A review by reebeee
The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A tour de force of a novel about gender, sex, religion and mysticism, nationalism, loyalty, and relationships that transcend definitions of "friendship" or "romance." It has its flaws—foremost among them a bioessentialism excellently described by Charlie Jane Anders in the afterword to the 2019 edition, along with a lack of examination of Gethenian ideas about gender separate from sex—but (once again, as Anders points out) these flaws are also strengths, as they teach us to distrust the reliability of Genly's observations and opinions. For a book published in 1969, its thought experiments hold up remarkably well, and it's nuanced enough that a reader can take issue with a facet of the text without having to discard the value of the whole—in short, it deserves to be among the classics. Also it destroyed me, and I mean that as a compliment.

One of the other remarkable things about this book is Le Guin's continuing engagement with and development of the ideas the advances in it (e.g. a later short story about Winter in which she changes the default pronoun from "he" to "she"). I highly recommend reading her essay "Is Gender Necessary? Redux," first written in 1976 discussing her choices in the novel, and then commented upon again by Le Guin in 1987. It's an excellent model of an author who is not afraid to adjust her ideas without erasing her past thoughts. As Le Guin says, "minds that don't change are like clams that don't open."
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