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The Hainish Cycle #8
The Telling
The Barnes & Noble ReviewSeptember 2000The Telling Ursula K. Le Guin's The Telling is the latest in the series of independent, loosely connected novels known as the Hainish cycle. The cycle began in 1966 with Rocannon's World and includes at least two undisputed The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed . The Telling manages to hold its own in this distinguished company, and I can't offer prospective readers a more meaningful recommendation than that. The central figure of this idea-driven, gently didactic novel is Sutty, a young, Terran-born woman who works as an Observer for the Ekumen, a sort of benign, intergalactic League of Nations. Sutty came to maturity on an Earth dominated by Unists, religious fundamentalists whose totalitarian insistence on "one Word, one Book, one Belief" very nearly devastated the planet. In The Telling, Sutty has just been assigned to the planet Aka, an ironically similar world, wholly dedicated to scientific advancement — a world in which all belief systems not related to technological progress have been driven underground. Aka, like the Earth of Sutty's childhood, is a place in which the past, with all its color and variety, has been buried, crushed beneath the weight of a drab, monolithic political system. This situation (which, Le Guin notes, directly reflects the repressive conditions of Communist China under Chairman Mao) provides the novel with its moral and intellectual framework, and serves as the basis for the spiritual quest which dominates the narrative. Thisquest takes the form of Sutty's pursuit of a forbidden, centrally important Akan the Telling. The Telling is an ancient, all-inclusive method of cultural exchange that encompasses history, literature, philosophy, science, medicine, and myth. Sutty defines the act of Telling as "teaching whatever's known to whoever will listen," and it still survives through the clandestine efforts of renegade teachers and a buried cache of forbidden books that lie hidden in a cave in the provincial backwaters of Aka. This primal conflict between the proponents of the Telling and the forces of cultural repression is classic Ursula Le Guin, and it is rendered with subtlety, passion, and understated eloquence. Le Guin's fiction has frequently concerned itself with conflicting ideologies and with the need for balance, harmony, and the peaceful reconciliation of opposites. The Telling offers, among many other things, a moving, memorable restatement of that recurring concern. It is one of those all too rare books in which fiction and philosophy, art and ideas come together in a seamlessly integrated whole. —Bill Sheehan Bill Sheehan reviews horror, suspense, and science fiction for Cemetery Dance , The New York Review of Science Fiction , and other publications. His book-length critical study of the fiction of Peter Straub, At the Foot of the Story Tree , has just been published by Subterranean Press (www.subterraneanpress.com).
Library Binding
First published September 11, 2000
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About the author
Ursula K. Le Guin
1,045 books30.4k followersUrsula K. Le Guin published twenty-two novels, eleven volumes of short stories, four collections of essays, twelve books for children, six volumes of poetry and four of translation, and has received many awards: Hugo, Nebula, National Book Award, PEN-Malamud, etc. Her recent publications include the novel Lavinia, an essay collection, Cheek by Jowl, and The Wild Girls. She lived in Portland, Oregon.
She was known for her treatment of gender (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Matter of Seggri), political systems (The Telling, The Dispossessed) and difference/otherness in any other form. Her interest in non-Western philosophies was reflected in works such as "Solitude" and The Telling but even more interesting are her imagined societies, often mixing traits extracted from her profound knowledge of anthropology acquired from growing up with her father, the famous anthropologist, Alfred Kroeber. The Hainish Cycle reflects the anthropologist's experience of immersing themselves in new strange cultures since most of their main characters and narrators (Le Guin favoured the first-person narration) are envoys from a humanitarian organization, the Ekumen, sent to investigate or ally themselves with the people of a different world and learn their ways.
She was known for her treatment of gender (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Matter of Seggri), political systems (The Telling, The Dispossessed) and difference/otherness in any other form. Her interest in non-Western philosophies was reflected in works such as "Solitude" and The Telling but even more interesting are her imagined societies, often mixing traits extracted from her profound knowledge of anthropology acquired from growing up with her father, the famous anthropologist, Alfred Kroeber. The Hainish Cycle reflects the anthropologist's experience of immersing themselves in new strange cultures since most of their main characters and narrators (Le Guin favoured the first-person narration) are envoys from a humanitarian organization, the Ekumen, sent to investigate or ally themselves with the people of a different world and learn their ways.
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September 24, 2019
Ursula K. LeGuin returns to her Hainsih cycle in The Telling but begins on dear old Terra.
First published in 2000, The Telling has as LeGuin’s outside-looking-in observer / narrator the Ekumen trained Sutty. In LeGuin’s Hainish universe, the Ekumen is an alliance of like-minded worlds who seek to re-unite humanity form the galaxy wide and eons old diaspora of the original Hain colonizers.
LeGuin first wrote about the Hain as the original source of humanity. Hundreds of thousands of years ago, people left Hain and went out to populate other solar systems and planets, our Terra being one. That old Hainish culture collapsed and all of the colonies eventually “forgot” from where they had come. A later Hainish civilization has returned to space and finds its offspring changed to meet local adaptive needs and many of the branches off the old tree have evolved separately.
This concept is both a fun series for science fiction / fantasy as well as a vehicle by which LeGuin can explore allegorical sociological concepts. In The Telling, the protagonist Sutty is an Ekumen observer, and through her LeGuin can take the reader on a metaphorical examination of a different culture that has roots in our own meta group dynamics.
