction" for some of her writing, while pointing out that many of her stories were not science fiction at all. She argued that the term "soft science fiction" was divisive, and implied a narrow view of what constitutes valid science fiction. The influence of anthropology can be seen in the setting Le Guin chose for a number of her works. Several of her protagonists are anthropologists or ethnologists exploring a world alien to them. This is particularly true in the stories set in the Hainish universe, an alternative reality in which humans did not evolve on Earth, but on Hain. The Hainish subsequently colonized many planets, before losing contact with them, giving rise to varied but related biology and social structure. Examples include Rocannon in ''Rocannon's World'' and Genly Ai in ''The Left Hand of Darkness''. Other characters, such as Shevek in ''The Dispossessed'', become cultural observers in the course of their journeys on other planets. Le Guin's writing often examines alien cultures, and particularly the human cultures from planets other than Earth in the Hainish universe. In discovering these "alien" worlds, Le Guin's protagonists, and by extension the readers, also journey into themselves, and challenge the nature of what they consider "alien" and what they consider "native". Several of Le Guin's works have featured stylistic or structural features that were unusual or subversive. The heterogeneous structure of ''The Left Hand of Darkness'', described as "distinctly post-modern", was unusual for the time of its publication. This was in marked contrast to the structure of (primarily male-authored) traditional science fiction, which was straightforward and linear. The novel was framed as part of a report sent to the Ekumen by the protagonist Genly Ai after his time on the planet Gethen, thus suggesting that Ai was selecting and ordering the material, consisting of personal narration, diary extracts, Gethenian myths, and ethnological reports. ''Earthsea'' also employed an unconventional narrative form described by scholar Mike Cadden as "free indirect discourse", in which the feelings of the protagonist are not directly separated from the narration, making the narrator seem sympathetic to the characters, and removing the skepticism towards a character's thoughts and emotions that are a feature of more direct narration. Cadden suggests that this method leads to younger readers sympathizing directly with the characters, making it an effective technique for young-adult literature. A number of Le Guin's writings, including the ''Earthsea'' series, challenged the conventions of epic fantasies and myths. Many of the protagonists in ''Earthsea'' were dark-skinned individuals, in comparison to the white-skinned heroes more traditionally used; some of the antagonists, in contrast, were white-skinned, a switching of race roles that has been remarked upon by multiple critics. In a 2001 interview, Le Guin attributed the frequent lack of character illustrations on her book covers to her choice of non-white protagonists. She explained this choice, saying: "most people in the world aren't white. Why in the future would we assume they are?" Her 1985 book ''Always Coming Home'', described as "her great experiment", included a story told from the perspective of a young protagonist, but also included poems, rough drawings of plants and animals, myths, and anthropological reports from the matriarchal society of the Kesh, a fictional people living in the Napa valley after a catastrophic global flood.


Themes


Gender and sexuality

Gender and sexuality are prominent themes in a number of Le Guin's works. ''The Left Hand of Darkness'', published in 1969, was among the first books in the genre now known as feminist science fiction, and is the most famous examination of
androgyny Androgyny is the possession of both masculine and feminine characteristics. Androgyny may be expressed with regard to biological sex, gender identity, or gender expression. When ''androgyny'' refers to mixed biological sex characteristics in ...
in science fiction. The story is set on the fictional planet of Gethen, whose inhabitants are ambisexual humans with no fixed
gender identity Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex or can differ from it. In most individuals, the various biological determinants of sex are congruent, and consistent with the ...
, who adopt female or male sexual characteristics for brief periods of their sexual cycle. Which sex they adopt can depend on context and relationships. Gethen was portrayed as a society without war, as a result of this absence of fixed gender characteristics, and also without sexuality as a continuous factor in social relationships. Gethenian culture was explored in the novel through the eyes of a Terran, whose masculinity proves a barrier to cross-cultural communication. Outside the Hainish Cycle, Le Guin's use of a female protagonist in ''The Tombs of Atuan'', published in 1971, was described as a "significant exploration of womanhood". Le Guin's attitude towards gender and feminism evolved considerably over time. Although ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' was seen as a landmark exploration of gender, it also received criticism for not going far enough. Reviewers pointed to its usage of masculine gender pronouns to describe its androgynous characters, the lack of androgynous characters portrayed in stereotypical feminine roles, and the portrayal of
heterosexuality Heterosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction or sexual behavior between people of the opposite sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, heterosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" ...
as the norm on Gethen. Le Guin's portrayal of gender in ''Earthsea'' was also described as perpetuating the notion of a male-dominated world; according to the ''Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'', "Le Guin saw men as the actors and doers in the orld while women remain the still centre, the well from which they drink". Le Guin initially defended her writing; in a 1976 essay "Is Gender Necessary?" she wrote that gender was secondary to the primary theme of loyalty in ''The Left Hand of Darkness''. Le Guin revisited this essay in 1988, and acknowledged that gender was central to the novel; she also apologized for depicting Gethenians solely in heterosexual relationships. Le Guin responded to these critiques in her subsequent writing. She intentionally used feminine
pronoun In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun ( abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not ...
s for all sexually latent Gethenians in her 1995 short story "Coming of Age in Karhide", and in a later reprinting of " Winter's King", which was first published in 1969. "Coming of Age in Karhide" was later anthologized in the 2002 collection '' The Birthday of the World'', which contained six other stories featuring unorthodox sexual relationships and marital arrangements. She also revisited gender relations in ''Earthsea'' in ''Tehanu'', published in 1990. This volume was described as a rewriting or reimagining of ''The Tombs of Atuan'', because the power and status of the female protagonist Tenar are the inverse of what they were in the earlier book, which was also focused on her and Ged. During this later period she commented that she considered ''The Eye of the Heron'', published in 1978, to be her first work genuinely centered on a woman.


