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Student Version
Th e Left Hand of Darkness
Reading selection for this module: Le Guin, Ursula K. Th e Left Hand of Darkness. New York: Ace, 1987.
Science fiction explores ethical and moral issues created by new tech- nology. Many of the technologies explored in science fiction stories of the 1940s and 1950s have become a part of our everyday world, and we live with the consequences. As Ursula K. Le Guin argues in her in- troduction to The Left Hand of Darkness, we can think of science fiction as a kind of thought experiment: If we do this, what will happen? How will it work? How will it change society? How will it change people? Should we do it at all? The Left Hand of Darkness takes place in a universe in which human- ity did not originate on Earth. The original humanoid race is the Hain, who deposited different versions of humanity on different planets throughout the galaxy. Perhaps the strangest to us are the inhabitants of Gethen, a planet in perpetual ice age. The humans of Gethen are all hermaphrodites, capable of being either male or female when ready for reproduction (in kemmer) but asexual the rest of the time. Le Guin uses this situation to explore male and female stereotypes as well as a number of different political philosophies. For the purposes of this module, the book is divided into the introduc- tion and four main sections. The reading assignments may be further divided to fit the schedule and pace of a particular class. Read the overview quickly to get a general sense of what the novel is about.
Reading Rhetorically
Prereading
An Overview of the Book
Section One (pages 1–71, Chapters 1–5): This section takes place predominantly in the kingdom of Karhide with Genly Ai (the representa- tive of a sort of federation of planets called the Ekumen) as the viewpoint character. It starts with a ceremonial parade. Genly has an
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awkward conversation with Tibe, an unpleasant political type, and then an awkward dinner with Estraven, the prime minister. The next day Genly has an audience with Argaven, the mad king, and finds that Estraven has been banished. Genly goes to a group called the “Fore- tellers” and learns much about the Handdara religion. This section also contains a folktale called “The Place Inside the Blizzard,” which figures later in the story. Much is presented in this section that be- comes important later, but the relevance and meaning of these events are unclear for the moment. Our narrator is confused, and thus, so are we. This section, in a sense, lays out the mechanisms of the political, cultural, and narrative snares that will ultimately trap both Genly and Estraven. Section Two (pages 72–161, Chapters 6–12): Chapter 6 switches viewpoint characters and relates Estraven’s flight from Karhide to Orgoreyn, a neighboring country organized as an authoritarian, socialist state, from Estraven’s point of view. Chapter 7 is presented as a field report on Gethenian sexuality from one of the original Ekumen investi- gators. This report fills in much about Gethenian culture and practices that have been hinted at in the narrative up to this point. Chapter 8 describes Genly’s journey to Orgoreyn, and eventually Genly meets Estraven there. Chapter 9 is another folktale, this one about “Estraven the Traitor,” a distant ancestor of the current Estraven, which has many parallels to the current situation. Chapter 10 is about Genly’s negotia- tions in Orgoreyn from Genly’s viewpoint, and Chapter 11 covers much of the same events from Estraven’s point of view. Genly doesn’t under- stand the politics of Orgoreyn, doesn’t trust Estraven, and continues to behave in a naïve and idealistic manner. Estraven understands the poli- tics of both Orgoreyn and Karhide very well, but is confused at Genly’s behavior. At the end of this section, Estraven warns Genly that he is in danger of his life. One could say that this section clarifies much that is referenced in section one and winds the springs in all the cultural and political traps very tightly. In other words, Genly’s continuing misunder- standings of the culture and politics of both Karhide and Orgoreyn are about to get him in big trouble. Section Three (pages 162–236, Chapters 13–16): In Chapter 13, Genly is arrested and sent to a “voluntary farm.” The traps are all sprung. In Chapter 14, Estraven escapes Mishnory (the capitol of Orgoreyn) and rescues Genly. In Chapter 15, we view events from Genly’s perspective again. He begins to recover from the drugs that were administered at the farm, and Estraven begins to recover from dothe, a state of height- ened energy that Gethenians are able to enter when necessary. The two set off back to Karhide, traveling the long way around, over a gla- cier in winter. Chapter 16 is from Estraven’s viewpoint. The two discuss philosophy, religion, kinship, love, sexuality, and telepathy. They begin to understand one another.