Sutty has left an Earth that is ravaged by geo-political and theological conflict and goes to serve as a kind of ambassador to Aka, a world that has only recently been “re-discovered” by the Hain. Akan society has demonstratively and aggressively shrugged off her old ways and cultures, literally burning the history books, as they seek to catch up to Hain in a single generation. Sutty and LeGuin observe the conflicts this rapid modernization has engendered in the people of both the old ways and the new.
From Wikipedia: “Le Guin constructed the recent historical situation of Aka as a parallel to the history of China during the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. The practice of the Telling is analogous to Taoist practices, and its suppression to the suppression of religious practices by the Chinese government at the time.”
I have yet to find an Ursula K. LeGuin book that I did not like. The Telling is a fair representative of her fine work, blending a literary virtuosity with fresh ideas and with a significant social message.
First published in 2000, The Telling has as LeGuin’s outside-looking-in observer / narrator the Ekumen trained Sutty. In LeGuin’s Hainish universe, the Ekumen is an alliance of like-minded worlds who seek to re-unite humanity form the galaxy wide and eons old diaspora of the original Hain colonizers.
LeGuin first wrote about the Hain as the original source of humanity. Hundreds of thousands of years ago, people left Hain and went out to populate other solar systems and planets, our Terra being one. That old Hainish culture collapsed and all of the colonies eventually “forgot” from where they had come. A later Hainish civilization has returned to space and finds its offspring changed to meet local adaptive needs and many of the branches off the old tree have evolved separately.
This concept is both a fun series for science fiction / fantasy as well as a vehicle by which LeGuin can explore allegorical sociological concepts. In The Telling, the protagonist Sutty is an Ekumen observer, and through her LeGuin can take the reader on a metaphorical examination of a different culture that has roots in our own meta group dynamics.
Sutty has left an Earth that is ravaged by geo-political and theological conflict and goes to serve as a kind of ambassador to Aka, a world that has only recently been “re-discovered” by the Hain. Akan society has demonstratively and aggressively shrugged off her old ways and cultures, literally burning the history books, as they seek to catch up to Hain in a single generation. Sutty and LeGuin observe the conflicts this rapid modernization has engendered in the people of both the old ways and the new.
From Wikipedia: “Le Guin constructed the recent historical situation of Aka as a parallel to the history of China during the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution. The practice of the Telling is analogous to Taoist practices, and its suppression to the suppression of religious practices by the Chinese government at the time.”
I have yet to find an Ursula K. LeGuin book that I did not like. The Telling is a fair representative of her fine work, blending a literary virtuosity with fresh ideas and with a significant social message.
January 16, 2016
When reading Le Guin's books, I'm often fooled into thinking that the story is only reaching my brain. I realize too late that it's worked its way into my heart and will demand tears by the end.
Back when I did my 2015 wrap-up, I mentioned two seemingly unrelated categories of books that I had enjoyed: 1) science fiction by women, and 2) stories about self-reflection in the countryside. To my surprise, one of my first reads of 2016 was both of those things.
Sutty was born on a future Earth overrun by religious fanatics. To get away from their oppressive rule, she studies to become an Observer for an interplanetary union dedicated to understanding and preserving knowledge about the universe's many cultures. Her career enables her to go on a one-way trip away from the world she knew, and into the world of Aka: a supercontinent on a distant planet that, she discovers, has become a mirror image of Earth. Here, government is dominated by technological fanatics, who have buried what they call the "rotten corpse" of traditional religious practices. The mainstream urban culture of Aka lives in adamant denial of its past. As a result, Sutty's task is to reconstruct a language and philosophy that, at first glance, seems to never have existed.
As Sutty moves away from the cities and into the countryside, she discovers that the old way of life has actually been hidden in plain sight. She immerses herself in the culture and tries to keep an "objective" record of what she finds, which sometimes proves challenging: her own life experiences gave her a deep disdain for religion, but the practices here turn out to be at odds with her preconceptions of what "religion" means. Her persistent internal chorus of Wrong, wrong eventually fades as she acclimates to the open-ended, open-hearted way of life.
For these Akans, few crimes are worse than usury, and not just when it comes to money. They live for the ongoing well-being of themselves and each other, not for the future fulfillment of rewards or debts.
Their culture revolves around the Telling: the never-ending sharing and reinterpretation of stories. Sutty's attempt to understand the Telling is similarly never-ending. The parables and fairy tales are fittingly un-Earthly in their lack of tidily interpretable conclusions. Although really, the Telling is only half (or less than half) of the practice. The unspoken remainder is the Listening, an art that Sutty gradually becomes better at herself. Even her enemies were once small children who stood at a window as their world ended outside; it's a past that's only revealed when they're willing to tell, and when she's willing to listen.
The universe could be stranger than either science or religion would have Sutty think, and perhaps it is by opening her ears to both that she stands a chance of being prepared to wrap her head around the truth.
A yielding, an obedience, a willingness to accept these notes as the right notes, this pattern as the true pattern, is the essential gesture of performance, translation, and understanding. The gesture need not be permanent, a lasting posture of the mind or heart; yet it is not false.
Back when I did my 2015 wrap-up, I mentioned two seemingly unrelated categories of books that I had enjoyed: 1) science fiction by women, and 2) stories about self-reflection in the countryside. To my surprise, one of my first reads of 2016 was both of those things.
