The literary genius Ursula K. Le Guin is not only one of the esteemed foremothers of the current speculative renaissance in publishing and Hollywood, she is also one of the most brilliant and captivating authors of the past century in any genre. One of my favorite aspects of Le Guin’s stories is that her treatment of race and racial differences stands sentinel over most of her white contemporaries, attesting to the prescience, power, and enduring significance of her work. Together with fellow Hugo and Nebula award winner Octavia E. Butler, she redefined the boundaries of her genre, sparking a transformation in speculative fiction that points to our current era of narrative representation, challenging who deserves to be seen, heard, and represented in the fantastic, and ultimately giving birth to our wide-ranging landscape of contemporary speculative fiction.
In Le Guin’s stories, children and childhood often take center stage. In this video, we learn how her own childhood shaped the writer she became. I find many resonances across time and amid our differences: being an avid reader in a home filled with books and storytelling, cultivating a love for folklore, sharing playtimes and stories with siblings, casting stuffed animals and toys as characters in our first forays into fairylands. The role that her own childhood played in her writer’s journey surely is part and parcel of the resonances that her stories have for readers from all kinds of backgrounds. Her deep concern about children is evident, as well as her respect for their freedom and autonomy, including in one of her most well-known short stories, “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.”
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