“The Word for World is Forest” by Ursula Le Guin

Title: “The Word for World is Forest”
Author: Ursula Le Guin
Series: Hainish Cycle
Genre: Science Fiction
Pages: 128 pages
Publisher: Panther

Summary:

Since the Internet has denied me the opportunity to use a ready blurb, I shall revert to a nutshell plot compression. “New Tahiti” is a prospering gold mine of a logging colony for Earth, who during the industrialization has lost its natural forests and is in dire need of wood material. Enslaving the native Athsheans and forcing them into destroying their own fragile ecosystem and abusing them on a daily basis seems like a common practice among the morally loose human military force. This goes until Selver, an Athshean who lost his village to the colony, his wife to a rape and his ability to dream like all in his race, reverses the roles and liberates the colony.

General Thoughts: It’s always a pleasure to have an Ursula Le Guin title in one’s hands and even better when it is a novel from her Hainish Cycle. I decided to return to her since I had two more books lying around from the cycle and it was February, at the time when I decided that I had to participate in the Sci-fi Experience. Considering the length I knew that this title would be somewhat more concise and tightened, developing in a short span of time. My intuition didn’t lie to me and I read a very fast paced and yet tranquil story about revolt and colonization. If this makes any sense at all.

Revolution in life and in fiction is a flash fire of an event that only needs a spark, a last drop to make everything crumble and Ursula Le Guin delivers. I can’t vouch for anything special regarding the prose, since translations tend to lose some of that unique voice, but what shines through is Le Guin’s intriguing storytelling. What makes an impression with “The Word for World is Forest” is that the novel was written in a certain historical context relevant to the generation, which witnessed history in that segment and must carry a stronger meaning to those who can relate to the message. I myself only guessed some references to the real world and that was with the help of the foreword.

Characters & Depth: Thinking about the cast I see Le Guin toy with an interesting idea, which ties together Selver and Captain Davidson, both of whom are adversaries, in a strange bundle. More or less a certain sense of patriotism and duty to one’s nation and people is the basic behavior encoded in the novel. Le Guin portrays the patriot soldier, who is ready to sacrifice all that he has and is in doing what is best for his people.

In the case of Selver slavery and need of a symbol, which will return hope, pushes him through a metamorphosis and he becomes a god in his people’s eyes, a champion to lead the Athsheans into salvation. At the same time we read of the same idea, but twisted and tarnished into something vile and a incubator of all the human sins. Captain Davidson is pure evil, vulgar and primal, and the only villain, who had managed to irritate me and make me want to stab him myself rather than wait for justice to prevail. Atrocity in his eyes is what has to be done. Sacrificing for him means killing his own men, if it meets his purpose and proving himself right means a secret coup. Nevertheless both men are two polar sides of the very same idea. Interesting concept.

Worldbuilding & Believability: Athsheans are an ingenious product of Le Guin’s imagination, which are my favorite from all her creations so far, partially because of their affinity towards nature and then because of their interesting use of dreams in their life and culture. Le Guin presents a society, where spirituality and tradition have prevailed over the need to excel in science and the material. Divided in gender specific roles and matriarchal in nature of government Athsheans coexist in harmony and peace in their communities and the concept of violence, war and slavery do not exist, until humans arrive to colonize. Up until then this species is the picture of a utopia, where intelligent life sustains development and yet manages to continue unity with the environment. The desecration of this purity and the adaptation to the humans’ ways of handling conflict and life is just for me personally a clear message that nothing good lasts and the utopia will remain a farfetched dream.

The Verdict: To be quite honest although it was a well written piece of fiction and had some sizeable conflict and tension it didn’t turn out to be a page turner. I liked it and think it has a lot of sense and sends off a major message, plus the original novellas won a Hugo award, but me and “The Word for World is Forest” lacked the chemistry. Nevertheless I do suggest you read it. You won’t be wasting time reading it.

"Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula Le Guin

Author: Ursual Le Guin
Title: "Left Hand of Darkness"
Pages: 304
Publishers: Ace Books

“The Left Hand of Darkness” by Ursula Le Guin is one of the most famous of her Hainish cycle with a Nebula Award for Best Books and rightly so. In the 300 or so, I accounted quite the plot and themes cramped inside with an ease. Just for that trait alone the book deserves its prize and praise, but once accounted with the depth of the world-building and characters, you can hardly deny that this is one of the greatest books ever written.

