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99-499: Sigma Tau Delta's central purpose is to confer distinction for high achievement in English language, literature, and writing, and the organization is dedicated to fostering literacy and all aspects of the discipline of English. The Society offers its members tens of thousands of dollars in scholarships, internships, grants, and awards, as well as publication opportunities in its journals The Rectangle and The Sigma Tau Delta Review. Annually

198-719: A commencement speech entitled "A Left-handed Commencement Address" at Mills College in Oakland, California . It is listed as No. 82 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

297-565: 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 , to author Theodora Kroeber and anthropologist Alfred Louis Kroeber . 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

396-621: 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 pronouns for all sexually latent Gethenians in her 1995 short story "Coming of Age in Karhide", and in

495-592: A catastrophic global flood. 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 in science fiction. The story is set on the fictional planet of Gethen, whose inhabitants are ambisexual humans with no fixed gender identity , 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

594-511: 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

693-483: 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

792-622: A larger reality. —Ursula K. Le Guin Le Guin refused a Nebula Award for her story " The Diary of the Rose " in 1977, in protest at the Science Fiction Writers of America '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 , and said she felt reluctant to receive an award "for

891-555: 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

990-587: A member of the Phi Beta Kappa 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 , and earned a Master of Arts degree in French in 1952. Soon after, she began working towards a PhD , and won a Fulbright grant to continue her studies in France from 1953 to 1954. In 1953, while traveling to France aboard

1089-900: A minimum grade point average of 3.3 on a 4.0 scale. The Society organizes a convention every year in March, at which members present original fiction , poetry , critical essays , and personal non-fiction . Workshops and roundtable discussions are presented by members and guest experts. Attendees also hear keynote presentations and readings and attend workshops, Q&A sessions, and book signings by featured speakers such as Ursula K. Le Guin, Neil Gaiman, and Poets Laureate Kay Ryan and Natasha Trethewey. Recent international conventions have been held in St. Louis, MO (2010), Pittsburgh, PA (2011), New Orleans, LA (2012), Portland, OR (2013), Savannah, GA (2014), Albuquerque, NM (2015), Minneapolis, MN (2016), Louisville, KY (2017), Cincinnati, OH (2018), and St. Louis, MO (2019). At

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1188-403: A minimum of a B or equivalent grade point average in English and must rank at least in the highest 35 percent of their class in general scholarship. (Local chapters may raise, but not lower, these criteria.) Candidates for graduate membership must be enrolled in a graduate program in English or one of its specializations, have completed six semester hours of graduate work or the equivalent, and have

1287-495: 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

1386-488: 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. 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

1485-496: 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 ", particularly between scholars of children's literature and speculative fiction. Commentators have noted that

1584-474: 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 , and the couple moved to Portland, Oregon , 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

1683-471: A slave society. In 2000 she published The Telling , 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 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

1782-526: A story about political intolerance from a group that had just displayed political intolerance". Le Guin once said she was "raised as irreligious as a jackrabbit". She expressed a deep interest in Taoism and Buddhism , 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 . In December 2009, Le Guin resigned from

1881-511: A variety of work in the second half of the 1970s. This included speculative fiction 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 , a realistic novel for adolescents, as well as the collection Orsinian Tales and the novel Malafrena in 1976 and 1979, respectively. Though

1980-594: A younger audience. In 1985 she published the experimental work 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,

2079-462: Is affiliated with Sigma Tau Delta (the four-year university English honor society) and Sigma Kappa Delta (the two-year college English honor society). NEHS awards over $ 70,000 USD in scholarships annually. Ursula K. Le Guin Ursula Kroeber Le Guin ( / ˈ k r oʊ b ər l ə ˈ ɡ w ɪ n / KROH -bər lə GWIN ; née Kroeber ; October 21, 1929 – January 22, 2018)

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2178-430: Is an element in science fiction, it isn't the name of the game by any means. It is far too rationalist and simplistic to satisfy the imaginative mind, whether the writer's or the reader's. Variables are the spice of life. [If] you like you can read [a lot of] science fiction, as a thought-experiment. Let's say (says Mary Shelley) that a young doctor creates a human being in his laboratory; let's say (says Philip K. Dick) that