Moral development

Le Guin explores
coming of age Coming of age is a young person's transition from being a child to being an adult. The specific age at which this transition takes place varies between societies, as does the nature of the change. It can be a simple legal convention or can ...
, and moral development more broadly, in many of her writings. This is particularly the case in those works written for a younger audience, such as ''Earthsea'' and ''Annals of the Western Shore''. Le Guin wrote in a 1973 essay that she chose to explore coming-of-age in ''Earthsea'' since she was writing for an adolescent audience: "Coming of age ... is a process that took me many years; I finished it, so far as I ever will, at about age thirty-one; and so I feel rather deeply about it. So do most adolescents. It's their main occupation, in fact." She also said that fantasy was best suited as a medium for describing coming of age, because exploring the subconscious was difficult using the language of "rational daily life". The first three ''Earthsea'' novels together follow Ged from youth to old age, and each of them also follow the coming of age of a different character. ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' focuses on Ged's adolescence, while ''The Tombs of Atuan'' and ''The Farthest Shore'' explore that of Tenar and the prince Arren, respectively. ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' is frequently described as a ''
Bildungsroman In literary criticism, a ''Bildungsroman'' (, plural ''Bildungsromane'', ) is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from childhood to adulthood (coming of age), in which character change is import ...
'', in which Ged's coming of age is intertwined with the physical journey he undertakes through the novel. To Mike Cadden the book was a convincing tale "to a reader as young and possibly as headstrong as Ged, and therefore sympathetic to him". Reviewers have described the ending of the novel, wherein Ged finally accepts the shadow as a part of himself, as a
rite of passage A rite of passage is a ceremony or ritual of the passage which occurs when an individual leaves one group to enter another. It involves a significant change of social status, status in society. In cultural anthropology the term is the Anglicisat ...
. Scholar Jeanne Walker writes that the rite of passage at the end was an analogue for the entire plot of ''A Wizard of Earthsea'', and that the plot itself plays the role of a rite of passage for an adolescent reader. Each volume of ''Annals of the Western Shore'' also describes the coming of age of its protagonists, and features explorations of being enslaved to one's own power. The process of growing up is depicted as seeing beyond narrow choices the protagonists are presented with by society. In ''Gifts'', Orrec and Gry realize that the powers their people possess can be used in two ways: for control and dominion, or for healing and nurturing. This recognition allows them to take a third choice, and leave. This wrestling with choice has been compared to the choices the characters are forced to make in Le Guin's short story "
The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" is a 1973 work of short philosophical fiction by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. With deliberately both vague and vivid descriptions, the narrator depicts a summer festival in the utopian city of Omelas, ...
". Similarly, Ged helps Tenar in ''The Tombs of Atuan'' to value herself and to find choices that she did not see, leading her to leave the Tombs with him.