Sutty was born on a future Earth overrun by religious fanatics. To get away from their oppressive rule, she studies to become an Observer for an interplanetary union dedicated to understanding and preserving knowledge about the universe's many cultures. Her career enables her to go on a one-way trip away from the world she knew, and into the world of Aka: a supercontinent on a distant planet that, she discovers, has become a mirror image of Earth. Here, government is dominated by technological fanatics, who have buried what they call the "rotten corpse" of traditional religious practices. The mainstream urban culture of Aka lives in adamant denial of its past. As a result, Sutty's task is to reconstruct a language and philosophy that, at first glance, seems to never have existed.
As Sutty moves away from the cities and into the countryside, she discovers that the old way of life has actually been hidden in plain sight. She immerses herself in the culture and tries to keep an "objective" record of what she finds, which sometimes proves challenging: her own life experiences gave her a deep disdain for religion, but the practices here turn out to be at odds with her preconceptions of what "religion" means. Her persistent internal chorus of Wrong, wrong eventually fades as she acclimates to the open-ended, open-hearted way of life.
For these Akans, few crimes are worse than usury, and not just when it comes to money. They live for the ongoing well-being of themselves and each other, not for the future fulfillment of rewards or debts.
Their culture revolves around the Telling: the never-ending sharing and reinterpretation of stories. Sutty's attempt to understand the Telling is similarly never-ending. The parables and fairy tales are fittingly un-Earthly in their lack of tidily interpretable conclusions. Although really, the Telling is only half (or less than half) of the practice. The unspoken remainder is the Listening, an art that Sutty gradually becomes better at herself. Even her enemies were once small children who stood at a window as their world ended outside; it's a past that's only revealed when they're willing to tell, and when she's willing to listen.
The universe could be stranger than either science or religion would have Sutty think, and perhaps it is by opening her ears to both that she stands a chance of being prepared to wrap her head around the truth.
A yielding, an obedience, a willingness to accept these notes as the right notes, this pattern as the true pattern, is the essential gesture of performance, translation, and understanding. The gesture need not be permanent, a lasting posture of the mind or heart; yet it is not false.
August 31, 2016
This story is very true. Some parts gave me a weird, deep emotional ache. It's fiction, but it's not.
October 14, 2025
*Updated- Adds Review To Rating*
4.6⭐ Rounded Up
A brilliant short novel in which Le Guin takes a riff off Orwell ( and/or possibly Katherine Burdekin?) about the intentional destruction of culture, history, memory. Her historical model, reportedly, was China's Cultural Revolution/ Great Leap Forward. The style, of course, is all Le Guin. She also side-swipes technological consumerism and institutionalized homophobia along the way.
The book is set in Le Guin's Hainish universe. The Hain are the primogeniture race/plot device the author uses to create and experiment with different varieties of humanity on different planets (and to tie the different stories together).
Sutty is an Earth woman and an Observer from the Ekumen ( think of the United Federation of Planets run by the Dalai Lama). She's leaving behind a personal tragedy on Earth, beginning her career as a cultural and historical observer and recorder on the planet Aka. By the time it takes her to get there, Aka has become what Le Guin calls a "fast forward" industrial society, locked into its "march to the stars." Sutty is asked by her boss to undertake a mission to find what's left of the planet's original culture, now being systematically destroyed by the Corporate world government.
It's a gentle and mannerly novel but not at all slow paced (imho). Sutty works to unravel the mystery of Aka, while at the same time avoiding being used by competing interests. The book is a thought provoking read, by a master story teller.
4.6⭐ Rounded Up
A brilliant short novel in which Le Guin takes a riff off Orwell ( and/or possibly Katherine Burdekin?) about the intentional destruction of culture, history, memory. Her historical model, reportedly, was China's Cultural Revolution/ Great Leap Forward. The style, of course, is all Le Guin. She also side-swipes technological consumerism and institutionalized homophobia along the way.
The book is set in Le Guin's Hainish universe. The Hain are the primogeniture race/plot device the author uses to create and experiment with different varieties of humanity on different planets (and to tie the different stories together).
Sutty is an Earth woman and an Observer from the Ekumen ( think of the United Federation of Planets run by the Dalai Lama). She's leaving behind a personal tragedy on Earth, beginning her career as a cultural and historical observer and recorder on the planet Aka. By the time it takes her to get there, Aka has become what Le Guin calls a "fast forward" industrial society, locked into its "march to the stars." Sutty is asked by her boss to undertake a mission to find what's left of the planet's original culture, now being systematically destroyed by the Corporate world government.
It's a gentle and mannerly novel but not at all slow paced (imho). Sutty works to unravel the mystery of Aka, while at the same time avoiding being used by competing interests. The book is a thought provoking read, by a master story teller.
October 3, 2019
Novela curiosa, extraña y (como siempre con Le guin) extremadamente interesante.
A pesar de todo, me costó un poco conectar con ella, y no se va a convertir en mi libro preferido. Pero me parece muy recomendable si os atrae su saga del Ekumen, porque es una pieza más de ese gigantesco universo que imaginó.
Al mismo tiempo no es necesario haber leído nada para comprender "El relato", que tiene unas reminiscencias claras a la Revolución Cultural y en general al régimen comunista en China. Quizás eso es lo que menos me ha gustado, porque me ha parecido menos original de lo que suele ser esta autora y ya hemos leído sobre situaciones parecidas en muchas ocasiones (ese mundo atrapado entre leyes absurdas y campos de trabajo), pero aún así el punto de vista resulta muy sugestivo.
