For more than four decades, Ursula K. Le Guin has enthralled readers with her imagination, clarity, and moral vision. The recipient of numerous literary prizes, including the National Book Award, the Kafka Award, and five Hugo and five Nebula Awards, this renowned writer has, in each story and novel, created a provocative, ever-evolving universe filled with diverse worlds and rich characters … characters reminiscent of our earthly selves. Now, in The Birthday of the World, this gifted artist returns to these worlds in eight brilliant short works, including a never-before-published novella, each of which probes the essence of humanity.
Here are stories that explore complex social interactions and troublesome issues of gender and sex; that define and defy notions of personal relationships and of society itself; that examine loyalty, survival, and introversion; that bring to light the vicissitudes of slavery and the meaning of transformation, religion, and history.
The first six tales in this spectacular volume are set in the author’s signature world of the Ekumen, “my pseudo-coherent universe with holes in the elbows,” as Le Guin describes it — a world made familiar in her award-winning novel The Left Hand of Darkness. The seventh, title story was hailed by Publishers Weekly as “remarkable . . . a standout.” The final offering in the collection, Paradises Lost, is a mesmerizing novella of space exploration and the pursuit of happiness.
In her foreword, Ursula K. Le Guin writes, “to create difference-to establish strangeness-then to let the fiery arc of human emotion leap and close the gap: this acrobatics of the imagination fascinates and satisfies me as no other.” In The Birthday of the World, this gifted literary acrobat exhibits a dazzling array of skills that will fascinate and satisfy us all.
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This is a collection of speculative fiction short stories, and while I usually don’t read short stories (almost never), I found all of these extremely compelling. Every story is set somewhere within her larger universe of planets and societies that is basically her playground to explore human nature. Each society resembles our own in some ways, but is drastically, crucially different in others. She turns gender roles and cultural institutions like marriage completely on their heads. Her writing is beautiful and powerful, but more importantly, the stories make you question many things we take for granted about our lives, and encourage you to consider the subjectivity of your own perspective.
Is there anyone else writing whose work seems so effrotless? I don’t think so. LeGuin makes writing seem wonderful and easy. Granted, you have to like alternative fiction. LeGuin’s fiction isn’t about “science” so much as other possible worlds that somewhat resemble ours if turned 90 degrees in one direction or another.
This book is a series of stories loosely connected by a civilization she has created, but they probe the human situation better than more realistic ficiton, touching on the heart of how human beings live with each other.
I find “Old Music and the Slave Woman” persistently haunting me because it takes the reader to the heart of human relations. It was the finest of several pieces that do that.
Brilliant!
Few authors are as good as Ursula LeGuin in setting up a premise and following it through to explore all of its unforeseen consequences. The generation ship story “Paradises Lost” was especially insightful in its depiction of lost linguistic understanding when it is not supported by everyday experience. The only thing that kept me from giving 5 stars is that a few of the stories left me hanging without a satisfying resolution.
LeGuin can be challenging, but in general I appreciate her ability to pull us into the society and world she imagines.
entertaining, but not as good as her other works I’ve read.
I haven’t read Ursula K. LeGuin in years and it was a treat to experience her prose again.
On all the different ways of being human…
It took me a few pages to get into it, but I loved every word. There is an ease with which Ursula Le Guin writes, words cascade or tumble or simply follow one another in just the way they should. While these stories are written about worlds that are far from ours, all characters are deeply human. I was left thinking about the various people of Le Guin’s imagination in the middle of the night when I couldn’t sleep — the stories stay with you.
“Left Hand of Darkness” was one of the first books I read in English. As such, what kind of impression can it really leave? But I still have that copy of the paperback, proudly on my shelf, over 40 years since. I loved it. But perhaps just as much as I loved “Don Quixote” when I read it as a twelve-going-on-thirteen-year-old. What did that kid really understand of the mid-life crisis of an aging man from a different culture? Yet, I loved it still.
Some books help us become better humans. Some authors write such books. Ursula Le Guin is one of those. Read the book, you won’t be disappointed.
Very good set of stories that give you a different angle on life. The stories are character driven and they are how the views and Moore’s of society are shown.
Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the best, ever. She always looked at the human condition from about thirty degrees off, pointing out absurdities and similarities.
Just read it.
Strange stories, even for sci-fi.
Found it tedious and repetitive from story to story. Disappointed as I have enjoyed previous works by the author.
Read a few of the short stories…she is creative…just didn’t interest me much.
This is vintage Le Guin.
Poorly done. I was disappointed in the author’s attempt to tell a story. I would not recommend this book. It is neither interesting nor stimulating in any way.
Plods too much, too much emphasis on sex.
Such depth…Le Guin can always be counted on to make one think…and feel. Great stuff!
Wonderful storytelling.
provocative, creative, well-written