A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA

[lunabee34]

thelastgoodname and I are once again reading kid lit--this time Ursula K. LeGuin's Wizard of Earthsea series.

SPOILERS FOR A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA

On the whole I did not enjoy this book. It was too interior of the mind, too devoid of human relationships, too bereft of dialogue. I have realized that when too many pages go by without dialogue, I start to get BORED! Also, the lack of chicks in this books is super annoying.

I liked the emphasis on and significance of names. I liked pretty much every part when Ged was speaking to and interacting with other people (or even creatures) but those were too few and too far between. I think the last three pages of the book were my absolute favorite because he and Vetch were, you know, DOING STUFF and TALKING TO EACH OTHER.

I honestly have nothing to say about this book other than, "I read it."


I've finished the next book, The Tombs of Atuan, and I have much to say about it, so the series does get better, thank goodness.

Comments

[thelastgoodname.livejournal.com]

I would have loved to read Ged as female, or at least gender-neutral. But she goes to such lengths to insist that no women are ever wizards and witches are basically frauds that I can't quite imagine how this is going to play out in the later books. If I thought she were doing it as social commentary, I'd feel a lot better. But I don't think that's it at all.

We're completists, so we're going the whole way, regardless; we read all the Dark Is Rising books, even though neither of us was particularly enthused, for some of the same reasons. If Harry Potter has nothing else going for it, at least it has this: there are women, smart women, powerful women, women who could be heroes. And more than one, even! I got a book of short stories, too, which evidently has a few Earthsea stories, so we'll see how those go, too.

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

This must mean you've posted on Tombs.

Yay!

*goes to see*

Also, I just finished the Great Tag Redo of Aught Eight. It took a long time, but my tags are finally in order and *useful*.

[thelastgoodname.livejournal.com]

I get my own tag! And this is how I discover that we were supposed to be reading L'Engle. We were? Oops. I clearly totally dropped that ball. I'm very sorry. Next? (Or, no, you had something else in mind, right?)

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

Heeeeeee. Of course you get your own tag. :)

I think what happened with the L'Engle is that we read the first one and then either you or I got busy and we kinda just forgot about finishing it. If you want to go back to it, we can or I'm cool with forging ahead and doing something else if you'd rather.

[jadelennox]

(Lunabee, hi, poking in my head from tlg's place)

Oh, trust me, it's social commentary. And she recants her previous political philosophy with every book! Tombs was a reaction to gender in Wizard, and at the time, was reasonably feminist. When you're done with the series, you might want to read some of her commentary on it, which is fascinating stuff.

[thelastgoodname.livejournal.com]

Social commentary with hindsight, or intentionally from the start? If, as you say, Tehanu was a response to Tombs, then she's growing as she's writing (which is great for her as a person and a writer, but less so for a reader reading the books in one go).

And yeah, Tombs was exactly what I would have expected from the time and the person (in a good way).

[jadelennox]

I think when she wrote Tombs, she was bringing female protagonists intentionally into an all male world, and she did it in a way which made sense at the time. Years later, she looked back at her own strange attempts at gender politics and was appalled, and that comes out in Tehanu. So yes, it's weird for the reader reading in one go.

It's strange for me, because she became much more of a gender feminist than I am. But reading the books as the development of a writer is fascinating to me. As opposed to when I was little and was just thrilled to have Tenar at all (in those pre-Tamora Peirce pre-Robin McKinley days, when Tenar was the best we got).

[lunabee34.livejournal.com]

*waves*

Hi. :)

I think I will check out the commentary. That sounds interesting to me.