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A review by ahsimlibrarian
Ursula K. Le Guin: The Last Interview and Other Conversations by Ursula K. Le Guin, David Streitfeld
5.0
I keep reading essays by Le Guin and interviews with her as I enjoy spending time with this woman and her fine mind so much. What wonderful company she continues to be.
Some choice interview bits:
On what she wants her legacy to be:
"Irreverence toward undeserved authority, and passionate respect for the power of the word. Oh, and my books staying in print, too."
How she became a feminist in the early 1970s:
"It was a real mind shift. And I was a grown woman with kids. And mothers of children were not welcome among a lot of early feminists. I was living the bad dream. I was a mommy. You know there's always prejudice in a revolutionary movement. I wasn't even sure I was welcome. And I wasn't to some of those people. It took a lot of thinking for me to find what kind of feminist I could be and why I wanted to be a feminist." (xv)
"Isn't the real question this: Is the work worth doing? Am I, a human being, working for what I really need and want--or for what the State or the advertisers tell me I want. Do I choose? I think that's what anarchism comes down to. Do I let my choices be made for me, and so go along with the power game, or do I choose, and accept the responsibility for my choice? In other words, am I going to be a machine-part, or a human being?"
"To genrify is necessary. There are different genres. What is wrong is to rank them as higher or lower, to make a hierarchy based only on genre, not the quality of the writing. That is my whole argument and it goes no further. So don't try to extend it into this world."
From a written interview, not Le Guin's words:
"To put it simply, anarchy is based on the realistic observation that people left to themselves, without the intervention of the state, tend to cooperate and work out their differences. The process may be awkward, inefficient and punctuated by fights, but its end result is usually more satisfying to everyone than when things are done by command." (94-5)
Some choice interview bits:
On what she wants her legacy to be:
"Irreverence toward undeserved authority, and passionate respect for the power of the word. Oh, and my books staying in print, too."
How she became a feminist in the early 1970s:
"It was a real mind shift. And I was a grown woman with kids. And mothers of children were not welcome among a lot of early feminists. I was living the bad dream. I was a mommy. You know there's always prejudice in a revolutionary movement. I wasn't even sure I was welcome. And I wasn't to some of those people. It took a lot of thinking for me to find what kind of feminist I could be and why I wanted to be a feminist." (xv)
"Isn't the real question this: Is the work worth doing? Am I, a human being, working for what I really need and want--or for what the State or the advertisers tell me I want. Do I choose? I think that's what anarchism comes down to. Do I let my choices be made for me, and so go along with the power game, or do I choose, and accept the responsibility for my choice? In other words, am I going to be a machine-part, or a human being?"
"To genrify is necessary. There are different genres. What is wrong is to rank them as higher or lower, to make a hierarchy based only on genre, not the quality of the writing. That is my whole argument and it goes no further. So don't try to extend it into this world."
From a written interview, not Le Guin's words:
"To put it simply, anarchy is based on the realistic observation that people left to themselves, without the intervention of the state, tend to cooperate and work out their differences. The process may be awkward, inefficient and punctuated by fights, but its end result is usually more satisfying to everyone than when things are done by command." (94-5)