Political systems

Alternative social and political systems are a recurring theme in Le Guin's writing. Critics have paid particular attention to ''The Dispossessed'' and ''Always Coming Home'', although Le Guin explores related themes in a number of her works, such as in "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas". ''The Dispossessed'' is an anarchist utopian novel, which according to Le Guin drew from pacifist anarchists, including
Peter Kropotkin Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin (; russian: link=no, Пётр Алексе́евич Кропо́ткин ; 9 December 1842 – 8 February 1921) was a Russian anarchist, socialist, revolutionary, historian, scientist, philosopher, and activist ...
, as well as from the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s. Le Guin has been credited with anarchism from the cultural ghetto to which it has been consigned", and helping to bring it into the intellectual mainstream. Fellow author
Kathleen Ann Goonan Kathleen Ann Goonan (May 14, 1952 – January 28, 2021)Kathleen Ann Goonan (1952–2021)
wrote that Le Guin's work confronted the "paradigm of insularity toward the suffering of people, other living beings, and resources", and explored "life-respecting sustainable alternatives". ''The Dispossessed'', set on the twin planets of Urras and Anarres, features a planned anarchist society depicted as an "ambiguous utopia". The society, created by settlers from Urras, is materially poorer than the wealthy society of Urras, but more ethically and morally advanced. Unlike classical utopias, the society of Anarres is portrayed as neither perfect nor static; the protagonist Shevek finds himself traveling to Urras to pursue his research. Nonetheless, the misogyny and hierarchy present in the authoritarian society of Urras is absent among the anarchists, who base their social structure on cooperation and individual liberty. ''The Eye of the Heron'', published a few years after ''The Dispossessed'', was described as continuing Le Guin's exploration of human freedom, through a conflict between two societies of opposing philosophies: a town inhabited by descendants of pacifists, and a city inhabited by descendants of criminals. ''Always Coming Home'', set in California in the distant future, examines a warlike society, resembling contemporary American society, from the perspective of the Kesh, its pacifist neighbors. The society of the Kesh has been identified by scholars as a feminist utopia, which Le Guin uses to explore the role of technology. Scholar Warren Rochelle stated that it was "neither a matriarchy nor a patriarchy: men and women just are". "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas", a parable depicting a society in which widespread wealth, happiness, and security, comes at the cost of the continued misery of a single child, has also been read as a critique of contemporary American society. ''The Word for World is Forest'' explored the manner in which the structure of society affects the natural environment; in the novel, the natives of the planet of Athshe have adapted their way of life to the ecology of the planet. The colonizing human society, in contrast, is depicted as destructive and uncaring; in depicting it, Le Guin also critiqued colonialism and
imperialism Imperialism is the state policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion, especially by direct territorial acquisition or by gaining political and economic control of other areas, often through employing hard power (economic powe ...
, driven partly by her disapproval for U.S. intervention in the
Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
. Other social structures are examined in works such as the story cycle ''Four Ways to Forgiveness'', and the short story "Old Music and the Slave Women", occasionally described as a "fifth way to forgiveness". Set in the Hainish universe, the five stories together examine revolution and reconstruction in a slave-owning society. According to Rochelle, the stories examine a society that has the potential to build a "truly human community", made possible by the Ekumen's recognition of the slaves as human beings, thus offering them the prospect of freedom and the possibility of utopia, brought about through revolution.
Slavery Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
, justice, and the role of women in society are also explored in ''Annals of the Western Shore''.