The setting this time is the planet Gethen, referred to sometimes as the planet Winter, because of its unfavorable cold weather, blamed for the lack of evolution and development of its original race. The main character this time is Genly Ai, a representative of the galactic federation of worlds, and his mission is to prepare Gethen for membership into the guild. His journey starts within the borders of Karhide, a primitive feudal kingdom. There under the guidance of Therem Harth rem ir Estraven, the prime minister of Karhide, he maneuvers trough the complicated political system, further entangled by the constant and yet subtle battle for personal shiftgrethor – social prestige. His mission fails with Estraven sent into exile and Genly tries with the neighbors aka Orgoreyn, which in terms of social life and politics seems to exceed Karhide. However yet again Genly loses to prejudice towards his abnormal biology (Gethenians are androgynous by nature), political games and plots against him, which lead to his imprisonment into a camp for criminals. Of course on his death bed Genly is saved by Estraven and they make a very long travel through ice and volcanoes to Karhide, where Genly calls his ship and his crew from the planet’s orbit in order to make the two countries believe his tales and join the federation.

Of course the plot I present to you is quite stripped from the subplots and all the interesting minor characters, who make their entrance and introduce more of the world and its spirituality. What excited me most is the apparent loss of gender along the way of evolution resulting in a species with no gentiles for 24 days of their 26 day month, while the last two days are spent in kemmer. In those two days pheromones battle in both partners until they settle on a gender. This choice is random, which makes it possible to both bear and sire children. To add even more exotic features to this biological species, Ursula le Guin mentions that incest is not forbidden. Alas I would have wished this peculiar trait to have been explored further with the psyche and its effect on its society.

The accent falls on inner duality and Zen-like religion and the ability to peer into the future. As we learn a Gethenian is a woman within a man and vice versa and their world and beliefs state that “light is the left hand of darkness, while darkness is the right hand of light”. These ideas hint towards the famous yin and yang sign, which is one of the most important symbols in Taoism and takes its place among many sub-religions in China. Similar ideas of religion are found in Gethen as well.

What I personally didn’t enjoy and left me a bit disappointed in the book was the political angle and the long journey through the barren lands. As a person, who likes a bit action seasoning on their literary plate, I felt compelled to sleep on the pages describing day after day surviving harsh cold winds, blizzards and chilling temperatures far below the zero mark. The long narratives on shiftgrethor tactics and political structures of both countries and the countless parties struggling for power. It can be said that I am not a major fan of political anything as it is boring to me a subject, but the manner in which Le Guin executed it was still very pleasing.

All in all this a very good book, but my heart still lies between the pages of “City of Illusions”. Nonetheless, you can’t say that you have read good literature unless you have read this work.

"City Of Illusions" by Ursula Le Guin

Author: Ursula Le Guin
Title: "City of Illusions"
Pages: 232
Publisher: Ace Books

“City Of Illusions” is the third book in the Hainish cycle, which I had happened to stumble on, before I reached “The Left Hand of Darkness” and I wasn’t left disappointed. From the three so far I enjoyed this book the most.

The story this time is set on Earth, our Earth referred to as Terra in the distant future and well we pretty much find it in ruins in a state after a major apocalypse, but not the way most people think. Terra has healed all wounds, has overgrown all the cities, know humans are nearly extinct and live in single Houses, giant ranches, miles and miles apart. Our future descendants never recuperated from the War culturally and exist on a pre-technology level of society. This of course is done against their will, since Terra is ruled by the Shing, rumored evil aliens referred to as the Enemy, who can lie with their minds, when general belief around the galaxy states that with telepathy no one can lie. So the Shing live in a giant city, the only one existing city Es Toch or the City of Illusions/Lies and forbid humans to evolve in any way, while they thrive with electricity and technology.

Falk is the protagonist of the story, an unusual human specimen with yellow eyes of a cat, who is also rumored to be a Shing, but he can’t tell for certain. Mainly because his brain was telepathically fried, so he sets on a journey to Es Toch to find his identity and answers. He teams up with Estrel, once he gets abducted by the fearsome and quite brutal in its rituals tribe Basnasska and escapes with her to the city. However things get kind of messy, when he learns that she is actually a tool of the Shing. To that initial shock comes the knowledge that the Shing are actually humans, who in order to prevent more wars have pretended to be the enemy. Then comes a boy, who announces that he is Agad Ramarren from the world of Werel (yes the same Werel from “Planet of Exile”), who has come here on a mission to contact Terra. The highest point in the novel is when Falk has to choose whether to make a psychic surgery to regain his memory. The dilemma consists in that once he regains his old memory his current life will be deleted, which he doesn’t want since is in love with a woman from his House. Secondary reason is that he knows that the Shing are lying about their history and intentions to help him regain memory and travel back to Werel. However as the story progresses we see Falk and Ramarren meld into one personality and escape earth with a hostage without revealing Werels’ coordinates to the Shing so that they may not attack Werel.

