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A review by emglange
Changing Planes: Stories by Ursula K. Le Guin
5.0
I have often remarked that I found Le Guin’s strength to be in worldbuilding first and foremost. While her characters and plots are often interesting, I find myself sinking into her worlds more readily. She approaches her fictions like an anthropologist, and even an anthropologist aware of Eurocentric/Western preconceptions. Changing Planes celebrates her worldbuilding strengths.
The collection of short stories is based around the idea that a woman from Cincinnati discovers a method of visiting other planes of existence, but only when you’re in an airport. The individual stories are accounts of some of these planes and the ways of life that have formed and continue to grow there.
It’s difficult to pick a favorite story from amongst the collection; despite being so different, Le Guin’s voice ties them together into a sense of wholeness. I can say that I was particularly intrigued by The Nna Mmoy Language, where translation falls apart and this fictional language takes into account all the could be said before or after something spoken in order to craft its meaning. The fact that I’m still thinking about what that sort of language might be like is a clue to how this collection has stuck with my thoughts.
The collection of short stories is based around the idea that a woman from Cincinnati discovers a method of visiting other planes of existence, but only when you’re in an airport. The individual stories are accounts of some of these planes and the ways of life that have formed and continue to grow there.
It’s difficult to pick a favorite story from amongst the collection; despite being so different, Le Guin’s voice ties them together into a sense of wholeness. I can say that I was particularly intrigued by The Nna Mmoy Language, where translation falls apart and this fictional language takes into account all the could be said before or after something spoken in order to craft its meaning. The fact that I’m still thinking about what that sort of language might be like is a clue to how this collection has stuck with my thoughts.