Nuestra protagonista, que llega a este planeta como observadora, es originaria de la tierra y particularmente de la India.
*Estos detalles hacen que siempre aprecie a esta escritora aún más por mostrarnos protagonistas que nunca son el típico hombre blanco occidental al que estamos acostumbrados.
En fin, nuestra protagonista, Sutty, tiene como objetivo desentrañar la verdadera identidad de este mundo, su Historia, cultura, creencias, lengua... pero se encuentra con un régimen hermético que ha intentado borrar todo rastro del pasado y prohibe cualquier tipo de recuerdo de aquel tiempo. La investigación de Sutty y cómo poco a poco va adentrándose en la historia de este mundo (y en la suya propia) me ha parecido muy interesante, tiene ese punto antropológico que tanto me gusta... Aunque al mismo tiempo, como decía al principio, tampoco es una de las novelas más impactantes de Le Guin.
Sea como sea, nos hace reflexionar una vez más, y ya solo por eso merece una reedición.
A pesar de todo, me costó un poco conectar con ella, y no se va a convertir en mi libro preferido. Pero me parece muy recomendable si os atrae su saga del Ekumen, porque es una pieza más de ese gigantesco universo que imaginó.
Al mismo tiempo no es necesario haber leído nada para comprender "El relato", que tiene unas reminiscencias claras a la Revolución Cultural y en general al régimen comunista en China. Quizás eso es lo que menos me ha gustado, porque me ha parecido menos original de lo que suele ser esta autora y ya hemos leído sobre situaciones parecidas en muchas ocasiones (ese mundo atrapado entre leyes absurdas y campos de trabajo), pero aún así el punto de vista resulta muy sugestivo.
Nuestra protagonista, que llega a este planeta como observadora, es originaria de la tierra y particularmente de la India.
*Estos detalles hacen que siempre aprecie a esta escritora aún más por mostrarnos protagonistas que nunca son el típico hombre blanco occidental al que estamos acostumbrados.
En fin, nuestra protagonista, Sutty, tiene como objetivo desentrañar la verdadera identidad de este mundo, su Historia, cultura, creencias, lengua... pero se encuentra con un régimen hermético que ha intentado borrar todo rastro del pasado y prohibe cualquier tipo de recuerdo de aquel tiempo. La investigación de Sutty y cómo poco a poco va adentrándose en la historia de este mundo (y en la suya propia) me ha parecido muy interesante, tiene ese punto antropológico que tanto me gusta... Aunque al mismo tiempo, como decía al principio, tampoco es una de las novelas más impactantes de Le Guin.
Sea como sea, nos hace reflexionar una vez más, y ya solo por eso merece una reedición.
July 18, 2018
“We're not outside the world... We are the world. We're its language. So we live and it lives. You see? If we don't say the words, what is their in our world?”
― Ursula K. Le Guin, The Telling
Le Guin, so far, for me, has yet to disappoint. This is one of her more Eastern-influenced books. There are elements of Buddhism (and a real feeling of Tibet) that runs throughout this novel. It is a book about a world (Aka) where the corporation/government has outlawed history, culture and writing. Books have been distroyed. Knowledge painted over or burned. But the native Akans seek to keep their history alive through stories, hidden books, etc.
In many ways it is a retelling (through Science Fiction) or reframing of China's 'Great Leap Forward'. There are elements of families divided, fanatical bureaucrats, and survival underneath it all. It is a novel about contrasting cultures, the transmission of history and philosophy through community and stories. It is, like many of Le Guin's novels, an exporation into the anthropological questions that arise when cultures meet.
It wasn't my favorite Le Guin, but it was still very good and moving.
― Ursula K. Le Guin, The Telling
Le Guin, so far, for me, has yet to disappoint. This is one of her more Eastern-influenced books. There are elements of Buddhism (and a real feeling of Tibet) that runs throughout this novel. It is a book about a world (Aka) where the corporation/government has outlawed history, culture and writing. Books have been distroyed. Knowledge painted over or burned. But the native Akans seek to keep their history alive through stories, hidden books, etc.
In many ways it is a retelling (through Science Fiction) or reframing of China's 'Great Leap Forward'. There are elements of families divided, fanatical bureaucrats, and survival underneath it all. It is a novel about contrasting cultures, the transmission of history and philosophy through community and stories. It is, like many of Le Guin's novels, an exporation into the anthropological questions that arise when cultures meet.
It wasn't my favorite Le Guin, but it was still very good and moving.
June 7, 2019
This is not a Le Guin book I'd ever heard much about, but I really enjoyed it. Sutty is one of my favorite Le Guin protagonists, in part because her perspective on religious authoritarianism is so relatable. The idea of story as a vehicle for telling truths about the world is a very common theme in Le Guin's writing, and the way that is expressed here in the system of The Telling is lovely. I know that the parallel she is drawing with Aka is to China's recent history, but I think that the story could just as easily relate to certain segments of white dude-bro atheists and "rational" thinkers in Western countries. This is a message-heavy story and it has, if anything, only gotten more relevant since its publication.
December 8, 2023
This was the last book that Le Guin wrote in her Hainish cycle (and the first full novel in this universe since the excellent The Dispossessed) and it is a beautiful story about language and how stories get passed down between generations. As in many of her stories, sexuality and colonization are major themes here. The characters are engaging and there is everything here to engage a reader in the 21st century because it still feels so fresh despite being written back in 2000.