2277-433: Is available to students currently enrolled in four-year colleges and universities that have active chapters; applications are submitted through the student's local chapter. Candidates for undergraduate membership must have completed at least three semesters or five quarters of college work and a minimum of two college courses in English language or literature beyond the usual requirements in freshman English. They must also have

2376-653: 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 Elizabeth Grove Frazer , a children's book adapted from The Golden Bough , a study of myth and religion by her husband James George Frazer . She described living with her father's friends and acquaintances as giving her

2475-652: 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 ". 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

2574-501: Is one of the largest member organizations of the ACHS. Literary honor society Lambda Iota Tau went dormant in 2016-2017, with many members joining Sigma Tau Delta. Sigma Tau Delta is divided into six regions: Eastern, Far Western, High Plains, Midwestern, Southern, and Southwestern. Each region has three elected regional officials: a Regent, a Student Representative, and an Associate Student Representative. The Regents are voting members of

2673-568: 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

2772-503: Is the name given to a person upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname , the given name , or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth register may by that fact alone become the person's legal name . The assumption in the Western world is often that the name from birth (or perhaps from baptism or brit milah ) will persist to adulthood in

2871-419: Is the honor society for secondary school students excelling in the study of English Language & Literature, Creative Writing, Drama & Theater, Film & Media Studies, and Student Journalism. NEHS works with over 80,000 students worldwide each year, making it one of the largest secondary school honor societies in the world. It has a network of over 1,200 schools and 1,600 educators on six continents. NEHS

2970-461: Is the masculine form. The term née , having feminine grammatical gender , can be used to denote a woman's surname at birth that has been replaced or changed. In most English-speaking cultures, it is specifically applied to a woman's maiden name after her surname has changed due to marriage. The term né can be used to denote a man's surname at birth that has subsequently been replaced or changed. The diacritic mark (the acute accent ) over

3069-671: 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 in Georgia, and later at the University of Idaho , Le Guin taught French: first at Mercer University , then at the University of Idaho after their move. She also worked as

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3168-474: The Authors Guild 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 ; 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 Awards , Le Guin criticized Amazon and

3267-684: 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 , 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." Fortunately, though extrapolation

3366-550: 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

3465-534: The National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters . Le Guin influenced many other authors, including Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie , David Mitchell , Neil Gaiman , and Iain Banks . After her death in 2018, critic John Clute wrote that Le Guin had "presided over American science fiction for nearly half a century", while author Michael Chabon referred to her as

3564-456: The e is considered significant to its spelling, and ultimately its meaning, but is sometimes omitted. According to Oxford University 's Dictionary of Modern English Usage , the terms are typically placed after the current surname (e.g., " Margaret Thatcher , née Roberts" or " Bill Clinton , né Blythe"). Since they are terms adopted into English (from French), they do not have to be italicized , but they often are. In Polish tradition ,

3663-414: 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 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

3762-435: The "greatest American writer of her generation". Ursula Kroeber was born in Berkeley, California , on October 21, 1929. Her father, Alfred Louis Kroeber , was an anthropologist at the University of California, Berkeley . 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

3861-404: 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 " is described as a retelling of a Norse myth . The discipline of cultural anthropology had a powerful influence on Le Guin's writing. Her father Alfred Kroeber

3960-530: The 1976 edition of The Left Hand of Darkness . Several of her works have a premise drawn from sociology , psychology , or philosophy . 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

4059-413: The 2013 Convention in Portland, nearly 550 papers were presented and over $ 10,000 was awarded for student works presented at the convention. Another $ 60,000+ was awarded for various other scholarships and writing awards. This year's convention location is Las Vegas, NV (March 25-March 28, 2020). The National English Honor Society (NEHS) is sponsored by Sigma Tau Delta . The National English Honor Society

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4158-456: The Allies lost the second world war; let's say this or that is such and so, and see what happens... In a story so conceived, the moral complexity proper to the modern novel need not be sacrificed, nor is there any built-in dead end; thought and intuition can move freely within bounds set only by the terms of the experiment, which may be very large indeed. —Ursula K. Le Guin, in the introduction to