Reception and legacy


Reception

Le Guin received rapid recognition after the publication of ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' in 1969, and by the 1970s she was among the best known writers in the field. Her books sold many millions of copies, and were translated into more than 40 languages; several remain in print many decades after their first publication. Her work received intense academic attention; she has been described as being the "premier writer of both fantasy and science fiction" of the 1970s, the most frequently discussed science fiction writer of the 1970s, and over her career, as intensively studied as Philip K. Dick. Later in her career, she also received recognition from mainstream literary critics: in an obituary,
Jo Walton Jo Walton (born 1964) is a Welsh and Canadian fantasy and science fiction writer and poet. She is best known for the fantasy novel '' Among Others'', which won the Hugo and Nebula Awards in 2012, and '' Tooth and Claw'', a Victorian era nov ...
stated that Le Guin "was so good that the mainstream couldn't dismiss SF any more". According to scholar Donna White, Le Guin was a "major voice in American letters", whose writing was the subject of many volumes of literary critique, more than two hundred scholarly articles, and a number of dissertations. Le Guin was unusual in receiving most of her recognition for her earliest works, which remained her most popular; a commentator in 2018 described a "tendency toward didacticism" in her later works, while
John Clute John Frederick Clute (born 12 September 1940) is a Canadian-born author and critic specializing in science fiction and fantasy literature who has lived in both England and the United States since 1969. He has been described as "an integral part ...
, writing in ''
The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...
'', stated that her later writing "suffers from the need she clearly felt to speak responsibly to her large audience about important things; an artist being responsible can be an artist wearing a crown of thorns". Not all of her works received as positive a reception; ''The Compass Rose'' was among the volumes that had a mixed reaction, while the ''Science Fiction Encyclopedia'' described ''The Eye of the Heron'' as "an over-diagrammatic political fable whose translucent simplicity approaches self-parody". Even the critically well-received ''The Left Hand of Darkness'', in addition to critique from feminists, was described by
Alexei Panshin Alexei Panshin (August 14, 1940 – August 21, 2022) was an American writer and science fiction critic. He wrote several critical works and several novels, including the 1968 Nebula Award–winning novel ''Rite of Passage''Nicholls 1979, p. 447 ...
as a "flat failure". Her writing was recognized by the popular media and by commentators. The ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...
'' commented in 2009 that after the death of
Arthur C. Clarke Sir Arthur Charles Clarke (16 December 191719 March 2008) was an English science-fiction writer, science writer, futurist, inventor, undersea explorer, and television series host. He co-wrote the screenplay for the 1968 film '' 2001: A Spac ...
, Le Guin was "arguably the most acclaimed science fiction writer on the planet", and went on to describe her as a "pioneer" of literature for young people. In an obituary, Clute described Le Guin as having "presided over American science fiction for nearly half a century", and as having a reputation as an author of the "first rank". In 2016, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' described her as "America's greatest living science fiction writer". Praise for Le Guin frequently focused on the social and political themes her work explored, and for her prose; literary critic Harold Bloom described Le Guin as an "exquisite stylist", saying that in her writing, "Every word was exactly in place and every sentence or line had resonance". According to Bloom, Le Guin was a "visionary who set herself against all brutality, discrimination, and exploitation". ''The New York Times'' described her as using "a lean but lyrical style" to explore issues of moral relevance. Prefacing an interview in 2008, ''
Vice A vice is a practice, behaviour, or habit generally considered immoral, sinful, criminal, rude, taboo, depraved, degrading, deviant or perverted in the associated society. In more minor usage, vice can refer to a fault, a negative character t ...
'' magazine described Le Guin as having written "some of the more mind-warping cience fictionand fantasy tales of the past 40 years". Le Guin's fellow authors also praised her writing. After Le Guin's death in 2018, writer
Michael Chabon Michael Chabon ( ; born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, gr ...
referred to her as the "greatest American writer of her generation", and said that she had "awed imwith the power of an unfettered imagination". Author Margaret Atwood hailed Le Guin's "sane, smart, crafty and lyrical voice", and wrote that social injustice was a powerful motivation through Le Guin's life. Her prose, according to Zadie Smith, was "as elegant and beautiful as any written in the twentieth century". Academic and author
Joyce Carol Oates Joyce Carol Oates (born June 16, 1938) is an American writer. Oates published her first book in 1963, and has since published 58 novels, a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and non-fiction. Her novels '' Bla ...
highlighted Le Guin's "outspoken sense of justice, decency, and common sense", and called her "one of the great American writers and a visionary artist whose work will long endure". China Miéville described Le Guin as a "literary colossus", and wrote that she was a "writer of intense ethical seriousness and intelligence, of wit and fury, of radical politics, of subtlety, of freedom and yearning".