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October 27, 2021
The Telling is a novel set on planet Aka but its female protagonist Sutty is an Ekumen visitor from our own planet (Earth/Terra). Sutty's Ekumen mentor/diplomat is from another planet as well (the two of them are only representatives of the Ekumen planets on Aka) but Sutty is left on her own most of the time. Sutty, the Anglo-Indian protagonist that acts as an observer for Ekumen is faced with a hard task of exploring this planet while not compromising budding diplomatic relationships.
A few words about the Ekumen to clear things up. The Ekumen (also known as the League of All Worlds ) is a future organization of humanoid governments, numbering many planets and willing to explore and discover new ones. Ekumen wants to share its knowledge/technology with Aka and they are willing to take it. Nevertheless, the Ekumen is worried as there is proof that Aka's atheist and technologically hungry government is oppressing its own population, banning religion and philosophy in the name of progress and reducing people to closely monitored 'consumers'. Since Ekumen is helping planet Aka in their technological development, this is obviously a concern.
Sutty has grown up in times of religious terror and wars, a fact that is relevant for understanding of her contradicted emotions while she serves as an Ekumen observer (as well as her motif for becoming Ekumen observer in the first place- she wanted to leave her native planet Earth). Sutty is named after an Indian goddess that walked into fire after her god husband, a fact that is clearly symbolical and references a horrible custom of burning woman alive. Religion can be used for good, but also for bad. Things have taken a turn for the better on her native Terra under the Ekumen Watch, but Sutty is often haunted by her past and sad memories. There is irony in the fact that someone who has grown up under religious terror now must examine communist/capitalist/technological terror. Religion is banned on planet Aka but its totalitarian atheist government is just as oppressing as a one composed of religious fanatics would be. Militant communism/atheism fanaticism doesn't differ at all from the religious one. Sutty gayness is a factor as well, but perhaps mostly a symbolical one. Sutty's sexuality doesn't really play a key role in the novel, as she is grieving for an ex-lover and not romantically motivated in her actions (she's not falling in love any time soon). On planet Aka, homosexuality is banned because to them it doesn't make sense from a biological point of view. Apparently, science (and not just religion) can be used to oppress others. All in the name of progress.
Set in the future, like all of Le Guin's Hainish novels, The Telling explores many interesting sociological themes. However, it is closely bound with our recent history. You could say this is Ursula Le Guin's take on the Chinese Cultural Revolution set in the Hainish Universe. So much so that I felt at times like I was reading about Chinese Cultural Revolution and not about another planet. The analogy was a bit too strong for my taste at times, in the sense that this novel didn't seem as imaginative as her other works. While I fully understand Le Guin's need to criticize fanatical and oppressing governments and to warn us of perils of cultural assimilation/colonization, the close parallels with the Cultural Revolution made it harder for me to enjoy this novel as a work of fiction. Don't get me wrong. There is plenty of food for the thought in this novel. The author often presents her arguments in an intelligent way (even if the writing leaves something to be desired at times). Nevertheless, I found that The Telling was not nearly as imaginative and well crafted as other works by Le Guin. The book is at times too close an analogy.
The Telling was my first Le Guin novel that didn't feel like science fiction at times. I had to remind myself that it was set on another planet. I could swear that its Anglo-Indian female protagonist Sutty was in fact visiting China during the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward. When Sutty recounted her growing up in India and arriving to Canada, I could imagine her our contemporary, a investigating journalist setting off to China. Her emotions would certainly match that scene. When she explores planet Aka, she is mistaken for a native. Sutty is fluent in the local language and can read the ancient script. So, the native population often excepts her as one of their own, even when Sutty struggles mimicking their customs (both the modern and the old ones), you can still imagine her as being a native of the planet. While Sutty's research was certainly interesting, it could have possibly happened on our planet as well.
On the other hand, there were times when cultural parallels were well explored. I loved Le Guin's take on Taoist inspired Aka's religion/philosophy know as 'The Telling' in the novel. It seems to me that Le Guin is well acquainted with Taoism and Buddism, so well acquainted she is able to summon some of the complexity of Asian theologies, myths and philosophy in this novel, something I imagine is not easy to do. Sutty's sincere devotion to discovering and saving the forbidden semi-religion known as The Telling is very convincing, but Sutty as a protagonist sometimes falls short. I enjoyed Sutty's thoughts, reflections and observations. Nevertheless, the character of Sutty remained something of a mystery. At times Sutty seemed a bit preachy, as when she verbally attacked another character and showed poor self-restraint. This combined with convenient plot developments seemed to weaken her character somewhat. I wanted to know more about Sutty and to see more character development. When Sutty finally shares her personal tragedy with the Monitor (another important character), their connection seems a bit unconvincing. I didn't feel like that relationship was explored as well as it could have been. Perhaps I just wanted Sully to be a stronger presence in the novel. Maybe it is not supposed to be like that. Perhaps 'The Telling' is the central point of the novel. It is certainly a beautifully explored concept but still I wanted a protagonist that would feel like a part of its all. I'm not sure I felt that in the end, that the observer Sutty was fundamentally changed by her experience. Not in the way I felt the protagonist of The Left Hand of Darkness was changed, if you know what I mean.
