The Complete Earthsea Series & The Left Hand of Darkness: A BBC Radio 3 full-cast dramatisation

by Ursula K. Le Guin

Ursula K. Le Guin was one of the most revered and influential writers of the 20th century. Her Earthsea books have sold millions of copies and been translated into numerous languages, while her trailblazing novel The Left Hand of Darkness was a landmark in feminist science fiction and ranks among the greatest SF novels of all time. This BBC collection brings together the magical radio retellings of both these seminal classics.


Read By: full cast, Toby Jones, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Lesley Sharp, Adjoa Andoh, Noma Dumezweni, Robert Glenister, James McArdle, Sam Dale

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Audiobook, Science Fiction

Audiobook

Published January 1, 2021

About the author

Ursula K. Le Guin published twenty-two novels, eleven volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and has received many awards: Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, PEN-Malamud, etc. Her recent publications include the novel Lavinia, an essay collection, Cheek by Jowl, and The Wild Girls. She lived in Portland, Oregon.

She was known for her treatment of gender (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Matter of Seggri), political systems (The Telling, The Dispossessed) and difference/otherness in any other form. Her interest in non-Western philosophies was reflected in works such as "Solitude" and The Telling but even more interesting are her imagined societies, often mixing traits extracted from her profound knowledge of anthropology acquired from growing up with her father, the famous anthropologist, Alfred Kroeber. The Hainish Cycle reflects the anthropologist's experience of immersing themselves in new strange cultures since most of their main characters and narrators (Le Guin favoured the first-person narration) are envoys from a humanitarian organization, the Ekumen, sent to investigate or ally themselves with the people of a different world and learn their ways.

Reviews

[Roshan · Rating 4 out of 5]

امشب فهمیدم مجموعه ای که در نوجوانی عاشقش بودم یه آداپتیشن فول کست داره و بلافاصله رفتم دانلودش کردم تا صدای شخصیت هایی که اینقدر دوست داشتم رو بشنوم و سر صدای لبانن واقعا اشکم در اومد. همش رو گوش نکردم فقط تکه هایی رو برای شنیدن صدای کاراکترها انتخاب و گوش کردم ولی مطمئنم در آینده بازم سراغش میام. اون قسمت مربوط به left hand of darkness رو حتما بعد از اینکه کتاب رو خوندم گوش میدم.

[Dominic · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Earthsea story is a bit hard to follow if you haven't read the books because different sections of the books are retold out of order and a lot is left out. The voice actors are pretty good. Left Hand of Darkness works better and is more complete. I'd really only recommend this for people who have read Earthsea and want to revisit the story in a different way.

[Si Clarke]

I wanted to re-read The Left Hand of Darkness, but the library didn't have it. It offered me this, though. I've never read any of the Earthsea series, so my interest was piqued.

The full-cast narration was outstanding, including some stellar actors. However, I don't know if the problem was that I don't know the series or if it was just that the story was too condensed for its own good, but I had absolutely no idea what was happening during the Earthsea portion of the book.

The Left Hand of Darkness was great – but I still think I'd rather read the full version.

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay this was going to be a 5 star. Earthsea was so amazing. The acting and soundscape were really compelling. I quite liked how brief and snappy it was, it really lended to the feeling of sitting down to hear tales. But for that reason, I don't think it's fair to say I've read either series as the audio is only 8 hours total..
And I don't think the format worked as well for the left hand of darkness which clearly had more political play that was not mentioned

[Saku Nielsen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely wonderful to listen to, and the cherry on the top is the last track with interviews with other authors and Ursula, her vision on gender and the future. Gives you food for thought and you just want to plunge into any and all of her books again!

[Zoltán · Rating 2 out of 5]

Great cast, but things got so condensed that it lost coherence.

[Alyson · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an excellent dramatisation!

[Tracie Hall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Under construction.

[literaryaura]

I love radio plays and full cast audio productions. What I don't like about radio plays is that they're super abridged. This one was an extreme - 3 books to 3 hours. There was so much content cut, that I couldn't follow what was going on. This might be a book for people who have read the original books, not for someone new.

[Lance · Rating 4 out of 5]

On the positive side, these books were written for ages 9-14 which puts them well within my intellectual horsepower.

Laziness compels me to only do one review for what is, in reality, 7 books:

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐄𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐡𝐬𝐞𝐚 𝐂𝐲𝐜𝐥𝐞:

-A Wizard of Earthsea
- The Tombs of Atuan
- The Farthest Shore
- Tehanu
- Tales from Earthsea
-The Other Wind

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐇𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐬𝐡 𝐂𝐲𝐜𝐥𝐞:

- The Left Hand of Darkness

__________

When I do my competitive calculation at the end of the year comparing myself to the reading totals of my significant other, I'll have to keep this 7-book total in mind so I can win!