Awards and recognition

The accolades Le Guin has received include numerous annual awards for individual works. She won eight
Hugo Award The Hugo Award is an annual literary award for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year, given at the World Science Fiction Convention and chosen by its members. The Hugo is widely considered the premier ...
s from twenty-six nominations, and six
Nebula Award The Nebula Awards annually recognize the best works of science fiction or fantasy published in the United States. The awards are organized and awarded by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), a nonprofit association of prof ...
s from eighteen nominations, including four Nebula Awards for Best Novel from six nominations, more than any other writer. Le Guin won twenty-four
Locus Award The Locus Awards are an annual set of literary awards voted on by readers of the science fiction and fantasy magazine ''Locus'', a monthly magazine based in Oakland, California. The awards are presented at an annual banquet. In addition to the p ...
s, voted for by subscribers of ''
Locus Magazine ''Locus: The Magazine of The Science Fiction & Fantasy Field'', founded in 1968, is an American magazine published monthly in Oakland, California. It is the news organ and trade journal for the English-language science fiction and fantasy fiel ...
'', and was joint third for total wins, as well as second behind
Neil Gaiman Neil Richard MacKinnon GaimanBorn as Neil Richard Gaiman, with "MacKinnon" added on the occasion of his marriage to Amanda Palmer. ; ( Neil Richard Gaiman; born 10 November 1960) is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, gra ...
, for the number of wins for works of fiction. For her novels alone she won five Locus Awards, four Nebula Awards, two Hugo Awards, and one
World Fantasy Award The World Fantasy Awards are a set of awards given each year for the best fantasy fiction published during the previous calendar year. Organized and overseen by the World Fantasy Convention, the awards are given each year at the eponymous ann ...
, and won each of those awards in short fiction categories as well. Her third ''Earthsea'' novel, ''The Farthest Shore'', won the 1973 National Book Award for Young People's Literature, and she was a finalist for ten Mythopoeic Awards, nine in Fantasy and one for Scholarship. Her 1996 collection ''
Unlocking the Air and Other Stories ''Unlocking the Air and Other Stories'' is a 1996 collection of short stories by Ursula K. Le Guin. Like ''Searoad'' and '' Orsinian Tales'', most of the included stories are neither science fiction nor fantasy. It was a finalist for the 1997 Pu ...
'' was one of three finalists for the 1997
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction is one of the seven American Pulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Letters, Drama, and Music. It recognizes distinguished fiction by an American author, preferably dealing with American life, published durin ...
. Other awards won by Le Guin include three James Tiptree Jr. Awards, and three Jupiter Awards. She won her final Hugo award a year after her death, for a complete edition of ''Earthsea'', illustrated by
Charles Vess Charles Vess (born June 10, 1951) is an American fantasy artist and comics artist who has specialized in the illustration of myths and fairy tales. His influences include British "Golden Age" book illustrator Arthur Rackham, Czech Art Nouveau pain ...
; the same volume also won a Locus award. Other awards and accolades have recognized Le Guin's contributions to speculative fiction. She was voted a Gandalf Grand Master Award by the
World Science Fiction Society Worldcon, or more formally the World Science Fiction Convention, the annual convention of the World Science Fiction Society (WSFS), is a science fiction convention. It has been held each year since 1939 (except for the years 1942 to 1945, duri ...
in 1979. The Science Fiction Research Association gave her its Pilgrim Award in 1989 for her "lifetime contributions to SF and fantasy scholarship". At the 1995 World Fantasy Convention she won the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement, a judged recognition of outstanding service to the fantasy field. The
Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame The Museum of Pop Culture or MoPOP is a nonprofit museum in Seattle, Washington, dedicated to contemporary popular culture. It was founded by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen in 2000 as the Experience Music Project. Since then MoPOP has organ ...
inducted her in 2001, its sixth class of two deceased and two living writers. The
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, doing business as Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association, commonly known as SFWA ( or ) is a Non-profit organization, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization of professional science fiction an ...
named her its 20th Grand Master in 2003: she was the second, and one of only six, women to receive that honor. In 2013, she was given the Eaton Award by the
University of California, Riverside The University of California, Riverside (UCR or UC Riverside) is a public land-grant research university in Riverside, California. It is one of the ten campuses of the University of California system. The main campus sits on in a suburban dist ...
, for lifetime achievement in science fiction. Later in her career Le Guin also received accolades recognizing her contributions to literature more generally. In April 2000, the U.S.
Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The libra ...
named Le Guin a Living Legend in the "Writers and Artists" category for her significant contributions to America's cultural heritage. The
American Library Association The American Library Association (ALA) is a nonprofit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world, with 49,727 members ...
granted her the annual Margaret Edwards Award in 2004, and also selected her to deliver the annual May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture. The Edwards Award recognizes one writer and a particular body of work: the 2004 panel cited the first four ''Earthsea'' volumes, ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' and ''The Beginning Place''. The panel said that Le Guin "has inspired four generations of young adults to read beautifully constructed language, visit fantasy worlds that inform them about their own lives, and think about their ideas that are neither easy nor inconsequential". A collection of Le Guin's works was published by the Library of America in 2016, an honor only rarely given to living writers. The National Book Foundation awarded Le Guin its Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters in 2014, stating that she had "defied conventions of narrative, language, character, and genre, and transcended boundaries between fantasy and realism to forge new paths for literary fiction". The
American Academy of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, music, and art. Its fixed number membership is elected for lifetime appointments. Its headqu ...
made her a member in 2017. On July 27, 2021, Le Guin was honored by the US Postal Service with the 33rd stamp in the Postal Service's Literary Arts series. The stamp features a portrait of the author taken from a 2006 photograph against a background image inspired by her book ''The Left Hand of Darkness''. The stamp was designed by Donato Gionacola.


