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A review by hopebrasfield
Tehanu by Ursula K. Le Guin
5.0
My favorite in the series by far (so far).
At this point in the series the world is fully built and the characters are so well developed I can finally lose myself in the plot from page one.
Unfortunately, somebody has spoiled the rest of the series for me--I am trying not to think about it but it might take me a while to get around to finishing on account of how mad I am!
Also the writing (as always) was brilliant.
Quotes below are behind spoiler tags just in case.
"But she had begun to see what their attempt to do him honor would do to him--denying his loss, denying him is grief for what he had lost, forcing him to act the part of what he was no longer."
^ Anybody who's quit something or had something taken away from them (a role, a skill, etc.), especially if you've got to go on and keep talking about it for one reason or another, surely gets what this feels like!
"If we hide, Therru, we feed him. We will eat. And we will starve him."
^ It's so hard not to feed the enemy; this is a great reminder of that.
"And I know that all I understand about living is having your work to do, and being able to do it. That's the pleasure, and the glory, and all. And if you can't do the work, or it's taken from you, then what's any good? You have to have something..."
^ I once found a copy of Man's Search for Meaning for ten cents in a Goodwill. I was just a kid, but reading about his three sources of meaning has stayed with me (and relates directly to the above quote). Specifically, he writes: "We can discover this meaning of life in three different ways: (1) by creating a work or doing a deed; (2) by experiencing something or encountering someone; and (3) by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering." Work, when we think about it beyond the confines of capitalistic-labor-selling-b.s., is so very important to our well-being! Ursula gets it.
"Like most people, Tiff believed that you are what happens to you. The rich and strong must have virtue; one to whom evil has been done must be bad, and may rightly be punished."
^ URSULA GETS IT.
"She found that their company revived her, carried her away from the constant presence of last night's terror, little by little, till she could begin to look back on it as something that had happened, not something that was happening, that must always be happening to her."
^ What a way to sum up the experience of trauma!
"The making from the unmaking / The ending from the beginning / Who shall know surely? / What we know is the doorway between them / That we enter departing"
^ Earthsea lore via poetry.
At this point in the series the world is fully built and the characters are so well developed I can finally lose myself in the plot from page one.
Unfortunately, somebody has spoiled the rest of the series for me--I am trying not to think about it but it might take me a while to get around to finishing on account of how mad I am!
Also the writing (as always) was brilliant.
Quotes below are behind spoiler tags just in case.
"But she had begun to see what their attempt to do him honor would do to him--denying his loss, denying him is grief for what he had lost, forcing him to act the part of what he was no longer."
^ Anybody who's quit something or had something taken away from them (a role, a skill, etc.), especially if you've got to go on and keep talking about it for one reason or another, surely gets what this feels like!
"If we hide, Therru, we feed him. We will eat. And we will starve him."
^ It's so hard not to feed the enemy; this is a great reminder of that.
"And I know that all I understand about living is having your work to do, and being able to do it. That's the pleasure, and the glory, and all. And if you can't do the work, or it's taken from you, then what's any good? You have to have something..."
^ I once found a copy of Man's Search for Meaning for ten cents in a Goodwill. I was just a kid, but reading about his three sources of meaning has stayed with me (and relates directly to the above quote). Specifically, he writes: "We can discover this meaning of life in three different ways: (1) by creating a work or doing a deed; (2) by experiencing something or encountering someone; and (3) by the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering." Work, when we think about it beyond the confines of capitalistic-labor-selling-b.s., is so very important to our well-being! Ursula gets it.
"Like most people, Tiff believed that you are what happens to you. The rich and strong must have virtue; one to whom evil has been done must be bad, and may rightly be punished."
^ URSULA GETS IT.
"She found that their company revived her, carried her away from the constant presence of last night's terror, little by little, till she could begin to look back on it as something that had happened, not something that was happening, that must always be happening to her."
^ What a way to sum up the experience of trauma!
"The making from the unmaking / The ending from the beginning / Who shall know surely? / What we know is the doorway between them / That we enter departing"
^ Earthsea lore via poetry.