All of this happened in 232 pages, which is unbelievably deep and skillfully written. I can even forget the fact that this is sci-fi, a genre, which initially doesn’t attract me much, but this book certainly changed my view if not a little. The main theme of the book is clearly about truth and deception. For quite a time I was fooled by some of the false theories Le Guin has presented, which were later revealed as false for new ones to fill in their places. The endless circle of lies and truth, which is later announced as lies and myths that were deemed as lies become true, is perplexing, intricate and overwhelming in the positive aspect. Then comes of course how the novels in the Hainish cycle interconnect is also enchanting. When we left “Planet of Exile” Werel was just about to settle down and here in “City of Illusions” we learn of Werel as a fully blooming world with a new rave forged from the two before. As a fan of world building, these tiny tidbits of setting, beliefs and history are precious and add volumes and depth to the experience.

Characterization here also is important and is mainly shown through Falk-Ramarran, who consists of two polar personalities, which reflect the struggle between truth and lies. Falk is naïve and in tune with his heart’s desires and emotions, while Rammarran is a mathematician, a person of logic and in full control of his spirit through a complicated spirit discipline that suppresses emotions. The process of both personalities melting together is parallel to the assimilation of what is fact and what is deceitful information.

I am confidently recommending this classic to anyone!

"Planet of Exile" by Ursula Le Guin

Author: Ursual Le Guin
Title: Planet of Exile
Pages: 140
Publisher: Ace Books

“Planet of Exile” is the second novel from the Hainish cycle and like the first book “Rocannon’s World” it is similar in length, contents and the fine blend between science fiction and fantasy.

The setting of “Planet of Exile” happens to be the planet Werel, third from the Gamma Draconis system, which is an extremely peculiar world. One year on Werel is equal to 60 human years, which is pretty much the average life length of the Tevarans, who are the planet’s original inhabitants. Like in “Rocannon’s World” the race is primitive with no religion, technology or literacy, while the Earth human colony stranded on the planet have once excelled in all fields, but due to the law of the League of Worlds have been forced to remain on the same level as the inhabiting race. This of course leads to the human degradation in terms of science and technology.

The story begins, when the Autumn season is almost reaching its end and preparations are made for the upcoming Winter season. News of an even more primitive tribe called the Gaals grouping in large armies in order to siege large Winter cities, built anew every year, stirs up the waters and forces the Tevarans, the clan of Wold to be more exact, and human fraction to interact. The relationship between the two races has been limited and tense as humans think of themselves as two evolved to be involved with Tevarans, while the Tevarans fear the humans for their telepathic abilities.

Rolery a young girl from Wold’s clan wanders inside the human city and almost drowns, once when the ocean tide returns fast, but is saved in the last second by Jakob Agat, one of the humans in the City senate. This chance meeting develops into a very strange love relationship with a lot less romance too many inadequate moments and bad consequences for both involved. As the long dreaded Winter comes and the rumors of invasions are confirmed, Tevarans unite with the Earth colony. From then on the book handles the siege of the Earth colony city as it manages to fend off the Gaals.

Personally I didn’t find “Planet of Exile” to be quite as entertaining as “Rocannon’s World” or “City of Illusions” due to the fact that in its core “Planet of Exile” is a military novel. The story starts with preparations for a war, which rages from then on in every aspect with sneak attacks, sieges, slaughters and all in between. Although there are deeper themes such as the evolution and interaction of two different species, which for their own survival have to merge together as much as they don’t want, run on the background. The Earth colony suffer from lack of potency to reproduce as an effect of the unusual sun’s radiation and later near the end it has been shown that they are vulnerable to infections, contradictory to the knowledge that no native to Werel disease or bacteria can harm the Earth colony. The Teverans take a step forward in their evolution with Rolery demonstrating a perceptive mind open to telepathic communication, a talent so far not exhibited by her race. This all leads to the idea that for the Earth colony to survive it has to merge with the native Teverans, which clearly happens as it is revealed in “City of Illusions”.

All in all it wasn’t a bad book, but it certainly wasn’t my cup of tea. I would recommend it to anyone, who likes to read about military strategy and war.