Legacy and influence

Le Guin had a considerable influence on the field of speculative fiction; Jo Walton argued that Le Guin played a large role in both broadening the genre and helping genre writers achieve mainstream recognition. The ''Earthsea'' books are cited as having a wide impact, including outside the field of literature. Atwood considers ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' one of the "wellsprings" of fantasy literature, and modern writers have credited the book for the idea of a "wizard school", later made famous by the ''
Harry Potter ''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young wizard, Harry Potter, and his friends Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, all of whom are students at ...
'' series of books, and with popularizing the trope of a boy wizard, also present in ''Harry Potter''. The notion that names can exert power is a theme in the Earthsea series; critics have suggested that this inspired Hayao Miyazaki's use of the idea in his 2001 film '' Spirited Away''. Le Guin's writings set in the Hainish universe also had a wide influence. Le Guin coined the name "
ansible An ansible is a category of fictional devices or technology capable of near-instantaneous or faster-than-light communication. It can send and receive messages to and from a corresponding device over any distance or obstacle whatsoever with no d ...
" for an instantaneous interstellar communication device in 1966; the term was later adopted by several other writers, including
Orson Scott Card Orson Scott Card (born August 24, 1951) is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is the first and (as of 2022) only person to win both a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for both ...
in the '' Ender Series'' and Neil Gaiman in a script for a ''
Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the ...
'' episode. Suzanne Reid wrote that at the time ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' was written, Le Guin's ideas of androgyny were unique not only to science fiction, but to literature in general. That volume is specifically cited as leaving a large legacy; in discussing it, literary critic Harold Bloom wrote "Le Guin, more than Tolkien, has raised fantasy into high literature, for our time". Bloom followed this up by listing the book in his '' The Western Canon'' (1994) as one of the books in his conception of artistic works that have been important and influential in Western culture. This view was echoed in ''
The Paris Review ''The Paris Review'' is a quarterly English-language literary magazine established in Paris in 1953 by Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen, and George Plimpton. In its first five years, ''The Paris Review'' published works by Jack Kerouac, Phi ...
'', which wrote that "No single work did more to upend the genre's conventions than ''The Left Hand of Darkness''", while White argued that it was one of the seminal works of science fiction, as important as
Mary Shelley Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (; ; 30 August 1797 – 1 February 1851) was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel '' Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also ...
's ''
Frankenstein ''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific ...
'' (1818). Commentators have also described Le Guin as being influential in the field of literature more generally. Literary critic Elaine Showalter suggested that Le Guin "set the pace as a writer for women unlearning silence, fear, and self-doubt", while writer
Brian Attebery Brian Attebery (born December 1951) is an American writer and emeritus professor of English and philosophy at Idaho State University. He is known for his studies of fantasy literature, including ''The Fantasy Tradition in American Literature: ...
stated that "
e Guin E, or e, is the fifth letter and the second vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''e'' (pronounced ); plur ...
invented us: science fiction and fantasy critics like me but also poets and essayists and picture book writers and novelists". Le Guin's own literary criticism proved influential; her 1973 essay "From Elfland to Poughkeepsie" led to renewed interest in the work of Kenneth Morris, and eventually to the publication of a posthumous novel by Morris. Le Guin also played a role in bringing speculative fiction into the literary mainstream by supporting journalists and scholarly endeavors examining the genre. Several prominent authors acknowledge Le Guin's influence on their own writing. Jo Walton wrote that "her way of looking at the world had a huge influence on me, not just as a writer but as a human being". Other writers she influenced include
Booker Prize The Booker Prize, formerly known as the Booker Prize for Fiction (1969–2001) and the Man Booker Prize (2002–2019), is a literary prize awarded each year for the best novel written in English and published in the United Kingdom or Ireland. ...
winner
Salman Rushdie Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie (; born 19 June 1947) is an Indian-born British-American novelist. His work often combines magic realism with historical fiction and primarily deals with connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and ...
, as well as David Mitchell, Gaiman,
Algis Budrys Algirdas Jonas "Algis" Budrys (January 9, 1931 – June 9, 2008) was a Lithuanian-American science fiction author, editor, and critic. He was also known under the pen names Frank Mason, Alger Rome (in collaboration with Jerome Bixby), John ...
, Goonan, and Iain Banks. Mitchell, author of books such as '' Cloud Atlas'', described ''A Wizard of Earthsea'' as having a strong influence on him, and said that he felt a desire to "wield words with the same power as Ursula Le Guin". Le Guin is also credited with inspiring several female science fiction authors in the 1970s, including Vonda McIntyre. When McIntyre established a writers' workshop in Seattle in 1971, Le Guin was one of the instructors. Film-maker Arwen Curry began production on a documentary about Le Guin in 2009, filming "dozens" of hours of interviews with the author as well as many other writers and artists who have been inspired by her. Curry launched a successful
crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by cro ...
campaign to finish the documentary in early 2016 after winning a grant from the
National Endowment for the Humanities The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
. In October 2021, the Ursula K. Le Guin Prize for Fiction was announced. The award is managed by the Ursula K. Le Guin Literary Trust and a panel of jurors. The prize is worth and will be awarded annually to "a single book-length work of imaginative fiction." The inaugural shortlist was announced on July 28, 2022. The prize's inaugural winner was announced on October 21, 2022, Le Guin's birthday.