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Getting Ready to Read
- What is science fiction? (Refer to your working definition and examples of its attributes. ) Think of some books, stories, TV shows, and movies that you have seen that you consider to be science fiction. Make a two-column list with the name of the work on the left and some reasons why you think this work is science fiction on the right. Then look at your lists and try to come up with a definition of the genre of science fiction.
- How is science fiction different from other types of fiction? Now think of some books, stories, TV shows, and movies that are definitely not science fiction. How are they different from the science fiction works? Add these to your list and describe why they are not science fiction. Are there any works you can think of that are in-be- tween or hard to categorize? Now write a short answer to this question: Do you enjoy science fiction? Why or why not?
- What is the role of the literary artist? What is the role of the writer in society? Is it to entertain us? Educate or enlighten us? Make us think? Change our views? Help us live better lives? What do you think?
- What is the nature of the artistic process? How do writers create stories? When you write a story, where does your inspiration come from? How do you know what to write about? How do you know what words to use? Do you think professional writers work the same way?
- Why do we read fiction, and what effect does it have on us? Have you ever identified with a character in a book, TV show, or a movie so much that you felt as though you were living a part of that character’s life? Have you ever been inspired to do something be- cause of a character’s actions in a book or a movie? Have you ever wished you could be a character in a story? Have you ever been sad when a book or movie is finished, because now you have to return to the real world? Think of a work that affected you in one or more of these ways and write a short description of what it was about and why it affected you. Then share your description with another student.
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Surveying the Text
You are going to read the author’s introduction to one of her most famous works.
- Look at the reverse of the title page. When was this book first published?
- What kind of information would you expect to find in an introduction?
- How long do you think it will take to read the introduction? How much benefit do you think you will get from it?
- What do you know about this author? (Try looking at her Web site: http://www.ursulakleguin.com)
Making Predictions and Asking Questions
Ursula Le Guin tries to answer the five questions from Activity 3 in her introduction to The Left Hand of Darkness. As you read it, think about whether her answers to those questions are similar to yours. Here are the questions again:
- What is science fiction?
- How is science fiction different from other types of fiction?
- What is the role of the literary artist?
- What is the nature of the artistic process?
- Why do we read fiction, and what effect does it have on us?
Introducing Key Vocabulary
The following words and phrases are important to understanding Le Guin’s introduction. Study the words’ derivations and use them to summarize the text, or explore the word using the Frayer method or a word tree. Share your results with the class. Keep your own dictionary of new terms learned here and throughout this module.
- extrapolation—To project a conclusion or a final state from a set of facts and conditions.
- escapist—Entertainment that allows the reader or viewer to escape from his or her problems into a fantasy world.
- rationalist—Based on facts, arguments, and reasoning. One who makes decisions based on these things.
- thought-experiment—An experiment that is not actually performed but instead takes place in the mind.
- clairvoyants—People who can see into the future through psychic means.
- futurologist—A scientist who tries to predict what the future will look like.
- apocalyptic—Having to do with the end of the world.
- androgynous—Having characteristics of both sexes, neither man nor woman (Greek roots andro, man, and gyn, woman).
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- How is science fiction different from other types of fiction? According to Le Guin, science fiction is not very different from other fiction. It just uses some different metaphors, often based on tech- nology and science. Do you agree?
- What is the role of the literary artist? Le Guin says the business of the novelist is telling lies. What does she mean by this? Do you agree? If the novelist tells lies, what is truth?
- What is the nature of the artistic process? Le Guin talks about the spirit of inspiration flowing through the writer. She talks about saying in words what cannot be said in words. She talks about Genly Ai (the main character in The Left Hand of Dark- ness) sitting down at her desk and using up her ink and typewriter ribbon. What does this all mean? Do you think that writing is to a certain extent an unconscious process for her? If you were going to imitate her writing process, what would you do?
