This was VERY MUCH a case of me being the wrong reader for this book. I think I went in expecting something a bit fluffier -- Le Guin gets fairly scholarly/serious here, Freud and Jung are mentioned numerous times throughout these essays! Tolkien and/or LOtR pop up in nearly every essay as well.

When the essays were good, they were great, otherwise I found it extremely difficult to remain focused and wound up skimming a bit. I really enjoyed Why Are Americans Afraid of Dragons?, an essay looking into why fantasy is written off as explicitly for children in the US vs other countries; her thoughts on language in fantasy novels ("You don't have to talk like Henry the Fifth to be a hero."); and her essay on the 'other' in science-fiction ("The people, in SF, are not people. They are masses, existing for one purpose: to be led by their superiors.")

I really wanted to love this one more than I did. I'm positive other readers will get far more out of it!

LeGuin's thoughtful and insightful essays on writing stand the test of time, Three decades after the original publication, they are enhanced by the introduction by Ken Liu, contextualizing her thoughts through an informed perspective that acknowledges the changing landscape of speculative fiction writers and readers.

A newly issued edition of Ursula Le Guin’s classic collection of essays, The Language of the Night, is focused on what makes good fantasy and science fiction writing. I’d read excerpts of some of these essays over the years with the original booking being out of print, so it was a pleasure to revisit them in full. A must-read for writers and readers of fantasy and science fiction.

Thank you SO MUCH to NetGalley and Scribner for my egalley in exchange for my honest opinion.

So, I already love Le Guin and her works. I've read most of her corpus and am still making my way through a few novella collections. All that is to say that I think this revised edition of a previously released book is going to be perfect for lovers of writing, science fiction, fantasy, and (or) Le Guin. The new introduction by Ken Liu did a brilliant job of bringing me right into the "right mood" to jump into this collection of Le Guin's essays. I also happen to love Ken Liu and his speculative fiction, so seeing him introduce this edition and speak to Le Guin's influence felt really serendipitous to read as a Liu and Le Guin lover. After Liu's introduction, we get Le Guin's introduction to the reprint of the original collection, and then finally the introduction to the original 1979 edition by Susan Woods. I loved reading Le Guin's own thoughts on her works and it was lovely reading Susan Woods' kind words.

After the trio of introductions, we have selection of Le Guin's essays from 1973-1977 (her early period) and ruminations on the beginnings of science fiction writings and its evolution as a genre to its eventual acceptance as a legitimate literary genre. She also discusses some of the early science fiction pioneers that brought a seriousness to the genre that led to its literary legitimacy. It was so wildly interesting! I had taken a survey Science Fiction and Fantasy course during my community college days and Le Guin and some of the authors she had discussed were covered in that course, so it felt very cool to read Le Guin's own thoughts on them. And I also felt a bit smarter than usual for recognizing so many of the pioneers and stories. Le Guin writes with such eloquence and her voice is just so engaging. It really kept reminding me of why she's one of my favorite writers and why she's so renowned.

We then have some introductions to Le Guin's novels like Rocannon's World, Planet of Exile, City of Illusions, The Word for World is Forest, and The Left Hand of Darkness. I am still working my way through the Hainish Cycle, and I've really only read The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed. I've started The Word for World is Forest SO MANY times but have just gotten distracted by school and life. So for me, this particular section was really interesting and cool to read. It's definitely inspired me to try and carve some time out to finish the Hainish Cycle all the way through.

The final two sections are more of Le Guin's essays but these explore her writing and her own writer's journey. Again, Le Guin's voice is so recognizable and the way she speaks about the process of writing is so interesting. I would have loved to take a writing class with her as I think it would have really changed my writing for the better. There's also a lot of theory that she goes into and yet somehow, unlike my literary theory course where I literally call myself a dum dum every meeting, I understood what she was referencing. And even more surprising, I understood the theory from how she wrote about it. I mean, Le Guin just seems like she would have been such a challenging and brilliant teacher and these sections really emphasize that.

I loved reading this and yeah, it's A LOT but my god, it will make you a better reader and a better writer.

We’ve all seen it before: An author signs a six-figure book deal for their debut novel. It’s in all the headlines, and their face is suddenly all over the place. The novel is a hit, topping the bestseller lists, and while it is another case of a book that is just three tropes in a trenchcoat, the Strong Female main character is so sassy, or the Main Male Love Interest is so handsome or so heroic that no one really cares because, like movie theater popcorn, it’s so easy to consume. Then, the author takes those same three tropes, adjusts the trenchcoat a little, and writes a new book featuring, essentially, the same characters with different names. They publish five, ten, fifteen more books like this until the reading public finally twigs to the fact that they’ve been buying the same story over and over again and stop buying it. The popcorn has grown stale. Maybe it was always stale, but there was enough butter and enough salt that the staleness went unnoticed. Or maybe people realized it was stale, and just kept buying the next book because it was a known quantity, and they didn’t want to take a risk on something different.

