My god, what a book. It took me a good while to get into it and it was a slow burn, but I couldn’t put it down after a while, and it moved me deeply. What a beautiful and thought-provoking read.
I am particularly impressed by Le Guin’s masterful way of playing with perception through clever perspective-switching. You start off thinking Genly Ai is a reliable narrator and a good guy. It’s even easy to overlook his pretty blatant misogyny. Then slowly you realise his perspective is incredibly limited and limiting, and he is frequently just plain wrong or self-sabotaging. This takes the book from a simple hero’s journey to a much more complex and interesting reflection on culture, communication and the (im)possibility of understanding one another. I loved it, but it’s also a pretty challenging read that I imagine isn’t for everyone. I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on it.
Also, this was my first Le Guin - what should I read next?
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