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A review by outcolder
Planet of Exile by Ursula K. Le Guin
5.0
An early Le Guin, originally from 1966, this one is kind of light. The feminism that informs most of her work isn't here yet. But she is such a master storyteller, and her knowledge of anthropology makes the humanoid "aliens" more alien than some bug-eyed-monsters in the novels of lesser authors from the same period.
One theme that comes up often in this short book is listening. It is a common feature in the conversations of the natives on the planet of exile to say whether they "hear" a speaker or not, which has more to do with is the concept worthy of reflection or not than it has to do with acoustics. Telepathy was in most SF books back then and it is here, too, and just as Le Guin does with magic in the Earthsea books she gets us to think a little about how a person would actually learn how to use it: by lowering their defenses and letting these outside thoughts in. There are three humanoid cultures in the novel and they are all three likely to be wiped out by events in the story and part of the problem is that they cannot adapt and at the root of that is an inability to listen.
Just want to add that this edition surprised me with a thick glossy color advertisement for Kent cigarettes in the middle of it, and pleased me no end with early 70s lists of SF novels to order from the publisher. At the top of each list is the author's name, for example Delany, Brunner, Andre Norton, and they chose a different font for each of them. Smiles all around. I love finding these paperbacks that are nearly as old as I am at the Villa Fantastica SF&F library here in Vienna, Austria. The secret pleasures of the true nerd are there in überfluss.
One theme that comes up often in this short book is listening. It is a common feature in the conversations of the natives on the planet of exile to say whether they "hear" a speaker or not, which has more to do with is the concept worthy of reflection or not than it has to do with acoustics. Telepathy was in most SF books back then and it is here, too, and just as Le Guin does with magic in the Earthsea books she gets us to think a little about how a person would actually learn how to use it: by lowering their defenses and letting these outside thoughts in. There are three humanoid cultures in the novel and they are all three likely to be wiped out by events in the story and part of the problem is that they cannot adapt and at the root of that is an inability to listen.
Just want to add that this edition surprised me with a thick glossy color advertisement for Kent cigarettes in the middle of it, and pleased me no end with early 70s lists of SF novels to order from the publisher. At the top of each list is the author's name, for example Delany, Brunner, Andre Norton, and they chose a different font for each of them. Smiles all around. I love finding these paperbacks that are nearly as old as I am at the Villa Fantastica SF&F library here in Vienna, Austria. The secret pleasures of the true nerd are there in überfluss.