Throughout her long career as a writer and critic, Ursula K. Le Guin was never fooled by an abundance of butter or salt. If she thought a book was stale, she called it out for being so and demanded better– from writers, from publishers, and from readers themselves. For decades, she warned that publishers would take the easy way out and publish books that would be easy to sell thanks to shallow plots and easy-to-like stock characters. In her 2014 speech to the National Book Foundation, Le Guin declared that we would need “writers who know the difference between production of a market commodity and the practice of an art”. Some ten years later, we still need more of those writers who understand what makes a story that will touch readers’ hearts and souls, and fewer of those writers who write for the market while they chase dreams of topping the bestseller lists.

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“When art shows only how and what, it is trivial entertainment, whether optimistic or despairing. When it asks why, it rises from mere emotional response to real statement, and to intelligent ethical choice. It becomes, not a passive reflection, but an act.

And that is when all the censors, of the government and of the marketplace, become afraid of it.

-Ursula K. Le Guin, ‘Privilege, Paranoia, Passivity’ from ‘The Stalin in the Soul, 1973-77’”

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The Language of the Night is a collection of Le Guin’s essays and reviews first published in 1979. It was republished in 1992 with annotations and a new introduction by Le Guin where she plainly states that she had changed and grown quite a bit since the 1960s and 70s, and that she looks back at some of the things she wrote– particularly the 1976 essay, ‘Is Gender Necessary?’-- and cringed at her earlier words. To her credit, she refused to change the essays. She simply added notes to show where she’d changed her mind about this or that. If only more authors were so willing to admit it when they were wrong about something, own their old words, and explain how they’ve changed their minds.

This upcoming reissue of The Language of the Night features a new introduction by Ken Liu, in which he lays out the context of Le Guin’s approach to criticism and her willingness to converse with her own work across the decades of her career. He also points out her desire for both authors and readers to refuse the trivialization of art. Sure, we read for entertainment to escape the anxieties of our lives for a little while, but if stories are food for the mind, what does it mean if we force our minds to subsist on a diet of stale movie theater popcorn and cheap candy? 

Though some of the book reviews are for titles that are rarely read by people in this part of the twenty-first century, Le Guin’s words regarding the genres of science fiction and fantasy remain evergreen. Geek culture may be the hottest thing on the market right now, but getting “serious readers and writers” to regard science fiction and fantasy as important in their own right is as difficult as ever. It doesn’t help when yet another rushed superhero film comes out in theaters, or another shoddily-conceived sexy fantasy novel surges to the top of the bestseller list. 

But there are speculative stories out there that are more than mere marketing ploys with pretty covers. It might take some effort, and it might take some bravery on the reader’s part to look away from the shiny covers, dig deep, and find something that is fresh- regardless of its age- and true, but it is worth it to find a story that speaks to our shared humanity without insulting it, and reawakens that childlike wonder we thought we’d left behind long ago. Trying new things can be hard, but it’s the kind of work that is worth the effort. It is never a bad thing to find something good and true.

This new edition of The Language of the Night will be available May 14, 2024. Thank you to Net Galley and Scribner for an advance copy of the ebook. The free book did not affect my review.

“I write science fiction because that is what publishers call my books. Left to myself, I should call them novels.” Le Guin’s voice is unlike anyone I have ever read before. It was refreshing and honest, and it directly spoke to my inner child, my muse, and the shadow that fuels my imagination and tells my stories.

Reading the insightful point of view from a master fantasy writer like Ken Liu in the introduction, helped to contextualize the merit and gravity of Le Guin’s work. Having read The Grace of Kings and now The Language of the Night, I can see Le Guin's influence on Ken’s writing. It was nice to see his words come full circle and pay respect to someone who had influenced and encouraged him to write. May we all be so lucky to honor our mentors someday with an introduction as witty and kind as his.

Anyone who reads this collection will put the book down with the courage to look inside themselves, find the shadow, and allow it to lead their words into a brand-new world of adventure and discovery.

“If the imagination is nurtured, however, each person can become a truly mature adult: ‘not a dead child, but a child who survived’.” Le Guin cites her motivations as “the desire […] to inspire readers to intelligent responses, and to awaken writers to a ‘sense of responsibility’.” Read The Language of the Night, and you will understand the meaning of both quotes and will be a better reader and writer for it.

