By Leea Rebeca Ruta – Graphics Editor

The Left Hand of Darkness is a 1969 science fiction, or sci-fi, novel by American author Ursula K. Le Guin (1929 – 2018). This twenty-chapter novel is set in the fictional Hainish universe and is part of Le Guin’s Hainish Cycle series. Yet, despite being a series, the books can be enjoyed as stand-alone works and do not require previous knowledge of the other novels or short stories.

Many will recognize the name Le Guin by her 1973 short story titled “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” or her high-fantasy Earthsea Cycle series (which I am currently reading). Le Guin was heavily inspired by philosophy, particularly Taoism,  but she also broached topics that were controversial for her time, such as gender. Many of her characters, including the protagonists, are people of colour. 

Additionally, Le Guin’s work contrasts Campbellian sci-fi, named after John Wood Campbell Jr. (1910 – 1971) who shaped or formalized modern sci-fi. As Damien Walter explains in his video “The Dangerous Philosophy of Ursula Le Guin”, Campbellian sci-fi “displayed a casual disregard for women”. Women were frequently caricatured as “unreasoning creatures who put feelings above the cold hard equations of reality”. This narrative removed early female writers such as Mary Shelley from the history of sci-fi. Campbellian sci-fi sees reality as an uncaring machine, and that a better world can only be achieved through scientific technology, according to Walter’s analysis. Le Guin, on the other hand, believed the human world was shaped by human thinking.

The Left Hand of Darkness is a book that is still regarded as one of Le Guin’s best works, though it remains controversial for the way it approaches gender. The protagonist, Genly Ai (a Black man), is a human envoy on the planet Gethen, also known as Winter due to its perpetual frozen environment (a long Ice Age). The humanoid Gethenians are true androgynous/hermaphroditic people: they look androgynous, yet are only sexually active once a month when their sex changes to either male or female. However, they have no influence over this change and do not know which sex they will have (it is random every cycle). 

Throughout the book, Genly Ai’s goal is to convince the Gethenians to join the Ekumen, a collective of planetary governments. He has to navigate this alien icebound world and petty royal governments that are trying to get rid of him because they do not believe him or do not want to join the Ekumen, which puts him at great risk. Mr. Ai also has to navigate his own prejudices regarding the gender/sex binary and the Gethenians’ sexual physiology. He has to spend months alongside a Gethenian, Therem Harth remir Estraven, the king’s ex-Prime Minister. With time, Mr. Ai comes to see Estraven as a very close friend and accepts them for who they truly are: both a man and a woman.

Although it was difficult to get into the story at first because of all the foreign terms, this book just became a new favourite of mine, and because I did not appreciate it enough on the first read, I will revisit it in the future (it is worth reading til the end, I promise!). It also made me accept myself more with my own feminine and masculine physical traits: feminine face, wide hips and thick thighs, but broad shoulders, big feet and somewhat manly hands. The story will stay with you for a long time!