In the Tombs of Atuan, Arha spends over a decade serving as high priestess in the dark temples of the Nameless Ones. The Tao Te Ching mentions names and nameless occasionally, and usually nameless is seen as the ideal. Names are human constructions, but they are not true or eternal. “The name you can say [...]
Archive for September, 2007
The Nameless Ones
Posted in Earthsea on September 29, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
The danger of a definition (or more Taoist babbling)
Posted in Taoism on September 28, 2007 | 1 Comment »
More on the duality of good & evil. I understand how action is dangerous – an action can have both good and bad consequences. I understand how abilities are dangerous – a person with the capacity to do good also has the capacity to do evil. But defining good is also seen as a reinforcement [...]
Power and Emptiness
Posted in Uncategorized on September 21, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
I think I’m starting to realize why LeGuin dislikes power. It’s not just that the ability to do good goes hand-in-hand with the ability to do evil. Power also takes a personal toll on the one who wields it. Under Taoism you can only take as much as you give, and so everything has a [...]
LeGuin and the Golden Rule
Posted in Uncategorized on September 20, 2007 | Leave a Comment »
“Do not do to other what you would wish others not to do to you.” -Alien to Dr. Haber in The Lathe of Heaven
Most religions and philosophies have some variation on the idea of reciprocity. The Christian version we were all taught in preschool reads, “Do unto others as you would have them do to [...]
LeGuin and the anticlimatic plot (*spoiler alert*)
Posted in plot on September 20, 2007 | 4 Comments »
It seems that a crucial part of LeGuin’s work is the unresolved, or thoroughly undramatic, ending. The best example of this would be City of Illusions, where the main character manages to resist the government’s numerous attempts to brainwash him, discovers his true identity and returns to his homeworld to try to persuade his people to [...]
Hello world!
Posted in Uncategorized on September 7, 2007 | 1 Comment »
Welcome to the home of all my English theses thoughts for the next eight months. I’m a sci-fi geek, so I picked up Ursula K. LeGuin because I figured that was the only way I could swallow a 60-plus page research paper without wanting to shoot myself in the foot afterwards. As it is, maybe I’ll just cut [...]