The Language of the Night by Ursula K. Le Guin

NetGalley ebook in exchange for honest review

I found this reprint of the original collection of essays first published in 1979 to be a wonderful introduction to the writings of Ursula Le Guin. These essays covered a primarily her thoughts on writing both her own and that of others in this genre and how she sees and understands this field of literature. The second section contain introductions by the author to several of her novels would be most helpful if a reader was looking for a place to start reading one of her works. The analysis of the writing process in general I found quite inspirational and might make one inclined to pick up a pen and write as Le Guin encourages and inspires so readily in these essays.

This is the reprint with some new additions of a book first published in 1979. I love the writing of Le Guin and read many of her books, including the original of this during the 1980’s. Le Guin has long had a reputation as one of the important female writers of science fiction and early fantasy. This book contains twenty-four of her essays about her writing of science fiction, both the content, ideas and introductions to various novels and addresses she gave at conferences of writers and fans.

“We like to think we live in daylight but half the world is always dark, and fantasy, like poetry, speaks to the language of the night”. Ursula K. Le Guin

This reprint begins with several introductions. First an introduction to this volume by Ken Liu, then an introduction by Le Guin to the reprint of the original from 1989 and then an introduction to original book done by Susan Wood in 1979. This is a lot of introductions and analysis of Le Guin’s writing by others and I found myself being a bit anxious to get on to Le Guin’s own words.
The first essays by Le Guin cover her early days of writing from 1973-1977. These I felt were some of the best about the early days of science fiction writing, the pulp magazines, the evolution and acceptance of the genre and some writers that were the early pioneers of taking these stories up a notch and giving them a literary legitimacy that had been absent. The second section of the book was a compilation of introductions to many of Le Guin’s novels including Rocannon’s World, Planet of Exile, City of Illusions, The Word for World is Forest, and the Left Hand of Darkness. The fourth and fifth sections return to essays Le Guin wrote about her writing and the evolution of her own writing.
I felt this is a book for primarily for people who have a strong interest in science fiction and fantasy and maybe interested in exploring the idea of writing in the genre. There is a strong historical coverage of this genre by one of its greats and contains much interesting analysis of the genre. Le Guin talks of her interest in the social side of science fiction, she stays away from heavy machinery and looks more at how humans in a fantasy or future world might exist or adjust. Her worlds regardless of the planet or type of environment look at how humans might exist, adapt, and live. She places humans and occasional robots in imaginative worlds with rules all their own. A prime example of this would be her essay on the Left Hand of Darkness entitled “Is Gender Necessary” in which she discusses the genderless world, a type of thought experiment that she explored in the created world of this novel.
While much of this writing is over 50 years old I found it still most relevant and with the explosion in this genre in recent times says much about a field of writing that is certainly coming into its own.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC of The Language of the Night: Essays on Writing, Science Fiction, and Fantasy by Ursula K. Le Guin!

As someone who has been exploring the discourse of science fiction, this book was an incredibly insightful read. This is a collection of some of Le Guin's writings, and it is such an honor to be able to review her work. My first Le Guin book was The Left Hand of Darkness and I was captivated by both her world building and her literary style. Her ability to convey aspects of the human condition through a science fiction universe is incredibly unique.
This book provides such great insight into her thinking and her evolution as an author. It puts together all her key work in one accessible medium, and serves as a summary of her "philosophy" as a writer. It's so obvious that so much of her writing and her character is build around psychological and spiritual theories (Jungian, Taoism) and so much of it shapes her writing. Often it is easy to forget the author behind the stories, but this highlights how Le Guin shapes her writing, and also how her writing has shaped the genre of science fiction.
I definitely recommend it to those who want to learn how to be more wholistic science fiction authors and readers.
This book release is near my birthday and I plan on getting a hard copy to add to my collection.
Once again, thank you for the ARC!

Firstly - Thank you to NetGalley for this opportunity to read and review The Language of the Night: Essays on Writing, Science Fiction, and Fantasy by Ursula K. Le Guin

I first learned of Ursula K. Le Guin in one of my Anthropology courses and immediately fell in love with her work. So, as soon as I saw The Language of the Night on NetGalley I knew I had to request it. I was floored, excited and felt so honored when the request was approved. Her work always inspires me and really makes me think and this collection of essays did not disappoint. One of my favorite things is Ursula K. Le Guin acknowledges her evolution as an author and human and isn’t afraid to say she was wrong or that her beliefs have changed. That is such a rarity in today’s society and is so refreshing to see. While I don’t have too much experience with the science fiction genre, I feel that there is still so much wisdom to be gained and applied to my own life and writing journey.

Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for a review.

I've not read a lot of Le Guin, and what a shame. I loved reading this book, and absorbing her wisdom and talent. My only downside was that there were too many introductions! You can definitely skip a couple. The chapters themselves were so well written and perfect for anyone who wants to be a writer or appreciates writing. Definitely adding more writing by Le Guin to my TBR.

Le Guin’s sharp and witty voice is on full display in this collection of twenty-four essays, revised by the author a decade after its initial publication in 1979. The collection covers a wide range of topics and Le Guin’s origins as a writer, her advocacy for science fiction and fantasy as mediums for true literary exploration, the writing of her own major works such as A Wizard of Earthsea and The Left Hand of Darkness, and her role as a public intellectual and educator. The book and each thematic section are brilliantly introduced and contextualized by Susan Wood, a professor at the University of British Columbia and a literary editor and feminist activist during the 1960s and ’70s.

This is a wonderful book! It was well written and gave great advice for writing and life in general. I highly recommend!

Okay, I’m gonna level with you: I had long loved the original book and dreamed of an eBook version. So I was pretty much going to love the book even before it appeared on my screen, and I do. Ursula K. Le Guin is the grand-dame of science fiction and fantasy, a title she well deserves. I have only dipped my toe into her works, but I look forward to reading more.

Ursula K. Le Guin was once one of my favorite thinkers. Her book "The Left Hand of Darkness" changed the way I thought about sexuality and gender. For that I am eternally grateful. This book of essays is full of mostly past writings and gives insights into how she formed her philosophy of Science Fiction. There is no doubt that Le Guin was a pioneer in bringing us into the new age of literature that made Science Fiction legitimate. Some of the "Introductions" by other writers seem to be superfluous, but the "Introductions" written by Le Guin herself are interesting and show her wit.

Excellent re-issued collection of essays by the pre-eminent speculative fiction author. They range from criticism, on writing, and on the genre. Will be ordering for my library, for certain.

Exploring "The Language of the Night" was, for me, an intellectual journey marked by both fascination and occasional perplexity. The richness of Ursula K. Le Guin's essays and critiques revealed a mind that effortlessly navigated diverse topics, from her personal background to profound reflections on fantasy and science fiction. As a writer with a learning disability, I found her ability to articulate complex ideas both inspiring and challenging.

Le Guin's talent was evident not only in her renowned science fiction works but also in her critical analyses, showcasing a depth of intellect and creativity that transcended the boundaries of a specific genre. Reading through the collection, I realized that her contributions to literature extended far beyond what I had initially known of her--just that she wrote the Earthsea books.

The distinctiveness of Le Guin's voice in the literary world became increasingly apparent as I encountered passages that demanded careful consideration. While some sections flowed seamlessly, others required a more deliberate and focused approach, a testament to the depth of her thoughts and the layers within her writing.

The multiple introductions to the collection were a source of confusion for me. The complexity of these introductory sections left me grappling with their significance, though I couldn't help but appreciate the effort to cater specifically to American readers in the reprint. This intentional approach to broaden accessibility to Le Guin's work, urging readers to study her writings for a more profound understanding of the craft, struck a chord with me.

One aspect of Le Guin's reflections that resonated strongly was her examination of her writing career from a male perspective. It was disheartening to learn that early in her career, she was narrowly perceived as solely a science fiction writer, only to be later recognized for her broader literary merit. This kind of validation, while appreciable, revealed the biases and challenges faced by even the most talented writers. The acknowledgment, in retrospect, felt like a backhanded compliment, underlining the pervasive gender biases in the literary world.

Beyond these challenges, I found Le Guin to be a progressive, dynamic, and remarkably unique writer. Her preference for spending most of her free time immersed in contemplation and creation rather than conforming to societal expectations was both admirable and relatable. It highlighted her commitment to the essence of writing as a form of profound expression and exploration.

In conclusion, my exploration of "The Language of the Night" not only deepened my appreciation for Ursula K. Le Guin's literary legacy but also prompted reflections on the broader challenges faced by writers, particularly those who defy conventional expectations. Le Guin's work encourages us to look beyond labels and appreciate the nuanced brilliance that transcends genres, making her a pivotal figure in the landscape of literature.

I'm an author, and this has been such an interesting book to dig into. I love that there are multiple forwards, told through the years and the various editions of the book. I write more commercial fiction, and the discussion around art vs commerce really made me think. This is a very different type of book on writing, and I think a necessary addition to an author or writer's collection.

Ursuale K Le Guin is a master of writing. Fantastic books with some interesting reflections on the world of language.