Fantasy Book Club discussion

Please discuss the world in which this story takes place here. Did you find it believable, enchanting, awful, etc.? Is it some place you'd like to visit? Have at it and please use the new spoiler tags for any spoilers - <> with 'spoiler' between brackets at the beginnning, > with 'spoiler' after the backslash at the end.

I like it...although there are so many islands and so many names and my book is so small and I am so blind now that I am having some difficulty keeping track of where Ged is at any given time.

I have a plan to start reading it tomorrow. Today = house and yard work.

The Wikipedia article is informative, especially as it describes the world. Very intriguing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earthsea

Michele wrote: "I like it...although there are so many islands and so many names and my book is so small and I am so blind now that I am having some difficulty keeping track of where Ged is at any given time."

Le Guin's website has an enlarged version of the map:

http://www.ursulakleguin.com/

thanks! even though I'm finished with the book, I'll play around with the map a bit!

I'm not sure I'm saying this correctly, but this fantasy world is more 'standard' than what I've been reading lately. A lot of the fantasy now seems to have a streak of realism or logic in it, while this just jumps into a completely fantastic world.

Jim wrote: "I'm not sure I'm saying this correctly, but this fantasy world is more 'standard' than what I've been reading lately. A lot of the fantasy now seems to have a streak of realism or logic in it, whi..."

Yes, and I like the way it's just woven into the story without explanation. I think some writers 'explain' too much.

"If you do something, do it well."

It's a phrase an old professor of mine used to say all the time, and I couldn't help but hear it in my ear every time Le Guin attempted to pepper this novel with supposed world-building details. Every mention of an island we never saw, a mountain that held no relevance whatsoever, a far-off land that was beyond insignificant for our purposes ... there are so many off-hand mentions like this throughout A Wizard of Earthsea, and 95% of them go nowhere.

On the one hand, I found that it was wasting my time. If your outside world has almost no bearing on the story you're telling, then leave it out. It's wasted space and we don't need to know this stuff.

On the other hand, I wish she had elaborated more. The world-building mentions were so cursory that they simply couldn't add anything to the story. Had she gone into more detail about these places—why they're relevant to me, why they're relevant to Ged—then at least they would have served some purpose.

As it stands, I don't care for the "world" in Earthsea. I don't see anything particularly inventive or detailed or interesting about it. And Le Guin didn't do much to convince me otherwise.

Rick wrote: ""If you do something, do it well."

It's a phrase an old professor of mine used to say all the time, and I couldn't help but hear it in my ear every time Le Guin attempted to pepper this novel with..."

It's true that a lot of the description of the world is not relevant to the story. I did get lost sometimes wondering where is she going with this. But as I kept reading I couldn't help myself feel like I was on the little boat with Ged. It made Earthsea more real to me.

Whenever I read the Earthsea novels I feel transported to a peaceful place, full of the sounds of the shore, sea, and forest.

About 20 years after first reading the novels, I visited the Pacific Northwest region (Oregon and Washington) for the first time (I'm from Puerto Rico), and you should've seen me seeking out yew and alder trees in the forests I visited. And spending a week exploring the San Juan Islands helped me visualize the islands of Earthsea, more than my own Caribbean archipelago did.

I love visiting Earthsea!

Rick: the other two books in the original trilogy do a good job of fleshing out some of the places in Earthsea, as well as its history.

Leonardo wrote: "Whenever I read the Earthsea novels I feel transported to a peaceful place, full of the sounds of the shore, sea, and forest.

About 20 years after first reading the novels, I visited the Pacific N..."

Yes, I think this book is meant to be read as part of the whole.

I just finished the novel today and really liked the way she built up the whole world of Earthsea. There were actually very few times I went back to the map to see where exactly the characters were on their journeys. I felt that, at least in this first novel, the author used the setting more to build a sense of distance and mystery than to provide us with a sense of reality. Particularly in the last journey, with all the lands flowing past the little boat, it left me with a sense of the distance travelled by the wizards - physical and emotional distance. Yeah, the exact places on a map may be important, but I feel that maybe our desire for geographic reality may take away from the mythic and psychological themes in the novel.

I really liked it since it really reminded me of the sea and the people that live near it, the small villages, the houses, the simple life style, it brought back so many memories of when I used to live by the beach... but there wasn't any magic where I lived!

The way she describes how you cast magic is really logic, and I think it's the first one that made sense to me since in other book they don't explain it or they don't convince me.