4257-588: The Board of Directors, which also includes the society President, Immediate Past President, Vice-President/President-Elect, Historian, Treasurer, and two Student Advisors. Serving the Board of Directors in a non-voting capacity are the Executive Director, Director of Communications and Chapter Development, Editor of Publications, Student Representatives, Alumni Representative, Web Facilitators, Business Manager, Project Coordinator, and NEHS Director. Student membership

4356-505: The Hainish universe released by the Library of America . Other works from this period included Lavinia (2008), based on a character from Virgil 's Aeneid , 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

4455-668: 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 , and explored themes of colonialism and militarism : 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

4554-536: The Mother, Animus, and Anima, have also been identified in Le Guin's writing. the planetary forests featured in multiple Hainish works are described as a metaphor for the mind, and of Jungian "collective unconscious. Philosophical Taoism 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

4653-584: 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. Once I learned to read, I read everything. I read all

4752-607: The Ritual and Owen the original constitution. The nascent Society adopted its current name in May 1924 , soon holding its first convention on April 3, 1925 - April 4, 1925 . At this first convention the first twelve chapters were installed, the insignia and regalia was formally adopted, and the Society's publication, The Rectangle was established. The society has grown swiftly through its first hundred years, having established over 850 chapters. It

4851-543: The Society provides an international convention, where over 1,000 students and faculty participate in scholarly and creative paper presentations, workshops, and roundtables, and hear featured speakers such as Ursula K. Le Guin , Neil Gaiman , and Poets Laureate Kay Ryan and Natasha Trethewey . Sigma Tau Delta also sponsors the National English Honor Society (NEHS), currently with over 600 chapters, which serves students and faculty in high schools throughout

4950-451: 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

5049-516: The Tombs with him. 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 , as well as from

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5148-558: The U.S. and abroad. The Society's central office is located at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb , Illinois . Sigma Tau Delta was founded on December 12, 1922 as the English Club of Dakota Wesleyan University in Mitchell, South Dakota. A group of professors developed a national constitution and ritual in preparation for expansion as a national organization, with Fadner contributing

5247-588: 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. 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 " in 1990. These stories included " Coming of Age in Karhide " (1995), which explored growing into adulthood and

5346-616: The control it exerted over the publishing industry, specifically referencing Amazon's treatment of the Hachette Book Group during a dispute over ebook publication . Her speech received widespread media attention within and outside the United States, and was broadcast twice by National Public Radio . Le Guin's first published work was the poem "Folksong from the Montayna Province" in 1959, while her first published short story

5445-472: The counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s. Le Guin has been credited with "[rescuing] 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 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

5544-607: 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",

5643-423: The experience of the other . 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 , and specifically by the idea of Jungian archetypes . In particular,

5742-400: The experimental work Always Coming Home (1985). Social and political themes, including race, gender, sexuality, and coming of age 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 " (1973) and the anarchist utopian novel The Dispossessed (1974). Le Guin's writing

5841-672: 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 and utopianism . Scholar Charlotte Spivack described it as representing a shift in Le Guin's science fiction towards discussing political ideas. Several of her speculative fiction short stories from

5940-696: The famous fantasies – Alice in Wonderland , and Wind in the Willows , and Kipling . I adored Kipling's Jungle Book . And then when I got older I found Lord Dunsany . He opened up a whole new world – the world of pure fantasy. And ... Worm Ouroboros . Again, pure fantasy. Very, very fattening. And then my brother and I blundered into science fiction when I was 11 or 12. Early Asimov , things like that. But that didn't have too much effect on me. It wasn't until I came back to science fiction and discovered Sturgeon – but particularly Cordwainer Smith . ... I read

6039-459: 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

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6138-580: The fictional country of Orsinia , several works for children, and many anthologies. Cultural anthropology , Taoism , feminism , and the writings of Carl Jung 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

6237-582: The genre as a child. Authors Le Guin describes as influential include Victor Hugo , William Wordsworth , Charles Dickens , Boris Pasternak , 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 as an homage to him. She also considered J. R. R. Tolkien and Leo Tolstoy to be stylistic influences, and preferred reading Virginia Woolf and Jorge Luis Borges to well-known science-fiction authors such as Robert Heinlein , whose writing she described as being of

