Communities of the Heart: The Rhetoric of Myth in the Fiction of Ursula K Le Guin (Liverpool Science Fiction Texts and Studies, 25)

by Warren Rochelle

This book explores the use of imaginative literature as persuasion, focusing on the science fiction of Ursula Le Guin and her rhetorical use of myth. The author concludes that Le Guin (like Emerson, Peirce, Thoreau, Whitman, and Dewey) is a romantic/pragmatic rhetorician. In that sense, she is
arguing for what Vico argued for in the eighteenth that knowledge should be seen and studied as an integrated whole, and that Cartesian thinking is only part of how humans make meaning.

Genres: Nonfiction

208 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2001

About the author

Warren Rochelle lives in Crozet, Virginia. He retired from teaching English at the University of Mary Washington in 2020. His short fiction and poetry have been published in such journals and anthologies as Icarus, North Carolina Literary Review, Forbidden Lines, Aboriginal Science Fiction, Collective Fallout, Queer Fish 2, Empty Oaks, Quantum Fairy Tales, Migration, Clarity, Innovation, The Silver Gryphon, Jaelle Her Book, Colonnades, and Graffiti, as well as the Asheville Poetry Review, GW Magazine, Crucible, The Charlotte Poetry Review, and Romance and Beyond. His short story, “The Golden Boy,” was a finalist for the 2004 Spectrum Award for Short Fiction.

Rochelle is the author of five novels. The Wild Boy (2001), Harvest of Changelings (2007), and The Called (2010),were all published by Golden Gryphon Press. The Werewolf and His Boy, originally published by Samhain Publishing in September 2016, was re-released from JMS Books in August 2020. His fifth novel, In Light’s Shadow, was published by JMS Books in September 2022. His first story collection, The Wicked Stepbrother and Other Stories was published by JMS Books in September 2020. His second collection, To Bring Him Home and Other Tales, was published in September 2021, by JMS Books. A third collection, The Great Forest and Other Love Stories was published by JMS Books in November 2024.
A stand-alone story, “Seagulls,” was released by JMS Books in September 2021.

A second stand-alone story, “Susurrus,” was published by JMS Books in November 2022

Reviews

[doggirl butler · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this as a fan of le guin's work, rather than from a scholarly perspective. considering that, it was rather interesting. it made me want to try rereading always coming home