- Why do we read fiction, and what effect does it have on us? Le Guin says that reading a novel makes us temporarily insane be- cause we hear voices that do not exist and believe in places we have never seen and events that never happened. Do you agree? Have you ever felt a bit distant from the real world when you are reading a story? Now compare your answers to these questions with those of Le Guin. How are they different? Did Le Guin’s introduction make you think about any of these questions in a different way?
Looking Closely at Language
Here are some words and phrases from the text that may be unfamiliar to you. They are in alphabetical order. Some of them you have seen before. If you get stuck on a word or phrase in the text, look to see if it is here. Return to the text to see what its meaning is there based on the definitions provided here or in the dictionary. Add the words to the dictionary you are creating. Find synonyms and related words to these to learn new words and to increase your vocabulary.
- aesthetically—Having to do with artistic beauty.
- androgynous—Having characteristics of both sexes, neither man nor woman.
- apocalyptic—Having to do with the end of the world.
- Apollo—Ancient Greek god of the sun and of music and poetry. - awen— An ancient Welsh word that means “flowing of spirit.”
- Battle of Borodino (Russian forces successfully fought Napoleon at a village south of Moscow on August 26, 1812. However, that knowl- edge is unnecessary to understand what Le Guin is talking about here.)
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- carcinogenic—Causes cancer. Here it is used metaphorically to mean that extrapolating too much tends to lead to a bad result.
- circumstantial—Circumstantial evidence is facts and plausible as- sumptions that would be consistent with something happening a certain way but do not actually prove that it happened that way.
- clairvoyants—People who can see into the future through psychic means.
- Club of Rome—A nonpartisan “think tank.” A group of philosophers and scientists who try to come up with solutions to the world’s prob- lems.
- devious—Tricky or deceiving.
- Dionysios—Ancient Greek god of wine and madness.
- escapist—Entertainment that allows the reader or viewer to escape from his or her problems into a fantasy world.
- extrapolation—To project a conclusion or a final state from a set of facts and conditions.
- futurologist—A scientist who tries to predict what the future will look like.
- Marshalsea Prison—A debtor’s prison in London that is mentioned in the works of Charles Dickens. It no longer exists.
- peculiar—Unique, strange, or different.
- prophets—Religious figures who predict what will happen if people do not change their behavior.
- Pythagoras—An ancient Greek philosopher, sometimes called the first pure mathematician.
- rationalist—Based on facts, arguments, and reasoning. One who makes decisions based on those things.
- Schrödinger—Erwin Schrödinger is famous for a paradox called “Schrödinger’s cat.” This was a thought experiment in which we imagine a cat in a closed box. Is the cat alive or dead? We don’t know until we open the box, and so two universes, one with a dead cat and one with a live one, seem to exist in parallel until we open it. http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Mathematicians/ Schrodinger.html
- seers—An older term for clairvoyants, people who can see the future.
- simplistic—An explanation that oversimplifies the real conditions.
- thought-experiment—An experiment that is not actually performed but instead takes place in the mind.
Analyzing Stylistic Choices
Le Guin makes a number of statements that are unexpected or surprising. She says:
- Science fiction is not predictive; it is descriptive.
- A novelist’s business is lying.
- When we read a novel, we are insane—bonkers.
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begins in Erhenrang, the major city of the kingdom of Karhide, and the major character is Genly Ai (whose first name is pronounced with a hard “g” as in “ghost” or “grape,” and whose last name is pronounced like “eye”). Genly is from off the world. He is a representative of a sort of United Nations of planets called the “Ekumen,” and his job is to convince the people of Gethen to join. As the story opens, Genly is watching a ceremony and trying to arrange an audience with the king, Argaven, but he is confused by the culture and language, and things are not going well.
Surveying the Text
The chapters in this section are:
- A Parade in Erhenrang
- The Place Inside the Blizzard
- The Mad King
- The Nineteenth Day
- The Domestication of Hunch Some things to think about when you read these chapters:
- We have parades for celebrations and holidays. What kind of cel- ebration could it be?
- How could there be a place inside a blizzard?
