023/053: The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition — Ursula Le Guin

[tamaranth]

2023/053: The Books of Earthsea: The Complete Illustrated Edition — Ursula Le Guin

I’m not sure if the dragons will ever return out of the west beyond the west, yet I know Tehanu will. I know where Ged goes next. But the storyteller doesn’t tell all she knows. When the story is over she falls silent. Then, after a while, perhaps she says, “But listen now! I have another tale to tell! [loc. 17466]

That rare artefact, an illustrated Kindle book where the illustrations -- beautiful illustrations, by Charles Vess -- are clear, visible and well-integrated. This was a 99p Kindle Daily Deal in June '22, and it contains all six books (A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, The Farthest Shore, Tehanu, Tales of Earthsea and The Other Wind), together with miscellaneous shorter Earthsea fiction, and fascinating introductions and afterwords by Le Guin.

I think I'd read all the fiction before, apart from the four late stories. But I've been reading and rereading A Wizard of Earthsea for nearly half a century, for so long that it's become part of me: while somehow I didn't get around to reading The Other Wind for over a decade after its 2001 publication, and have, as far as I recall, not reread it until now.

I read the whole sequence, start to finish, over a long weekend, and it was an immersive and utterly delightful experience. The deep familiarity of the first two novels; the layers of The Farthest Shore, which I did not understand when I first read it as an adolescent (though some of the imagery is firmly rooted in my subconscious); Tehanu, which would have distressed me when I was a child and is still fairly harrowing; the stories in Tales from Earthsea, which I don't think I had ever really fitted into the wider narrative arc; and The Other Wind, the only book of Earthsea that I've read since beginning this blog in 2005. (I've never reread it, and I think now that this might be because the setting is more urban, more courtly, more crowded. What has stayed with me from the initial trilogy is the sense of a traveller, sometimes with a companion and sometimes utterly alone, going into the wild places of the earth.)

This wasn't only a joyful reprise of the familiar and a review of the less-familiar: nor was it only a heartfelt appreciation of Le Guin's craft. With the inclusion of the author's introductions and afterwords, her 'Description of Earthsea', and her perceptive comments about the evolution of Earthsea (and, necessarily, the evolution of herself as its author), the story does indeed feel 'Complete', and the narrative rightness of its arc shines clear. The fiction is a delight, a revelation, a 'spell for the refreshment of the spirit': Le Guin's honest and thoughtful commentary -- how she came to see the magic and history of Earthsea, and the Old Powers, 'in a different light, under a larger, kinder sky' [loc. 4732] -- grounds the stories, and gives them historical and personal context. ('Men’s writing was seen as transcending gender; women’s writing as trapped in it. Why am I using the past tense?' [loc. 18812])

I've been thinking about the ways in which choice is a theme. 'It is very hard for evil to take hold of the unconsenting soul.' [loc. 1757] 'Freedom ... is not a gift given, but a choice made, and the choice may be a hard one.' [loc. 4575] '...in the beginning of time, mankind and the dragons had been one, but the dragons chose wildness and freedom, and mankind chose wealth and power.' [loc. 15940] (That choice, made in the deep past of Earthsea, made me think of the great Neolithic choice: hunter-gatherer or farmer?) '...he had spent his life learning how to choose to do what he had no choice but to do' [loc. 17262]. There's a spiritual aspect to that last, a sense of going with the flow, that appeals to me.

And one loose end: I still don't know if Lebannen and Ged ever meet again, after their parting in Roke at the end of The Farthest Shore. Le Guin surely knew, but she did not share that story.

Comments

[lobelia321]

Ah, what a lovely review. And what resonant quotes. And I like the idea of the hunter-gatherer or farmer. So glad I have this too and can look forward to it at at time when I need to read it.

[muninnhuginn]

It's one of the few ebooks that's a pleasure to own as a (digital) artefact, like the best physical books. You don't often get that--ebooks are almost always merely functional.

I loved this.

[andrewducker]

I read the complete series a few years ago and loved the way that my relationship to the world changed as the stories unfolded.

I own the physical version, and look forward to reading it in that form at some point :-)