My first Urula Le Guin book! I really enjoyed this. I always like a good exploration of an alien culture, and in this case it doubles as an exploration of gender. The "aliens" in this book don't have gender, and the protagonist views this through a lens of our own culture. Sometimes he seems to have a fairly regressive view of gender, and I realise that is necessary to the narrative, but it can be a bit off putting.

I enjoy the way seemingly unconnected mythology chapters are woven into the story, which by the end turn out to be necessary for a complete understanding of the narrative. ( )

"Hate Orgoreyn? No, how should I? How does one hate a country, or love one? Tibe talks about it; I lack the trick of it. I know people, I know towns, farms, hills and rivers and rocks, I know how the sun at sunset in autumn falls on the side of a certain plowland in the hills; but what is the sense of giving a boundary to all that, of giving it a name and ceasing to love where the name ceases to apply? What is love of one’s country; is it hate of one’s uncountry? Then it’s not a good thing. Is it simply self-love? That’s a good thing, but one mustn’t make a virtue of it, or a profession… Insofar as I love life, I love the hills of the Domain of Estre, but that sort of love does not have a boundary-line of hate. And beyond that, I am ignorant, I hope."

I wasn't sure whether to give this a 4 or a 5 but I cried hard at the end so 5 it is. This is a novel about dualism, difference, friendship and nationalism. It is very little a novel about spaceships, although one forms the thread that binds the book together. The important part of the novel is a friendship between two people that's built up in the second half of the book. It's surprisingly affecting and touching and beautiful.

I feel I have to mention that the language used to talk about the people of Winter is often pretty gender essentialist, but it's all from the main character's perspective and it's clear it's his own problem that he sees female and male characteristics in genderless people. There's also a few mentions of sibling incest.

I imagine there's a lot to say about how Orgoryen is presented and the whole cold war theme between the two nations, but I'm not sure how to articulate it. I will say it kind of bothered me how the people of Orgoryen are presented sort of as passive/meek/obedient almost inherently. There are a couple of passages where it's mentioned and I don't like it much. But it's not a big thing at all.

One of the things that comes up is dualism.

Taoism is mentioned specifically by bringing up the ying-yang symbol, as well as through a fictional mystical system that has some similarities with it. I thought given the link I'd bring up one of my favourite poems "Legend of the Origin of the Book Tao-te-ching on Lao-Tsu's Road into Exile". It has a verse that says:

"He learnt how quite soft water, by attrition
over the years will grind strong rocks away.
In other words, that hardness must lose the day."

Which is a somewhat loose paraphrasing of a verse from the Tao-te-ching itself. It links to the plot of the book: the Ekumen deliberately behave softly and slowly, only sending 1 person to the planet at first and knowing it may take years to get results, after the 10s of years getting there in the first place. They know that eventually softness will win the day at spreading the idea of the community of planets. The story also has elements of that idea of action without action - reaching for goals in an indirect route, relying on intuition about the patterns in the world.

Walter Benjamin wrote a short commentary on the Brecht poem. A close friend of Brecht, he says what the poem says about friendship.

"First of all: friendliness is not dispensed without due forethought.
Secondly, friendliness does not consist in doing small things casually, but in doing the very greatest things as though they were the smallest.
Thirdly, we learn about friendliness that it does not abolish the distance between human beings but brings that distance to life."

The second point is something that comes up all the time in the book. I didn't know what the third point meant before, but in this book the main friendship is marked by it. A major point is when Ai learns to see the friend as something other than alternately "male" or "female" but as neither and more. His recognition of the difference and what sets them apart draws them closer. To be a friend is to recognise what is different. In a way, this is the whole plot of the book, both on the interpersonal level and on an interstellar one. The Ekumen is about acknowledging and respecting the differences between worlds and not imposing on them but building ties between them. Ai gives a short speech later in the book where he says

"Alone, I cannot change your world. But I can be changed by it. Alone, I must listen, as well as speak. Alone, the relationship I finally make, if I make one, is not impersonal and not only political: it is individual, it is personal, it is both more and less than political."

When we encounter difference, we change ourselves in response to it. The book is a story of growth through a single relationship and it's beautiful. ( )

Very good, not *too* scifiy (if you get my drift). The majority of it is a stranger in a strange land, being treated with fear and distrust, as he travels around a new planet in his role as envoy.

Very good, not *too* scifiy (if you get my drift). The majority of it is a stranger in a strange land, being treated with fear and distrust, as he travels around a new planet in his role as envoy.

2.5

I'm not sure I would go as far as to say this is a bad book, but I did not enjoy it. LeGuin's prose is very good here, but her plotting is not. The pages run dry. It took some time for me to finish this simply because I was so busy rehydrating.

There is a huge emphasis on world-building in The Left Hand of Darkness, and while I do not fault that aspect (or even any author who is able to construct and develop a world well), when it comes at the cost of everything else, it is a problem. The plot is minimal, spread thin over pages chiefly dedicated to exploring the geography and mythology of the world, and the politics and sexual nature of its inhabitants. The plot in question essentially revolves around a stranger to this world, an envoy, and his attempt to form an alliance between this alien planet and the epic, galactic hegemony he represents. While intriguing at first, his mission never really evolves and there seems to be little significance to any of the characters we meet beyond the first chapter. You could switch off for a good two thirds of the book and still have a good grasp of the central narrative, character motivations and general aspects of the world. Very little changes, and new information is sparse once we pass the halfway point and transition into a "journey home" type narrative.

The book alternates between the perspectives of two characters, which is a little confusing and not entirely needed. The wall between them setup by misunderstanding, miscommunication, different cultural perspectives and gender is probably the most prominent thing in the book, but for something that puts so much focus on characters and relationship, it is incredibly dull.

I'm not sure if I have accurately observed the thematic thrust, but feminism and Taoism are prominent in much of LeGuin's writing and I can see that here. The concept of a male human trying to connect with a race of beings neither male nor female (or both) seems to promote both gender equality and present an element of dualism. The fact that the book flip-flops between the perspective of two characters, and that one character even goes as close to the nose as to explain Taosim would suggest this also. The title, The Left Hand of Darkness, is in reference to Yin and Yang as well - light being the "left hand of darkness"; what we would normally see as a contrasting opposite is in fact an extension of the other. The two are meant to be joined in a mutually beneficial relationship; one cannot exist without the other. I don't ascribe to this worldview, but it often works well in fantasy.

So what else is there to say? At the end of the day, I did not find the story interesting, I did not find the characters interesting, I did not find the world interesting. The prose is nice, there are some good ideas, but it's not very well developed. Its dry, political nature and the bare-bones plot was unattractive to me, and it felt especially unfocused in the second half. It didn't get me to invest, and at a certain point I gave up trying to. ( )