- Is the king angry or crazy? Is an angry or crazy king a good ruler?
- What is the significance of the nineteenth day?
- A hunch is a kind of irrational feeling, without any visible evidence, that something is true or is going to happen. What would it mean to “domesticate” the power to have a hunch? At this point you don’t have enough information to answer these ques- tions. You need to read the book with these questions in mind.
Making Predictions and Asking Questions
People often ask, “What is this novel about?” Sometimes they are asking about the plot of the novel, the series of events that happen in it. But events are usually driven by people who are trying to do some- thing, who have goals and objectives and are facing obstacles and dangers. So we might say that the novel is about the characters, es- pecially the protagonist, or viewpoint character. However, a novelist is usually exploring some particular themes and ideas, and we could also say that the novel, in some abstract sense, is about those themes. Three points of view. We might see The Left Hand of Darkness as hav- ing three main areas of exploration:
- First, Le Guin is clearly interested in the development of her charac- ters: who they are, what they are trying to do, their emotional states, and their growth as people. We might call this a psychological orien- tation.
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- Second, this novel explores cultural differences, differences between Gethenian culture and our own and between the different countries of Gethen. We might call this a cultural or anthropological perspec- tive. This perspective is especially interesting because physically, in one particular sense, the people of Gethen are very different from us.
- Third, Le Guin is interested in the way different societies organize themselves politically. Karhide, where Genly starts out, is a traditional monarchy, but it is starting to change. Orgoreyn, where Genly goes after he is unsuccessful in Karhide, has a more modern and efficient government, but all is not quite as it seems. This we might call the political perspective. Before beginning to read the novel, you should choose one of the three perspectives as a focus for reading. You can be a “psychologist,” an “anthropologist,” or a “political officer.” As you read, you will keep your particular perspective in mind, looking for information relevant to your questions. The psychologist should pay attention to the main characters, Genly Ai and Estraven, and their relationships with some of the other char- acters, such as Tibe and Argaven. Throughout your reading you will encounter “character questions,” such as these:
- What kind of personality does this character have? How can you tell?
- What are the strong points of this character?
- What are the weak points?
- What is this character trying to do?
- What motivates this character?
- What obstacles does this character face?
- How does this character change through the course of the novel?
- What causes the character to change?
- What does the character learn?
- What kind of language would a psychologist use to describe a per- son? Identify those kinds of words from the text and create a page for them in your vocabulary notebook. The anthropologist should pay attention to foods, etiquette and standards of behavior, cultural practices and concepts, religious ideas, significant words, marriage and family customs, and all the ways that people in a society interact with one another. Throughout your reading, you will encounter “culture questions,” such as these:
- How are Gethenians different from us?
- How does the cold affect Gethenian culture?
- What do Gethenians eat and drink? How is their diet different from ours?
- What is the equivalent of marriage on Gethen?
- How do Gethenians organize families?
- What kind of technology do Gethenians have?
- What kinds of weapons do Gethenians have?
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Genly says, “I’ll make my report as if I told a story, for I was taught as a child on my homeworld that Truth is a matter of the imagination.”
- What are some of the normal differences between a report and a story? Why do you think Genly chooses to tell a story instead of writing an official report?
- Why doesn’t Genly think that facts equal Truth? What does he mean by comparing facts to pearls that look different when worn by different people?
- Genly says that the story is not all his, nor told by him alone. What do you think this means about how the story will be told?
- Genly says, “If at moments the facts seem to alter with an altered voice, why then you can choose the fact you like best.” Does this mean that the facts change depending on the perspective of the teller? Do you agree?
- Genly says that where he comes from, “Truth is a matter of the imagination.” Le Guin quotes Genly saying this in her introduction, so she must think it is an important idea. What does it mean?
Introducing Key Vocabulary
Le Guin’s style is literary, and there is a lot of interesting vocabulary. The following words are useful in understanding the story, especially at the beginning. Look for these words in the story when you read it:
- potentates—Persons with power; kings, rulers.
- dignitaries—Important people; people with dignity, which come from their social status.
- insolent—Very disrespectful (adjective form).
