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A review by whatsheread
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
slow-paced
3.5
THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS is my first experience with Ursula K. Le Guin. She is my son's favorite author, and he presented me with this particular novel for Christmas. He felt it was the one that was closest to reflecting some of my values. Now that I've finished at least one Le Guin novel, I am not sure she is the author for me.
THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS starts slowly. While the intention is for it to sound like a travel brochure, it doesn't make for the most engaging of reads. Our main narrator, Genly Ai, is self-centered, misogynistic, and pompous. As his eyes provide our only look at the perpetually frozen planet Gethen and its inhabitants, his biases have a way of sneaking into your subconscious, as do his deliberate or unintentional cultural misunderstandings.
The first half of the novel contains nothing but his commentary on Winter's population and is told in such dry language that it took all my effort to stay awake while reading. Plus, for someone who was sent to the planet as an observer and to entice the natives to join the planetary collective, Ai proves to be less observant and a lot more judgemental than he should be. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Ai's refusal to accept the ambisexuality and complete lack of gender roles that are the hallmark of Gethenians.
While THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS is somewhat of a philosophical experiment regarding gender roles' impact on society, the experiment suffers specifically because of Ai's biases affecting his observations. Ai does not attempt to understand a society without gender norms. He continues to categorize those Gethenians he meets as either female or male. And because he has such a rigid, archaic idea of female gender roles, those categorizations immediately impact how he interacts with others. We can only surmise that the Gethenians' lack of war or sex crimes is a direct result of their gender fluidity. There is not enough concrete evidence to support this hypothesis, and all Ai provides is a continued opinion that becoming war-like would promote the Gethenians to a more advanced race.
Once the story becomes less a travelogue and more an actual story, complete with action and adventure, THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS improves in readability and enjoyment. I particularly enjoyed those few chapters told through Estravan's point of view. Not only did it give me a break from Ai's one-sidedness, but those chapters also helped solidify some of the cultural differences Ai was trying to explain.
I can't say that I enjoyed THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS, but I can appreciate what Ms. Le Guin was trying to accomplish with it. In many ways, the novel feels prescient as discussions of gender fluidity and transgender continue to dominate politics today. For me, however, the novel is too philosophical, too esoteric for my tastes. I like escapist fiction, and at least half of THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS is not escapist at all. It demands your undivided attention while reading and dedicated analysis after reading. My son loves that sort of thing. I prefer to read something a lot less intellectual.
THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS starts slowly. While the intention is for it to sound like a travel brochure, it doesn't make for the most engaging of reads. Our main narrator, Genly Ai, is self-centered, misogynistic, and pompous. As his eyes provide our only look at the perpetually frozen planet Gethen and its inhabitants, his biases have a way of sneaking into your subconscious, as do his deliberate or unintentional cultural misunderstandings.
The first half of the novel contains nothing but his commentary on Winter's population and is told in such dry language that it took all my effort to stay awake while reading. Plus, for someone who was sent to the planet as an observer and to entice the natives to join the planetary collective, Ai proves to be less observant and a lot more judgemental than he should be. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Ai's refusal to accept the ambisexuality and complete lack of gender roles that are the hallmark of Gethenians.
While THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS is somewhat of a philosophical experiment regarding gender roles' impact on society, the experiment suffers specifically because of Ai's biases affecting his observations. Ai does not attempt to understand a society without gender norms. He continues to categorize those Gethenians he meets as either female or male. And because he has such a rigid, archaic idea of female gender roles, those categorizations immediately impact how he interacts with others. We can only surmise that the Gethenians' lack of war or sex crimes is a direct result of their gender fluidity. There is not enough concrete evidence to support this hypothesis, and all Ai provides is a continued opinion that becoming war-like would promote the Gethenians to a more advanced race.
Once the story becomes less a travelogue and more an actual story, complete with action and adventure, THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS improves in readability and enjoyment. I particularly enjoyed those few chapters told through Estravan's point of view. Not only did it give me a break from Ai's one-sidedness, but those chapters also helped solidify some of the cultural differences Ai was trying to explain.
I can't say that I enjoyed THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS, but I can appreciate what Ms. Le Guin was trying to accomplish with it. In many ways, the novel feels prescient as discussions of gender fluidity and transgender continue to dominate politics today. For me, however, the novel is too philosophical, too esoteric for my tastes. I like escapist fiction, and at least half of THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS is not escapist at all. It demands your undivided attention while reading and dedicated analysis after reading. My son loves that sort of thing. I prefer to read something a lot less intellectual.