In some ways, this was the weakest Le Guin's novel that I have read so far. It is still pretty amazing, though. Le Guin was an accomplished writer and based on what I have read of her so far it seems that she couldn't do no wrong. I'm happy I had the chance to read this novel. On overall, The Telling probably is not one of her best works but it is still a very interesting and educating read.
A few words about the Ekumen to clear things up. The Ekumen (also known as the League of All Worlds ) is a future organization of humanoid governments, numbering many planets and willing to explore and discover new ones. Ekumen wants to share its knowledge/technology with Aka and they are willing to take it. Nevertheless, the Ekumen is worried as there is proof that Aka's atheist and technologically hungry government is oppressing its own population, banning religion and philosophy in the name of progress and reducing people to closely monitored 'consumers'. Since Ekumen is helping planet Aka in their technological development, this is obviously a concern.
Sutty has grown up in times of religious terror and wars, a fact that is relevant for understanding of her contradicted emotions while she serves as an Ekumen observer (as well as her motif for becoming Ekumen observer in the first place- she wanted to leave her native planet Earth). Sutty is named after an Indian goddess that walked into fire after her god husband, a fact that is clearly symbolical and references a horrible custom of burning woman alive. Religion can be used for good, but also for bad. Things have taken a turn for the better on her native Terra under the Ekumen Watch, but Sutty is often haunted by her past and sad memories. There is irony in the fact that someone who has grown up under religious terror now must examine communist/capitalist/technological terror. Religion is banned on planet Aka but its totalitarian atheist government is just as oppressing as a one composed of religious fanatics would be. Militant communism/atheism fanaticism doesn't differ at all from the religious one. Sutty gayness is a factor as well, but perhaps mostly a symbolical one. Sutty's sexuality doesn't really play a key role in the novel, as she is grieving for an ex-lover and not romantically motivated in her actions (she's not falling in love any time soon). On planet Aka, homosexuality is banned because to them it doesn't make sense from a biological point of view. Apparently, science (and not just religion) can be used to oppress others. All in the name of progress.
Set in the future, like all of Le Guin's Hainish novels, The Telling explores many interesting sociological themes. However, it is closely bound with our recent history. You could say this is Ursula Le Guin's take on the Chinese Cultural Revolution set in the Hainish Universe. So much so that I felt at times like I was reading about Chinese Cultural Revolution and not about another planet. The analogy was a bit too strong for my taste at times, in the sense that this novel didn't seem as imaginative as her other works. While I fully understand Le Guin's need to criticize fanatical and oppressing governments and to warn us of perils of cultural assimilation/colonization, the close parallels with the Cultural Revolution made it harder for me to enjoy this novel as a work of fiction. Don't get me wrong. There is plenty of food for the thought in this novel. The author often presents her arguments in an intelligent way (even if the writing leaves something to be desired at times). Nevertheless, I found that The Telling was not nearly as imaginative and well crafted as other works by Le Guin. The book is at times too close an analogy.
The Telling was my first Le Guin novel that didn't feel like science fiction at times. I had to remind myself that it was set on another planet. I could swear that its Anglo-Indian female protagonist Sutty was in fact visiting China during the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward. When Sutty recounted her growing up in India and arriving to Canada, I could imagine her our contemporary, a investigating journalist setting off to China. Her emotions would certainly match that scene. When she explores planet Aka, she is mistaken for a native. Sutty is fluent in the local language and can read the ancient script. So, the native population often excepts her as one of their own, even when Sutty struggles mimicking their customs (both the modern and the old ones), you can still imagine her as being a native of the planet. While Sutty's research was certainly interesting, it could have possibly happened on our planet as well.
On the other hand, there were times when cultural parallels were well explored. I loved Le Guin's take on Taoist inspired Aka's religion/philosophy know as 'The Telling' in the novel. It seems to me that Le Guin is well acquainted with Taoism and Buddism, so well acquainted she is able to summon some of the complexity of Asian theologies, myths and philosophy in this novel, something I imagine is not easy to do. Sutty's sincere devotion to discovering and saving the forbidden semi-religion known as The Telling is very convincing, but Sutty as a protagonist sometimes falls short. I enjoyed Sutty's thoughts, reflections and observations. Nevertheless, the character of Sutty remained something of a mystery. At times Sutty seemed a bit preachy, as when she verbally attacked another character and showed poor self-restraint. This combined with convenient plot developments seemed to weaken her character somewhat. I wanted to know more about Sutty and to see more character development. When Sutty finally shares her personal tragedy with the Monitor (another important character), their connection seems a bit unconvincing. I didn't feel like that relationship was explored as well as it could have been. Perhaps I just wanted Sully to be a stronger presence in the novel. Maybe it is not supposed to be like that. Perhaps 'The Telling' is the central point of the novel. It is certainly a beautifully explored concept but still I wanted a protagonist that would feel like a part of its all. I'm not sure I felt that in the end, that the observer Sutty was fundamentally changed by her experience. Not in the way I felt the protagonist of The Left Hand of Darkness was changed, if you know what I mean.
In some ways, this was the weakest Le Guin's novel that I have read so far. It is still pretty amazing, though. Le Guin was an accomplished writer and based on what I have read of her so far it seems that she couldn't do no wrong. I'm happy I had the chance to read this novel. On overall, The Telling probably is not one of her best works but it is still a very interesting and educating read.
May 4, 2013
Christmas 2010: I realised that I had got stuck in a rut. I was re-reading old favourites again and again, waiting for a few trusted authors to release new works. Something had to be done.