- insolence—Disrespectful speech and behavior (noun form).
- animosity—Hostile or unfriendly feeling.
- specious—Used to describe an argument that looks reasonable on the surface but is not really so.
- proclamation—An announcement.
- pretense—A pretended reason for doing something that is really be- ing done for another reason. The following “Gethenian” words are very important to understanding the story. These words are made-up words that do not exist in English, but you need to know them to understand Gethenian culture. - shifgrethor —Gethenian term related to honor and prestige. - kemmer —Gethenian word meaning that a person is in a physical state of being “ready for reproduction.” - kemmering —A vow similar to marriage between two Gethenians.
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Reading
First Reading
Read pages 1–71 (Chapters 1–5), keeping in mind the questions raised in “Surveying the Text” and “Making Predictions.” As you read, look for the answers to the questions listed below for each chapter. Also keep in mind your techniques for learning about words from contextual clues. Chapter 1
- What is the occasion of the parade? a. A celebration of a great military victory. b. Mother’s Day. c. The completion of the Arch of the River Gate. d. The parade has been done every year for so long that no one knows why.
- Who is Estraven? a. The Prime Minister of Karhide. b. The “King’s Ear.” c. A dignitary. d. All of the above.
- How does Genly feel about Estraven? a. He doesn’t like him. b. He trusts him completely. c. Estraven is his greatest enemy in Karhide. d. Genly has never met him.
- Who is Argaven? a. A spy from Orgoreyn. b. The king of Karhide. c. Estraven’s brother. d. All of the above.
- Who is Tibe? a. Genly’s landlady. b. A politician with a wrinkled face. c. A fortuneteller. d. Genly’s friend.
- On Gethen, what is an “island”? a. A bit of land surrounded by water. b. A bit of land surrounded by ice. c. A boarding house or hotel. d. A part of a roadway.
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c. There were others with him but they got lost somehow. d. His partner, Archon Fabrile, was killed by a sonic gun.
- Why does the king think that all the people in the Ekumen are monsters? a. The people of the Ekumen have two heads, except for the kings. b. The people of the Ekumen are either male or female and stay that way all the time. c. The people of the Ekumen don’t have any kings. d. The king is crazy.
- Why is the king afraid of Genly? a. Genly has a sonic gun. b. Genly looks like a monster. c. Genly brings change to Karhide. d. He thinks Genly might poison him.
- Why doesn’t the king want to join the Ekumen? a. He wants Karhide to go its own way. b. He wants more money. d. He is crazy. d. Estraven told him not to. Chapter 4
- Why isn’t Berosty happy with the answer the Foretellers give to his question, “When will I die?” a. The date they told him is too soon. b. The answer they gave him was too vague. c. He wanted them to tell him he would never die. d. Knowing the precise day of his death was too much for him.
- Why isn’t Berosty happy with the answer Herbor gets from the Foretellers? a. The date they told him is too soon. b. The answer they gave him was too vague. c. He wanted them to tell him he would never die. d. Knowing the precise day of his death was too much for him.
- How does the story end? a. Berosty finally gets the right answer and is happy until the day of his death. b. Herbor convinces Berosty that it was a stupid question anyway. c. Berosty goes crazy and kills Herbor and then dies on the 19th day of the month. d. Herbor runs away, never to be seen again. Chapter 5
- What are the two main religions of Gethen? (See the first page of the chapter.) a. The old way of the Handarra and the new way of Yomesh. b. Nihilism and Bokonism.
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c. Socialism and facism. d. On Gethen, there is no religion.
- Why don’t Gethenians go to war? a. They have no weapons. b. They never commit acts of violence of any kind. c. Acts of violence are instantly punished by death. d. They lack the ability to mobilize, and they don’t even have a word for war.
- Why does Genly seek out the Foretellers? a. He wants to convince them to join the Ekumen. b. He wants to teach them telepathy. c. He wants to find out if they can really tell the future. d. He wants to ask them where Estraven went.