I enjoyed the stories, but I'm a little unsure of the BBC full-cast concept. There are two issues:

- First, the sound quality was very far from the best. The actors were often speaking in what appeared to be low hushed tones, with fast-clip English accents, to the backdrop of old-timey village noises which often threatened to drown them out.

- Second, compared to a reading of the series I did in my youth, the whole audio version seemed crushed together and chaotic. Coupled with the background noise issues and voice volume issues, it often seemed the adapted storyline was rushing by at high speed, and jumping around all over the place. Having a full cast instead of one or two readers also added in a bunch of different vocal styles which just added another layer to the confusion.

So, why then did I give it 4 stars instead of, say, 2? Alright, in fairness that rating is entirely because I've actually read the books in the past. I enjoyed the stories and, especially where The Left Hand of Darkness is concerned, enjoyed the thought-provoking nature of the narrative. If my first and only exposure to the books had been this series of audiobooks, I might have given it 2 stars.

If you've never read the books before I strongly recommend reading them instead of listening to them. Just know they count as young adult fiction. Also be aware that The Left Hand of Darkness introduced, for the first time, concepts such as androgyny - a subject that seems to cause some persons of a political persuasion in this country to break out in hives.

You are forewarned.

[Matthew Lloyd · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone who has read all of the books adapted here fairly recently, I found these adaptations deeply enjoyable, a reminder of how the story goes and how powerful and effective they are to me. If I try to imagine them from the point of view of someone who has not previously read these books, they are probably too vague about the story, probably adapting things in too short a span of time to work. But as a week-long reminder of all of Earthsea, and The Left Hand of Darkness, it was wonderful. And the Ursula Le Guin at 85 Radio 4 program, which I did listen to in 2015 when it was originally broadcast, I loved, just as I did then.

[E.H. Alger · Rating 4 out of 5]

I greatly enjoyed these radio dramatizations of some of my absolute favourite books. They’re well adapted and beautifully performed and even had me emotional and teary-eyed a few times. But there are huge chunks of the stories missing (made me think it’d be rather hard to follow them if you hadn’t already read the books) and I really missed hearing every word of Le Guin’s exquisitely spare, luminous prose. But as an unexpected bonus, there’s a really nice interview with the author included after the stories.

[Brittany McCann · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was quite fun!

I loved the full cast and you could tell that they had a lot of fun creating and performing this.

I would love to see it on stage.

These planets and their inhabitants are quite queer in every definition of the words.

I like that it still hold the politics of the sci fi at the time, but that it's a bit more exciting than other novels at the time. Perhaps it was a woman's touch...

4 Stars

[Uli Vogel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bad mistake not having read the books. I didn't really grab half of the plot and most of the characters in Earthsea. I also felt the speakers were unfitting - as I later found out totally justified. I did love The Left Hand of Darkness with its ideas of fluid gender and tolerance. The afterwords by two of my favourite authors (Gaiman and Mitchell) then really got me.

[Animesh Singh · Rating 4 out of 5]

it was like a recap of the world of earth the story of ged a little boy from guant to the archmage and then a husband. it is a beautiful world Ursula built and it has stayed that way it's one of the last refuge untarnished by the current capitalist reaches that makes fantasy world's a souless money making machines

[Peter Kalnin · Rating 5 out of 5]

An edition that shortens several of Le Guin's greatest stories but without damaging their message.

Narration of this audiobook done by Toby Jones, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Lesley Sharp, Adjoa Andoh, Noma Dumezweni, Robert Glenister, James McArdle, Sam Dale is masterfully done and well worth the listen.

[Baron · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this for the most part. I think the biggest problem is that you can tell it wasn't made for a full cast of people in play form. Much of the setup and description of the world is lost. I would say this is for people that have read the books. People that are new should stay away and maybe comeback to this later.

[Morten · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have not read the books but from the summaries on Wikipedia, it seems these dramatisations required you to know the books or at least the plots. It is a good story but I have listened to other dramatisations where one would not have had to have read the books

[Dina ElMaamoun · Rating 3 out of 5]

The adaptation is not so good and can often be confusing

[Sophia · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the worst adaptation ever. I had no idea what was going on most of the time.

[Dav · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this recording but the story seemed very disjointed

[Mikael · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pretty bad adaptation. The only thing good is Le Guin's writing.