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Worlds Of Exile And Illusion by Ursula le Guin (book review).

Unlike Amil El-Mahtar in her introduction, I have read ‘The Left Hand Of Darkness’ and ‘The Dispossessed’ and jumped at the opportunity to read the first three Hainish books. This volume ‘Worlds Of Exile And Illusion, contains these three novels by Ursula le Guin of her Hainish stories: ‘Rocannon’s World’, ‘Planet Of Exile’ and ‘City Of Illusions’.

I can understand LeGuin thinking elements of her books is mixing SF and fantasy and travelogue. Its very clear in ‘The Left Hand Of Darkness’ that she was using this technique further down the line. ‘Rocannon’s World’ was originally released in 1966. The planet is actually called Fomalhaut II and has three difference species, a couple of which demonstrate telekinesis. Technology-wise, they are around the bronze age development. The Hainish have been there, added a few things to their museum and only centuries later decided to go back.

The nearest Hainish planet is four years away at light speed and any visit means going back long after your people there have died. Hence, only one person is sent, Gaverel Rocannon, is sent on his own. He does have access to an Ansible to allow instantaneous communication and this is the first time its name and use is seen in print.

The story essentially follows his travels and is actually very low key, depending a lot on Le Guin’s ability with description and mood. Back 56 years ago, I suspect Le Guin was finding her way and had little to compare it to. The Hainish was also clearly in development and the focus was more on Fomalhaut II than the technology. What little we see of it is very high tech, enough for a primitive species to see as it magic although we aren’t really that privy to its limitations. Mind you, any time a protective suit can protect you from incineration it has to be pretty powerful.

Applying modern day story logistics, there are some inherent weaknesses in no significant events or anything that might have Rocannon might have learnt to change him from his experiences.

‘Planet Of Exile’ happens some time after ‘Rocannon’s World’ and some of its telepathic, an ability called mindspeak, black inhabitants have emigrated to Askatevar. The story is seen mostly through Rolery’s eyes and she marries Jakob Agat Alterra. I’m a little confused just how there is a civil war with the emigrants and local population and Le Guin doesn’t help herself by not re-enforcing what the problem is.

Bearing in mind, this novel was written in 1966, she was also still developing her Hainish ideas. Certainly, the Fomalhaut II people are more developed here than they were in her previous novel, indicating that she must have seen an area of weakness here. Bearing in mind that these emigrants are black, you do have to wonder if this was a thinly disguised racial colour issue even for its time period. If it is, it is very much under-played.

‘Worlds Of Exile’ follows similar lines, coming out in 1967. Objectively, Le Guin still looks like she’s finding her feet with the Hainish reality, this time giving some of the history of the colonisation of planets beyond the Solar System. Often, said planets had a delivery of colonists and the spacecraft returned home and forgot them or didn’t bother to go back.

You would have thought some bean-pusher would have been keeping accounts on the cost but it is Le Guin’s reality of some 55 years ago now and SF realities over several books was still mostly in its infancy and often made up along the way. Frank Herbert’s ‘Dune’ had some of this as well and was embellished in latter books to clarify details. This story is pretty much a speaking head story with very little going on until the end.

Developing any reality can become awkward and I tend to think Le Guin was groping for something to do in these early stories. You can’t dispute the fact that she wrote well but I think had I read them back then I would still have said it needs more plot to make them function. She obviously improved further down the line. Even so, this volume is a good way to get these books today.

GF Willmetts

April 2022

(pub: TOR Essential, 2022. 334 page enlarged paperback. Price: $19.99 (US), $26.99 (CAN), £15.38 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-250-78126-0)

check out website: www.tor-forge.com

UncleGeoff

Geoff Willmetts has been editor at SFCrowsnest for some 21 plus years now, showing a versatility and knowledge in not only Science Fiction, but also the sciences and arts, all of which has been displayed here through editorials, reviews, articles and stories. With the latter, he has been running a short story series under the title of ‘Psi-Kicks’ If you want to contribute to SFCrowsnest, read the guidelines and show him what you can do. If it isn’t usable, he spends as much time telling you what the problems is as he would with material he accepts. This is largely how he got called an Uncle, as in Dutch Uncle. He’s not actually Dutch but hails from the west country in the UK.

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