On the spur of the moment I set myself a challenge, to read every book to have won the Locus Sci-Fi award. That’s 35 books, 6 of which I’d previously read, leaving 29 titles by 14 authors who were new to me.
While working through this reading list I got married, went on my honeymoon, switched career and became a father. As such these stories became imprinted on my memory as the soundtrack to the happiest period in my life (so far).
Like two desperate wretches clinging to opposite sides of the Wheel of Fate, it sometimes seems, to me, like Fantasy and Sci-Fi, the two heirs of Speculative Fiction, must always suffer from opposing fortunes. When one rises up the other must be forced down.
In 2001, Fantasy was on a high. A Storm of Swords won the Locus Fantasy award, the Hugo that year went to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire , Perdido Street Station took the BSFA and The Amber Spyglass and The Truth made up a very strong pack.
Sci-Fi, on the other hand, went through a lull. I’m sure that’s doing many fine sci-fi novels a disservice, but the genre certainly wasn’t reaching comparable heights to its sword and wand wielding kin.
The Locus Sci-Fi, 2001 winner, was Ursula Le Guin’s The Telling , part of her Hainish Cycle which, at time of writing, stands at 13 works (none of which I had previously read). Her best known work is the Earthsea Cycle (which I also hadn’t read), and the only book of Le Guin’s which I had read was Lavinia (which didn’t exactly grabbed me).
So I had low expectation when I started.
You might think I must have really hated this book to give it 1-star.
I didn’t hate it.
You might be wondering when (if ever) I’m going to get around to saying something about this book in particular.
I’m wondering that too.
Now, let me tell you, my friend: I have a good memory for books. I may not remember your girlfriends name until I’ve met her a dozen times and she’s called me a jackass for asking who she is (again) but I can tell you about plots and characters from a book I read, once, 15 years ago.
I read The Telling last year, in the run-up to my wedding. Maybe I was distracted. I certainly had bigger things on my mind, but still – I’d expect to remember more about it than I do. I read it between Cyteen and The Integral Trees and I remember both of them crystal clear.
I did actually wonder if I even read this book – or just thought I did – but my wife reassures me that she saw me reading it, that definitely did happen…
I remember the cover of the book. I’m two-thirds sure that the protagonist was a lesbian. I think she was of Indian descent. I’ve got one mental image of a helicopter crashing in the desert. And I’ve got a feeling – a hypnotic sort of Taoist staring-at-water feeling. Aside from that, I’ve got nothing.
You might be outraged at such a low score for a book many people regard highly. The interweb tells me this is a delicate and subtle investigation of how traditional cultures survive underground in headstrong progressive times (such as Mao’s China). But for me – this book isn’t just forgettable, The Telling is forgotten – and that is a crime I find hard to forgive.
ps. On further reflection another image which I think is from this book came back to me... old people standing around in a hall doing a kind of yoga dance. Exciting, no?
May 15, 2020
This book, like all of those by Ms. Le Guin, was thought-provoking and focused on sociological elements of an alien culture that was not quite so alien at its core, after all. This time around, the main character, Sutty, was a female, a departure from some of the more male-centric stories I’ve read in this series. Sutty, a representative of the Ekumen, traveled far from Terra to learn what happened on the planet Aka to have it go from housing a primitive society that was diverse and culturally rich in both written and oral lore to a technologically driven police state where the past must be erased, including all the so-called subversive writings and reading material from its primitive roots. Those who still practice the old ways hide in plain sight or are driven underground to preserve all they know, not only in written form, but in oral form, a practice called The Telling, so the past might be passed on.
The main goal for Sutty at the beginning is to merely observe and to record and not to influence or aid, and later, to see if there’s any possible way this split society can be mended so Aka might be brought peacefully into the Ekumen’s federation of planets to share their knowledge and benefit from other’s knowledge, as all members do. This is somewhat the opposite set up as what Iain M. Banks had going with his Culture series in which The Culture dominated other societies it wished to bring into its orbit, forcing them to assimilate or be conquered.
Getting back to Sutty, though, she soon finds that being an unemotional and passive observer of that planet is not so easy, when witnessing one segment of its society on the brink of destruction, and especially when a mysterious man she calls The Monitor seemingly wants to thwart her and use her for his own nefarious purposes.
This story, like most by Le Guin, takes patience to read and an ear to what’s left unsaid, as much as to what’s said. I admit that halfway through it, I lost patience when the story had me stuck inside Sutty’s head for pages on end as she mused over the puzzling society before her. The emotional connection I felt to her and others was broken then, and it wasn’t until the three-fourths mark that the connection was mended and the story again found its way. It found its way to an ending that knocked my rating up to four stars. It was an ending I never could have imagined and one I’ll never forget. It broke something lose in both the story and in me.
As always with Le Guin, her writing was masterful and gently put, even when hitting the reader hard in the heart. I’ll leave you with some of my favorite lines that highlight her skill:
Where my guides lead me in kindness
I follow, follow lightly,
and there are no footprints
in the dust behind us.
He had a straight back and good features, though ambition, anxiety, authority had made his face hard, tight. Nobody starts out that way, Sutty thought. There are no hard babies.
That he couldn’t control her was so intolerable to him that he’d lost control of himself.
He was sincere. Most bigots are sincere.
Go down to go upward, fail to succeed.