6336-476: The late 1950s and achieved major critical and commercial success with A Wizard of Earthsea (1968) and The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), which have been described by Harold Bloom 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

6435-507: 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 , Bennington College , and Stanford University , among others. In May 1983, she delivered

6534-541: 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 was released, Le Guin wrote primarily for

6633-433: 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

6732-465: 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. Le Guin's next two books brought her sudden and widespread critical acclaim. A Wizard of Earthsea , published in 1968,

6831-435: 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 , driven partly by her disapproval for U.S. intervention in the Vietnam War . Birth name#Maiden and married names A birth name

6930-405: The normal course of affairs—either throughout life or until marriage. Some reasons for changes of a person's name include middle names , diminutive forms, changes relating to parental status (due to one's parents' divorce or adoption by different parents), and gender transition . The French and English-adopted née is the feminine past participle of naître , which means "to be born". Né

7029-586: The period, including her first published story, were later anthologized in the 1975 collection The Wind's Twelve Quarters . The fiction of the period 1966 to 1974, which also included The Lathe of Heaven , the Hugo Award-winning " The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas " and the Nebula Award-winning " The Day Before the Revolution ", constitutes Le Guin's best-known body of work. Le Guin published

7128-454: The portrayal of heterosexuality 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 [world], while women remain the still centre, the well from which they drink". Le Guin initially defended her writing; in

7227-405: 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. Le Guin explores coming of age , and moral development more broadly, in many of her writings. This

7326-473: The prince Arren, respectively. A Wizard of Earthsea is frequently described as a Bildungsroman , 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

7425-784: 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

7524-467: The shadow as a part of himself, as a rite of passage . 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

7623-462: 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

7722-690: 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 and Astounding Science Fiction . She

7821-417: The story " Alpha Ralpha Boulevard ", and it just made me go, "Wow! This stuff is so beautiful, and so strange, and I want to do something like that." —Ursula K. Le Guin 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 , and that she had sneered at

7920-441: 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,

8019-447: 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

8118-439: The world of Earthsea . These stories were largely ignored by critics. Ace Books released Rocannon's World , Le Guin's first published novel, in 1966. Two more Hainish novels, Planet of Exile and City of Illusions 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

8217-402: 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

8316-512: Was Ishi in Two Worlds (1961), a biographical volume about Ishi , an Indigenous American who had been studied by Alfred Kroeber. Ishi was the last known member of the Yahi tribe after the rest of its members died or (mostly) were killed by white colonizers. Le Guin had three older brothers: Karl , who became a literary scholar, Theodore, and Clifton. The family had a large book collection, and

8415-500: 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

8514-413: 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

8613-603: 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 as Le Guin's masterpieces. She won

8712-429: 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 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 ,

8811-562: 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 , and seven other stories followed in the next few years, in Fantastic or Amazing Stories . Among them were " The Dowry of Angyar ", which introduced the fictional Hainish universe , and " The Rule of Names " and " The Word of Unbinding ", which introduced

8910-558: Was an American author. She is best known for her works of speculative fiction , including science fiction works set in her Hainish universe , and the Earthsea fantasy series. Her work 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 , translations, and children's books. Frequently described as an author of science fiction, Le Guin has also been called

9009-437: 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

9108-463: 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

9207-491: 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-five Locus Awards , and in 2003 became the second woman honored as a Grand Master of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America . The U.S. Library of Congress named her a Living Legend in 2000, and in 2014, she won

9306-732: Was fond of myths and legends, particularly Norse mythology , and of Native American legends that her father would narrate. Other authors she enjoyed were Lord Dunsany and Lewis Padgett . 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 degree in Renaissance French and Italian literature from Radcliffe College of Harvard University in 1951, and graduated as

9405-563: Was likely she had had a heart attack . Private memorial services for her were held in Portland. A public memorial service, which included speeches by the writers Margaret Atwood , Molly Gloss , and Walidah Imarisha , was held in Portland on June 13, 2018. I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries – the realists of

9504-431: 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,

9603-471: 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 (2012), and The Hainish Novels and Stories , a two-volume set of works from

9702-500: 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

9801-651: 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

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