Adaptations of her work

Le Guin's works have been adapted for radio, film, television, and the stage. Her 1971 novel ''The Lathe of Heaven'' has been released on film twice, in 1979 by
WNET WNET (channel 13), branded on-air as "Thirteen" (stylized as "THIRTEEN"), is a primary PBS member television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York City area. Owned by The WNET Group (formerly known as the ...
with Le Guin's participation, and then in 2002 by the
A&E Network A&E is an American basic cable network, the flagship television property of A&E Networks. The network was originally founded in 1984 as the Arts & Entertainment Network, initially focusing on fine arts, documentaries, dramas, and educational ent ...
. In a 2008 interview, she said she considered the 1979 version as "the only good adaptation to film" of her work to date. In the early 1980s Hayao Miyazaki asked to create an animated adaptation of ''Earthsea''. Le Guin, who was unfamiliar with his work and anime in general, initially turned down the offer, but later accepted after seeing '' My Neighbor Totoro''. The third and fourth ''Earthsea'' books were used as the basis of '' Tales from Earthsea'', released in 2006. Rather than being directed by Hayao Miyazaki himself, the film was directed by his son Gorō, which disappointed Le Guin. Le Guin was positive about the aesthetic of the film, writing that "much of it was beautiful", but was critical of the film's moral sense and its use of physical violence, and particularly the use of a villain whose death provided the film's resolution. In 2004, the Sci Fi Channel adapted the first two books of the ''Earthsea'' trilogy as the miniseries ''
Legend of Earthsea ''Legend of Earthsea'' (later shortened to ''Earthsea'') is a two-part television fantasy miniseries produced for the Sci-Fi Channel. It is an adaptation of the ''Earthsea'' novels by Ursula K. Le Guin. The teleplay was written by Gavin Scott, a ...
''. Le Guin was highly critical of the miniseries, calling it a "far cry from the Earthsea I envisioned", objecting to the use of white actors for her red-, brown-, and black-skinned characters. Le Guin's novel ''The Left Hand of Darkness'' was adapted for the stage in 1995 by Chicago's Lifeline Theatre. Reviewer Jack Helbig at the ''
Chicago Reader The ''Chicago Reader'', or ''Reader'' (stylized as ЯEADER), is an American alternative weekly newspaper in Chicago, Illinois, noted for its literary style of journalism and coverage of the arts, particularly film and theater. It was founded by ...
'' wrote that the "adaptation is intelligent and well crafted but ultimately unsatisfying", in large measure because it is extremely difficult to compress a complex 300-page novel into a two-hour stage presentation. ''Paradises Lost'' was adapted into an
opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libr ...
by the opera program of the
University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Uni ...
. The opera was composed by Stephen A. Taylor; the
libretto A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the text of major li ...
has been attributed both to Kate Gale and to Marcia Johnson. Created in 2005, the opera premiered in April 2012. Le Guin described the effort as a "beautiful opera" in an interview, and expressed hopes that it would be picked up by other producers. She also said she was better pleased with stage versions, including ''Paradises Lost'', than screen adaptations of her work to that date. In 2013, the Portland Playhouse and Hand2Mouth Theatre produced a play based on ''The Left Hand of Darkness'', directed and adapted by Jonathan Walters, with text written by John Schmor. The play opened May 2, 2013, and ran until June 16, 2013, in Portland, Oregon.


