Reviews with content warning for Mental illness - The Lathe of Heaven

Reviews tagging 'Mental illness'

The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin

17 reviews

figgy24_20's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Really interesting, complex book. Very intriguing, but not confusing. Because the main driving force of the book, throughout, is the character of George. And he grows and changes and faces struggles. The plot is very strange and difficult to follow. Looking back, there are whispers of the beginning at the end and of the end at the beginning.

Wonderful, strange, Le Guin Does it again!

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lottie1803's review against another edition

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Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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samdalefox's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

I enjoyed the concept and found the the book easy to read. It's short enough to get through in one sitting if you enjoy a full evening of reading. I think many important moral and philosophical points were raised, but I did find that the pacing of the story weighed things down for me, especially around 50-80% of the way through, the pace slowed and the storyline seemed repetitive.

However, pacing aside, this is a solid classic scifi book where a simple concept is continually escalated until we see its natural (disastrous) conclusion. Both lead characters, Haber and Orr, are imbued with heavy symbolism. And the tertiary character

Heather Lelache

has particular significance with respect to identity. I would like to have seen more exploration of the

Aldebaranian aliens

I found their characterisation interesting, their interactions with Orr moving, and their potential insights into 'iahklu' and 'Er' perrehne' fascinating. It's a short read but packed with meaning, symbols and emotions. It shows us that the world is complicated, maybe meaningless, there are no easy solutions. We should embrace the constraints and learn to live within them.

It wasn't until page 149 that I understood the title of the book 'The Lathe of Heaven'...

A lathe is a machine for shaping wood. Orr is consistenly described throughout the book as been a solid block of wood. Haber sees him as an inert insignficant lump, while Lelache sees him as a pillar of immovable strength. Haber can be interpretted as the lathe trying to shape Orr, the block of wood, by using Orr's effective dreams as a way to intentionally change reality. Haber explicity says his goal on pg 149 as "then this world will be like heaven, and the men will be like gods.".

Haber and Orr represent opposites in the extreme. Haber - Selfish benevolence. Disrepect, or at least misunderstanding, of nature. God ego. Insatiable will/ambition. Individualism. Ultimately his perfectionist tinkering led to eugenics, and the climate changes issues persisted throughout all his changes. Who did he really help? Did the means of achieving the desired ends, justify them? e.g.,

by removing the existance of concepts of race and ethnicity can one really say he solved racism and white supremacy? No, he simply stripped people of their idividuality and cultures and homogenised them. It is a blunt tool that made a short cut through a nuanced problem...

Whereas Orr - passive. Acceptance of nature. No desire to impose his will upon the existing order. Desires harmony and just 'to be'.

Quotes:

"Love doesn't just sit there, like a stone, it has to be made, like bread; remade all the time, made new.

"Things don't have purposes, as if the universe were a machine, where every part has a useful function. What's the function of a galaxy? I don't know if our life has a purpose and I don't see that it matters. What does matter is that we're a part. Like a thread in a cloth or a grass-blade in a field. It is and we are. What we do is like wind blowing on the grass."

"But the big man was like an onion, slip off layer after layer of personality, belief, response, infinite layers, no end to them, no center to him. Nowhere that he ever stopped, had to stop, had to say Here I stay! No being, only layers."

"He had gone into sleep research and oneirology in the first place to find therapeutic applications. He was not interested in detached knowledge, science for science' sake: there was no use in learning anything if it was of no use. Relevance was his touchstone..

"A person is defined solely by the extent of his influence over other people, by the sphere of his interrelationships; and morality is an utter meaningless term unless defined as the good one does to others, the fufiling of one's function in the sociopolitical whole."

"Orr was not a fast reasoner. In fact, he was not a reasonor. Hi arrived at idas the slow way, never skating over the clear, hard ice fo logic, nor soaring on the slipstreams of imagination, but slogging, plodding along on the heavy ground of existence. He did not see connections, which is said to be a hallmark of intellect. He felt connections - like a plumber."

“We're in the world, not against it. It doesn't work to try to stand outside things and run them, that way. It just doesn't work, it goes against life. There is a way but you have to follow it. The world is, no matter how we think it ought to be. You have to be with it. You have to let it be.”

“The quality of the will to power is, precisely, growth. Achievement is its cancellation. To be, the will to power must increase with each fulfillment, making the fulfillment only a step to a further one. The vaster the power gained, the vaster the appetite for more. As there was no visible limit to the power Haber wielded through Orr’s dreams, so there was no end to his determination to improve the world.”

"It's not that he's evil. He's right, one ought ot try and help other people. But that analogy with snakebite serum is false. He was talknig about one person meeting another person in pain... You have to help the other person. But it's not right to play god with masses of people. To be God you have to know what you're doing. And to do any good at all, just believing you're right and your motives are good isn't enough. You have to... be in touch. He isn't in touch... He sees the world only as a means to his end. It doesn't make any difference if his end is good; means are all we got... He can't accept, he can't let be, he can't let go."

"He seemed not to know the uses fo silence."

"... a machine is more blameless, more sinless even than any animal. It has no intentions whatsoever but our own."

Content Warnings

lanid's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging mysterious reflective

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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mkdjr's review against another edition

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challenging emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

I cannot recommend this book enough. I found certain feelings and experiences of mine to be so powerfully and elegantly conveyed in ways I did not even begin to expect. I read this book while listening to some of my favorite instrumental songs and was alltogether absorbed, amazed, overjoyed, and heartbroken.

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potassiumk's review against another edition

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emotional mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

It was pretty slow at first. I found it hard to get into, but it picked up pretty fast after the first 50 pages. Overall, the book was excellent! The only flaw, which really isn't a flaw was that I wasn't too into it at the beginning.

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