The Left Hand of Darkness

This book was excellent, but not my taste.

Very interesting concepts and fascinating political maneuvering, but written in a largely inaccessible style for a significant part of the book. Le Guin introduces Gethenian concepts and doesn't explain them right away, leaving me very confused a lot of the time.

Cool concept, execution wasn't for me.

Looks like I finally found a LeGuin's book that's not overrated. About time.

I loved the overall narrative, the richness of the culture Genly is discovering and the slight alienness he experiences because while they are human... they are not quite human like him.

The “aliens” have amorphous gender but they are still people, humans left on icy planet and experimented on long time ago - they cycle through being man and woman once a month like a PMS, the rest of the time they are infertile and something in the middle. It is a fascinating idea and I'm glad the book was written in the 60's because today it would have several dozen preachy passages with LGBT metaphors and “THE MESSAGE” (read the word in Critical Drinker's voice for best effect). This way it was ideologically free and LeGuin simply went discovering what a culture like that would look like, which was, in a way, refreshing.

Two thirds of the book are spent in political match between two nations while Genly is trying to get at least one of them to enter Ekumen union of planets. He knows that if one agrees the rest will soon follow. But they don't believe or don't want to believe him for their own political sake. He came alone and while he looks weird to them and the spaceship is being analyzed he's still struggling against political forces that want to keep the power to themselves and fear joining galactic union would undermine their plans.

This part was good but not as good as the last third where Genly is forced to travel through icy plains with a native companion. I was quite surprised that this was the stuff I enjoyed the most. The bonding between them was the best part of the novel. I wouldn't say that LeGuin is in any way good with writing rich and complex characters but this part made me care about both of them.

I've rated only Wizard of Earthsea this high but this book was slightly better and it's not as highly praised as that one. So far Hainish Cycle was improving with (almost) every book and I hope this keeps going. LeGuin will never be among my favorite authors but at least I'm finally starting to understand why she is for many other people.

P.S.: China Miéville wrote introduction to this and it just solidified my opinion that I wouldn't enjoy his work. He doesn't understand Heinlein's ‘The door dilated' metaphor and misunderstands that LeGuin used masculine language for pregnant ‘king' because we have no other way to address a ruler that is most of the time sexless eunuch and turns into one of the sexes only for a day each month.

Ursula K Le Guin's classic science fiction novel posits the question: What if a society wasn't split into two genders? So we are introduced to the world of Gethen (or Winter) where its inhabitants, unique amongst mankind, are androgynes, being neither male nor female. Once a month they enter “the kemmering” at which point they develop either male or female characteristics in order to mate. And so we have a society that is not driven by gender politics or everyday sexual urges.

Into this world comes Genly Ai, a representative of the Ekumen, a league of inhabited planets, to invite the Gethenians to join. He lands at first in the kingdom of Karhide and must persuade the mad king that he is truly alien, yet human. Aided by the Prime Minister, Estraven, Genly must tread a fine line. Is he being believed or indulged?

Le Guin presents a fully rounded world and explores every facet of this alien society, from the monarchy of Karhide, to the totalitarian bureaucracy of Orgoreyn all set on a world of ice and snow. For Winter is a cold planet, the most extreme place that man inhabits in all the known worlds.

This is no dry textbook about an imagined world. Such is Le Guin's skill as a storyteller that the complex relationship between Genly and Estraven is fully developed into a deep friendship. There is hardship here as Genly is imprisoned in Orgoreyn, Estraven deposed and exiled. She never flinches from depicting the darker parts of this genderless society. It's a truly alien concept, but wrapped in a story of struggle and hard won freedom that, finally, becomes deeply moving.

In the end the message is, I suppose, that male, female or androgyne, we are all Human. Mankind is one entity despite superficial differences. Beneath skin colour, beyond sexuality, we are all the same. It is a lesson we would do well to learn. Recommended.