- What happens if someone asks the Foretellers an unanswerable question? a. They charge twice as much. b. They won’t even try to answer it, because once they tried and it made them all crazy. c. They just give a vague, ambiguous answer. d. They just take the questioner’s money and run away.
- What questions does Genly ask the Foretellers? a. Who is the fairest one of all? b. What is the square root of four? c. Will Gethen be a member of the Ekumen in five years? d. Where did Estraven go?
- When Genly asked his question, why were there ten members in the telepathic circle of the Foretellers instead of the usual nine? a. Estraven was spying on the circle. b. Genly’s telepathic abilities caused him to join the circle. c. The Foretellers miscounted how many people were there. d. Genly’s gems were worth more than he thought, so another person was added.
- Why don’t kings ask many questions of the Foretellers? a. The Foretellers charge kings a lot of money, and the answers aren’t very useful. b. Kings on Gethen are usually crazy. c. The Foretellers are afraid of kings. d. Kings have their own fortune tellers.
- What answer do the Foretellers give to Genly’s question? a. “Good fences make good neighbors.” b. “Karhide isn’t a country; it’s a family quarrel.” c. “No.” d. “Yes!”
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pertinacious—holding firmly to a purpose phlegmatic—sluggish, slow, calm transmuted—changed or transformed Chapter 2 blighted—diseased, sick chapfallen—having the lower jaw hanging loosely, surprised and depressed prospered—things went well, there was growth and good health transgression—breaking the rules tumult—disordered action, chaos Chapter 3 augmented—added to etiquette—politeness implicated—involved, responsible intently—with great attention interior—inside panoply—impressive clothes perjuring—lying physiological—having to do with the physical body and its systems predecessors—people who came before resolution—strength of purpose rufous—reddish simultaneously—at the same time trudging—walking as if very tired verbatim—completely word for word Chapter 4 demented—mentally ill Chapter 5 abominations—hateful things abyss—a deep drop, a canyon aerie—the high nest of an eagle; a high dwelling place ambiguous—unclear, vague anomalies—differences appalling—shocking buttresses—structures to hold up a wall chasms—a wide, deep opening, similar to “abyss” creed—a set of beliefs emulate—to imitate or copy evasion—escape frailest—weakest hallucinations—things seen that are not really there ignoble—not noble, base inarticulate—unable to speak or unable to speak clearly paraverbal—beyond words
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phantasmal—like a phantasm, an illusion, or a ghostly figure precipice—a sharp drop; a cliff recoil—pull back in shock or disgust sheaf—a bundle skein—a coil of yarn or thread transients—temporary visitors passing through ubiquitous—seen everywhere vendettas—feuds voluble—talkative
Analyzing Stylistic Choices
The linguistic choices writers make create certain effects for their readers. The questions for discussion are divided into two categories: words and sentences. Words Although Le Guin writes this story in English, she also uses some Gethenian words, such as gossiwor, kyorremy, shifgrethor, and nusuth. Since Gethen is a fictitious place, clearly these words have been in- vented by the author. Discuss the following questions:
- What is the effect of these alien words on the reader?
- Does an author need alien words to describe an alien culture?
- Does using these “Gethenian” words help Le Guin create the feeling of a different culture with different ideas?
- Would the story be less confusing and easier to read without using these words?
- Do you think words like shifgrethor and nusuth would be useful in English? Could you use them with your classmates? Sentences Although Le Guin’s sentence structure is quite varied, she does tend to favor long, complex structures with phrases and sentences connected by semicolons, dashes, commas, and even periods. Here are some examples:
- I don’t trust Estraven, whose motives are forever obscure; I don’t like him; yet I feel and respond to his authority as surely as I do to the warmth of the sun (7).
- No doubt this was all a matter of shifgrethor —prestige, face, place, the pride-relationship, the untranslatable and all-important principle of social authority in Karhide and all civilizations of Gethen. And if it was I would not understand it (14).
- I thought of Estraven waiting for me there as the snow fell last night, and felt a pang of pure pity for the man whom I had seen in yester- day’s parade sweating and superb under the weight of his panoply and power, a man at the prime of his career, potent and magnifi- cent—gone now, down, done (41).
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