I think that by seeing how much Ged has travelled around Earthsea gives you the idea of the hardships and time it takes for a human being to grow up. Really beautiful.

there are so many off-hand mentions like this throughout A Wizard of Earthsea, and 95% of them go nowhere.

This actually made it feel more natural to me. People who live in a place don't mention a locale or event and then immediately explain its significance to the person next to them, who is supposedly also from there. It bothers me when characters say things like, "... the Fields of Comador, which as you know have been a barren wasteland since the great battle of Mubnug where thousands died before King Ethelfart was able to wrest the magical Scepter of Destruction from the wizard Malagrimace, ending his centuries-long reign of cruelty." Of course Le Guin's way is more confusing for the reader, but also richer. It's like traveling in a country you didn't read up on before visiting.

Miriam wrote: "there are so many off-hand mentions like this throughout A Wizard of Earthsea, and 95% of them go nowhere.

This actually made it feel more natural to me. People who live in a place don't mention a..."

LOL, well stated.

If I'm remembering correctly, LeGuin was one of the first high fantasy authors to set her novel in an archipelago. This setting disrupted the Eurocentric feel of much high fantasy published before her. The setting coincides with LeGuin's (not altogether successful) attempt to interrogate race and racial constructions, with the white Kargads depicted as the more aggressive, "evil" nation. How does the fact that the world is a world of islands affect how you think about it?

I just finished this - took a break in the middle - and now that I'm done, I can see why people love this book so much. There's something very appealing about the story - and it's so nice to see the kind of understanding of human nature that is shown here. I see the symbolism of the whole 'earthsea' world - if the sea is the unconscious with little islands of consciousness, the wizard traveling from one to the other, making connections, and finally traveling to the far reaches where he finds his shadow and knows its name - his. Shades of Pogo, here. "We have found the enemy and he is us." Very satisfying.

Jackie wrote: "If I'm remembering correctly, LeGuin was one of the first high fantasy authors to set her novel in an archipelago. This setting disrupted the Eurocentric feel of much high fantasy published before ..."

Earthsea being a world of islands gives this feeling of separation. I live on a small island, and we pretty much live with a sort of disconnection of the rest of the world, pretty much caught up in our own things. I imagine the islands of Earthsea to be like this. Specially Astowell, (view spoiler)[ the last island. The people there are disconnected from the rest of the world, specially the large islands, no one has even travelled to one of them. (hide spoiler)] I like this feeling, that each island may be so different that is it's own little world. Reminded me of Lewis' Narnia, specially in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

This was only the second LeGuin book that I had read, but the aspect of her writing that struck me as the most powerful and moving was the tone that she sets for her environments. I think an easy way to put this is world-building, but for me it also the emotions and current I was feeling at the same time

In The Left Hand of Darkness the tone was very oppressing, heavy, and cold, which fit the book perfectly. (view spoiler)[ In Wizard of Earthsea though I saw it cropping up in a number of ways, and I think it really added to the depth of the story. In Gont, you could feel the isolation of him leaving his home and starting a new life. In Roke, the queer culture of the villagers completely changed the tone into something new, and enticing. By the time he was being chased by the shadow, you could feel the despair weighing on him. (hide spoiler)]

I think this added a lot to the experience, since you weren't really just seeing it, you were living it.

Amazing. I adore it! One of best fantasy series for me.

I love the first paragraph, which does impressive world building in a handful of words:

The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is a land famous for wizards. From the towns in its high valleys and the ports on its dark narrow bays many a Gontishman has gone forth to serve the Lords of the Archipelago in their cities as a wizard or mage, or, looking for adventure, to wander working magic from isle to isle of all Earthsea. Of these some say the greatest, and surely the greatest voyager, was the man called Sparrowhawk, who in his day became both dragonlord and Archmage. His life is told in the Deed of Ged and in many songs, but this is a tale of the time before his fame, before the songs were made.

It sets the tone beautifully: an island, a world that consists of similar islands, the fact that there are wizards and dragons, a hero, and his legendary adventures. The economy and poetic compression of this opening paragraph is masterful, in my opinion.

Leonardo wrote: "I love the first paragraph, which does impressive world building in a handful of words:

The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is a ..."

Nicely said, and I agree.

Leonardo wrote: "I love the first paragraph, which does impressive world building in a handful of words:

The island of Gont, a single mountain that lifts its peak a mile above the storm-racked Northeast Sea, is a ..."
I agree, too.

The Wizard of Earthsea captures the misty tone of Arthurian Legend. Its noble squalor. Its decay and hesitant hopes. This, more than anything else, made the story memorable.