"Rocannon's World" by Ursula Le Guin

Author: Ursula Le Guin
Title: "Rocannon's World"
Pages: 134
Publisher: Ace (1966)

As it would seem the Bulgarian reprint of Ursula Le Guin’s “Left Hand of Darkness” is a collection of most of the novels from the Hainish cycle. I came across this, while researching the matter, while I was still reading the book and since I finished two of the novels compressed in the first volume I felt like reviewing them separately.

“Rocannon’s World” is not only the opening of the first volume, but is Ursula’s debut as well back in 1966, which for me is the time, when sci-fi as a genre picked up and developed. A fairly short read at the mere 136 pages the plot is very simple, but the story remains sophisticated without troubling the readers mind so much, a trait I admire in Ursula’s writing, clearly demonstrated in her Earthsea novels, which have earned their stature as irreplaceable in my heart.

The protagonist of this tale is the ethnologist Rocannon, who is doing some research for the League of Worlds on the nameless planet simply labeled as Fomalhaut II, which is inhabited by three intelligent races. The Gdemiar resemble Earth’s dwarves by living in cave colonies and displaying wordsmith mastery and their own grip over technology, which has been taught by the league. The Fiia are the friendly gnomes that share a constant telepathic connection among their kind. The Liuar are taller than normal humans, Rocannon being one, and are a race of wars and honor and are divided into two subspecies: the taller blond families are the royalty, while the shorter brunette families are treated as servants.

Interesting to note is that the prologue to this novel “Semley’s Necklace” has been a short story published as a standalone. Semley is a young woman from a royal family, who in search to reclaim her clan’s pride undergoes a space journey to return her family’s heirloom, a blue sapphire necklace, only to find that she returns one generation later with her daughter grown and her husband dead, rendering her efforts pointless.

The great introduction shows a great deal of the worldbuilding in Fomalhaut II, which is still in the Bronze Era, and introduces the characters. Rocannon arrives on the primitive world with a party to determine, whether the planet is inhabited by the army of Faradey, a world, which engages in intergalactic wars and uses primitive worlds as bases. Considering everyone from the party, plus their means of transport, being obliterated by a laze beam and the news of many cataclysmic fires spreading on the planet, the answer is pretty positive.

So Rocannon embarks on an epic journey to find the enemy base and use their communication systems to warn the League. His companion is Mogien, one of the blond Liuar, royalty and grandson of Semley. Considering the lack of technology the story resembles a Tolkinesque plot with a part consisting of different races: Rocannon, Mogien and his servants are joined by the sole Fiia, who survived a slaughtering of his village. To top it off, this Fiia speaks of a prophecy, which involves Rocannon and the sapphire necklace, which basically gets him in lot of trouble, almost costing his life.

In his travels the brave ethnologist earns the reputation of a god status being, because of his special protective suit, which saved him from being cooked and eaten. Rocannon also encounters with two other races that are rumored to inhabit the planet, which are left unnamed. The first race consists of tall angelic creatures with big wings, which are blind and deaf. They serve as the antagonists as their agenda is feeding on the traveling party by sucking their life juices. The second race is supposedly the ancestors of both the Gdemiar and Fiia before they split up and evolved. From them Rocannon learns the art of telepathy. In a very interesting solo spy mission Rocannon achieves his mission and waits for the rescuing team to come get him after the enemy has been obliterated as well. However traveling to him takes too much time and Rocannon dies of age, while waiting for his rescue. As a consolation prize Fomalhaut II is named Rocannon.

The prologue “Semley's Necklace” begins like this:

"How can you tell the legend from the fact on these worlds that lie so many years away? - planets without names, called by their people simply The World, planets without history, where the past is the matter of myth, and a returning explorer finds his own doings of a few years back have become the gestures of a god."

Apart from being thought provocative, full of depth and simply brilliant, these starting sentences carry the spirit and are at the base of “Rocannon’s World”, “Planet of Exiles” and probably the whole Hainish cycle. There is this blend of past and future, fantasy and sci-fi, facts and myths and the experience of watching a single object or action reflected in absolutely polar perceptions is quite unique. Seeing how humans used to think that lightning was created by gods, how objects like a clock and a gun were magical to human tribes in the uncultivated parts of Earth, we are left wondering whether our mythology doesn’t have a quite believable explanation. One of the leading motifs is that truth is subjective and it depends on the beholder, a fact that has been established in history.

If you are looking for a very short read for the weekend, which packs a decent doze of action and still manages to flex your brain, then by all means check out “Rocannon’s World”.