The Left Hand Of Darkness.
The Lathe Of Heaven.
The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas.
Ive written some really good stuff recently!
Le Guin has nourished imaginative literature for decades with fine, precise prose and political exploration.
Shell put anyone straight on the myopic assumption that the silliest realist was better than Tolkien.
Just as she will those who treat books as commodities.
They gave her a medal.
She gave em hell.
[Laughs] Dont tell my government that!
Was transgression your intention when you started publishing in the sixties?
Looking back now, do you think you caused enough trouble?
Well, let me think about that a moment.
I did not set out to be a troublemaker.
I set out to be a novelist and a poet.
Im not really a political person.
Im just a writer, as they say.
Well, of course the personal is the political and theres no way to get around that.
Do you see yourself as a radical?
China Mieville once described you as one of American literatures most radical voices.
Yeah, I do.
Ive always been something of a socialist in politics and so on, and thatsextremelyradical over here.
I think some of my writing is radical in a sort of quiet way.
I dont go in for dangerous writing and shocking people and so on.
To whom and for what would you say your writing has given permission?
That, I dont know.
The reader has to answer that question, I cant.
On the topic of conservatism in the US, did you follow the recent Clean Reader App controversy?
Briefly then, its an program that takes away profanity and sexual language from literature e-books.
[Laughs] Ai ai ai!
It made me think back to your Why Are Americans Afraid Of Dragons?
essay about Puritanism and the US fear of fantasy.
That same conservatism and Puritanism is still at the heart of America now.
Its very strong here.
And there are people who want to ban your books, and keep them out of schools?
My books have been banned simply because they are imaginative science-fiction, fantasy, what have you.
The imagination is considered dangerous and of course,it is.
These people are right.
The imagination is truly the enemy of bigotry and dogma.
Do you think well ever reach a point when those snobbish attitudes dont exist?
Some people have to be snobs, dont they?
They cant exist without looking down on something.
Certainly notautomaticallythe best, which is what the snobbery thing was to do with.
Well, it just, it wont wash, as we say.
You see that attitude diminishing?
Its changing very very fast.
Or to use another metaphor, that weve changed the scenery.
Those books are incredibly hard to write.
I dont think its harder, but its a different job.
It involves certain different skills and techniques.
If Zadie Smith knows that, then shes got nothing to worry about!
You know what I mean.
Holding their noses as they do so.
It happens in film too.
I really have been keeping away from science-fiction films.
She wants to redefine science-fiction to exclude herself from it [laughing].
Thats too bad, its sort of a waste of her good time I think.
But yes, it is very much that.
Everything in publishing now has to do with marketing and appearance and whats easiest for the PR people.
Were back now to the idea of being a troublemaker.
Was that speech an instance of you throwing bombs at the publishing industry?
Talk about speaking truth to power!
You deserve a whole other medal for that speech as far as Im concerned.
Literature still needs its heroes.
On theEarthseaseries, for instance, which youve revisited at intervals of more than a decade?
Sometimes I get tired of talking about work that I wrote forty years ago.
Everybody wants to go back to the older stuff [laughing] come on now!
Ive written some really good stuff recently!
I dont want to get stuck in reminiscing.
Its because we grew up with it.
What do you consider you could tell about people from their responses to your work?
How much do you let yourself think about your legacy?
So long as I can do any work, I just want to go ahead working.
What becomes of it is not up to me.
You once said that at vulnerable moments the thought who is going to keep me alive?
Do those thoughts still intrude?
I said that specifically talking about what happens to women writers.
They get disappeared very quickly, so often and so unjustly.
Then there has to be this laborious attempting to bring them back, sometimes succeeding and sometimes not.
There is a real injustice there.
You know, what the hell?
Who have you seen that happen to?
Women writers being swept off the map, I mean.
Im a little afraid that its happening to our wonderful Grace Paley.
A lot of people felt she was definitely one of the best writers we had going.
Her stories are absolutely wonderful and it looks like theyre just dropping out of the canon.
I suppose if Peter Jackson doesnt make a trilogy of films about them…
[Laughing]Theresan idea.
That can bring writers out of obscurity though, cant it?
That kind of treatment.
Yeah, but when books depend on films to keep them in sight…
The movies are not Tolkien.
Presumably youve said no too?
You must have turned down projects.
Oh yes, indeed I have.
What decides for you whether you say no or yes?
That has changed as Ive got a little bit…
I had an odd experience.
My very first movie was the one that was done right and done well.
The PBS version ofLathe Of Heaven(1979)?
Yeah, the oldLathe Of Heaven.
I was in a very unusual situation.
So I sort of naively agreed to other things.
[adopts gruff voice] we dont want your help.
Youre just the writer, chopped liver.
So Ive got very hard-nosed about this.
I dont know any cases of their having done that.
We dont have radio drama over here, we lost it years, decades ago.
I wrote a little of it myself back in the 80s, but it doesnt exist here anymore.
Its just beginning to creep back as a sort of underground thing done by young people.
I miss it, I love radio drama.
Its wonderful to watch a real pro at work.
It was a great experience and Im looking forward to hearing the result.
Do you followGame Of Throneson television at all?
Thats all we see on television.
Does HBO actually make the movies or just buy them from makers?
Theyre certainly the money…
Sure.
Do you worry about what might be done years and years in the future with your work?
Are there things in place to stop bastardised versions coming out in the cinema and on TV?
He will manage the estate.
Hes a businessman and very canny and he knows whats right and what isnt.
I just stole it and passed it on.
Im trying to remember what the passage was?
It was one of the Hempstocks talking about the language of making, I think.
It was veryEarthsea-ish magic, the true names for things and…
Oh, the true names.
I didnt specifically steal it, but naming magic is a well-known form of magic all over the world.
Its one of those ideas that a lot of people have had.
So Neil didnt steal it from me at all, he just stole it out of the air!
Oh sure, yeah.
A writer who didntreadwould be a weird creature wouldnt it?
They say Tell us about the book that influenced you most.
Everything I ever read!
It all goes into me, its like food.
Tell me about the meal that nourished you most?
[laughs] I cant do it!
I eat books and so of course they become part of me.
Oh, no no.
Thats such a good question.
I think about them.
I know exactly what youre saying.
Youre getting at something very true and very complicated, I think.
To speak inEarthseaterms, is Ursula Le Guin your use-name?
As do we all.
People like Neil Gaiman provide that via Twitter, and George R.R.
Martin on his Not A Blog website.
When I was younger, I needed that and I did it to some extent at least.
Of course, I havent hit the kind of tremendous popularity of George Martin or Neil Gaiman.
Im not in that league at all.
People have been very respectful and kind.
Ive gota websitewhich is not interactive.
I do not respond to people on it at all, and people seem okay with that.
Maybe theyll write me a letter thats nice but they know I really cant answer most letters any more.
I feel that people havent done this sort of mobbing thing, which must be rather terrifying.
In the intervening years, have you been able to answer it?
Or is that what the books and poems are for?
Is there an answer to that question?
In a sense, its a rhetorical question.
It simply brings it up, it just says it: men are afraid of women.
Will they be able to stop being afraid of women is, in a sense, the real question.
If they realise that theyre afraid of women and begin to handle the fear and accept it as such…
I think some of thats happened.
The doors are opening wider in that, because theres less fear.
Weve found out, well, what were we afraid of after all?
Your writing has played a huge part in pushing open those doors for so many people.
If it has played a part, Im very glad of it.
Ursula Le Guin, thank you very much.
The BBC Radio 4 Extra Earthsea radio adaptation airs on Monday the 27th of April at 6pm.