Bibliography

Le Guin's career as a professional writer spanned nearly sixty years, from 1959 to 2018. During this period, she wrote more than twenty novels, more than a hundred short stories, more than a dozen volumes of poetry, five translations, and thirteen children's books. Her writing encompassed
speculative fiction Speculative fiction is a term that has been used with a variety of (sometimes contradictory) meanings. The broadest interpretation is as a category of fiction encompassing genres with elements that do not exist in reality, recorded history, nat ...
, realistic fiction, non-fiction,
screenplay ''ScreenPlay'' is a television drama anthology series broadcast on BBC2 between 9 July 1986 and 27 October 1993. Background After single-play anthology series went off the air, the BBC introduced several showcases for made-for-television, f ...
s, librettos, essays, poetry, speeches, translations, literary critiques,
chapbook A chapbook is a small publication of up to about 40 pages, sometimes bound with a saddle stitch. In early modern Europe a chapbook was a type of printed street literature. Produced cheaply, chapbooks were commonly small, paper-covered bookle ...
s, and children's fiction. Le Guin's first published work was the poem "Folksong from the Montayna Province" in 1959, while her first published short story was "An die Musik", in 1961. Her first professional publication was the short story "April in Paris" in 1962, while her first published novel was ''Rocannon's World'', released by Ace Books in 1966. Her final publications included the non-fiction collections ''Dreams Must Explain Themselves'' and ''Ursula K Le Guin: Conversations on Writing'', both released after her death. Her best-known works include the six volumes of the ''Earthsea'' series, and the many novels of the Hainish Cycle.


See also

*
List of American novelists This is a list of novelists from the United States, listed with titles of a major work for each. This is not intended to be a list of every American (born U.S. citizen, naturalized citizen, or long-time resident alien) who has published a nov ...
* List of fantasy authors *
List of science fiction authors This is a list of noted science-fiction authors (in alphabetical order): A *Dafydd ab Hugh (born 1960) * Alexander Abasheli (1884–1954) * Edwin Abbott Abbott (1838–1926) * Kōbō Abe (1924–1993) * Robert Abernathy (1924–1990) *Dan ...


Citations


Sources

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *


Further reading

* * * * * * * *


External links

* *
Ursula K. Le Guin papers, circa 1930s–2018
at the
University of Oregon The University of Oregon (UO, U of O or Oregon) is a public research university in Eugene, Oregon. Founded in 1876, the institution is well known for its strong ties to the sports apparel and marketing firm Nike, Inc Nike, Inc. ( or ) is a ...
Libraries


Interviews

* * * * Ursula Le Guin Bookworm Interviews (Audio) with
Michael Silverblatt Michael Silverblatt (born August 6, 1952) is a literary critic and American broadcaster who hosted '' Bookworm'', a nationally syndicated radio program focusing on books and literature, from 1989 to 2022. ''Bookworm'' is broadcast by Los Angeles ...

January 1992March 2001
*


Speeches

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Le Guin, Ursula K. 1929 births 2018 deaths 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American novelists 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American non-fiction writers 21st-century American novelists 21st-century American women writers American fantasy writers American feminist writers American literary critics American women critics Women literary critics American people of German descent American science fiction writers American short story writers American speculative fiction critics American speculative fiction translators American Taoists American women children's writers American children's writers American women essayists American women poets American women short story writers American women novelists Berkeley High School (Berkeley, California) alumni Columbia University alumni Constructed language creators Endeavour Award winners Environmental fiction writers Hugo Award-winning writers Kroeber family Margaret A. Edwards Award winners National Book Award for Young People's Literature winners Nebula Award winners Newbery Honor winners American anti-capitalists Novelists from Oregon PEN/Malamud Award winners Postmodern writers Radcliffe College alumni Rhysling Award for Best Long Poem winners Science fiction critics Science Fiction Hall of Fame inductees SFWA Grand Masters The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction people Translators of Gabriela Mistral Women science fiction and fantasy writers Women writers of young adult literature World Fantasy Award-winning writers Writers from Berkeley, California Writers from Portland, Oregon Writers from the San Francisco Bay Area Fulbright alumni