Belief is the wound that knowledge heals.
Bigots have small ears.
Hate eats the hater.
(Referring to a metaphorical mirror) If the glass is whole, it reflects the whole world, but broken, it shows only fragments, and cuts the hand that holds it.
His life, that was what underwrote her bargaining. His life, Pao’s life. Those were the intangible, incalculable stakes. The money burned to ashes, the gold thrown away. Footsteps on the air.
The main goal for Sutty at the beginning is to merely observe and to record and not to influence or aid, and later, to see if there’s any possible way this split society can be mended so Aka might be brought peacefully into the Ekumen’s federation of planets to share their knowledge and benefit from other’s knowledge, as all members do. This is somewhat the opposite set up as what Iain M. Banks had going with his Culture series in which The Culture dominated other societies it wished to bring into its orbit, forcing them to assimilate or be conquered.
Getting back to Sutty, though, she soon finds that being an unemotional and passive observer of that planet is not so easy, when witnessing one segment of its society on the brink of destruction, and especially when a mysterious man she calls The Monitor seemingly wants to thwart her and use her for his own nefarious purposes.
This story, like most by Le Guin, takes patience to read and an ear to what’s left unsaid, as much as to what’s said. I admit that halfway through it, I lost patience when the story had me stuck inside Sutty’s head for pages on end as she mused over the puzzling society before her. The emotional connection I felt to her and others was broken then, and it wasn’t until the three-fourths mark that the connection was mended and the story again found its way. It found its way to an ending that knocked my rating up to four stars. It was an ending I never could have imagined and one I’ll never forget. It broke something lose in both the story and in me.
As always with Le Guin, her writing was masterful and gently put, even when hitting the reader hard in the heart. I’ll leave you with some of my favorite lines that highlight her skill:
Where my guides lead me in kindness
I follow, follow lightly,
and there are no footprints
in the dust behind us.
He had a straight back and good features, though ambition, anxiety, authority had made his face hard, tight. Nobody starts out that way, Sutty thought. There are no hard babies.
That he couldn’t control her was so intolerable to him that he’d lost control of himself.
He was sincere. Most bigots are sincere.
Go down to go upward, fail to succeed.
Belief is the wound that knowledge heals.
Bigots have small ears.
Hate eats the hater.
(Referring to a metaphorical mirror) If the glass is whole, it reflects the whole world, but broken, it shows only fragments, and cuts the hand that holds it.
His life, that was what underwrote her bargaining. His life, Pao’s life. Those were the intangible, incalculable stakes. The money burned to ashes, the gold thrown away. Footsteps on the air.
February 11, 2010
I'm going to use an arguably banal and trite metaphor here: that of a love affair. Okay, maybe not so arguable. It is a banal and trite metaphor. But that’s okay, I think, because the “relationship” many of us experience with our books and our authors is like a love affair, is it not? So forget that the metaphor is worn or hackneyed, because it’s apt, and it’s something to which many of you will relate, and it’s the best way I can think of to communicate how this book affected me.
To be more precise, I am comparing my reading of The Telling to the beginning of a love affair ... to the first date. That’s how I see it, anyway ... my first date with UKL ... the first of many, I hope.
UKL is the woman at the edge of my circle of friends. Not that she’s unpopular or lonely, mind you. She has a circle of her own. A rather large circle, from what I gather. It’s just that my circle only slightly overlaps her own. She is beautiful from a distance, and she certainly looks pretty enough up close, too. She always seems to be involved in conversation and everybody always has nice things to say about her. I have checked her out across the room at parties but never really had the motivation to introduce myself. On the one hand I’m always game for flirting with a pretty girl, but on the other hand I have plenty of friends and I’m not eager to spend the energy cultivating another relationship.
Eventually, a friend of mine leads UKL over and introduces us, thinking we might hit it off, which in fact we do. At the end of the party we both play it cool, exchange phone numbers, and part on a hug.
I let a few days pass before I make the call. For one thing, I want to keep playing it cool; that’s my style. But really, I’m afraid of getting involved in something right now. Life is plenty busy. A new relationship can be work, you know? And it’s always a risk. I like the known quantity. Still, I can’t stop thinking about the pretty girl that captured my attention so completely the other night, so I pull out the digits and dial. We agree to meet for drinks after work. Nothing too big. Nothing too committal. Something from which either of us could exit if we don’t have a good feeling about things.
For me, The Telling began as drinks after work, and ended late that night with a reluctant parting and a lasting impression. There will, without a doubt, be a second date.
As I read The Telling I discovered a rich imagination, a vibrant story teller, and a fair and thoughtful judge of character. UKL impressed me greatly. I thought at first that her writing reminded me of Herbert, but with a softness around the edges and woven through the words. But that was just a first impression; I quickly fell in love with UKL on her own merits and not because she was reminiscent of anyone else.
The Telling is about “The Telling” – an ancient way of life among a remarkable people on a planet called Aka. The Telling is a religion, a philosophy, a cosmology, a sociology, and an economy tied and woven inseparably together. It is a bit utopian, really. But it has become fragmented, hidden, and perhaps a bit distorted. Our protagonist is a historian-anthropologist-sociologist from Earth named Sutty. She has come to Aka to learn from its people, and she must patiently peel back the concrete-and-steel surface imposed by the modern Corporation-State. The State has criminalized The Telling, seeing it as a threat to progress and, as you might guess, as a threat to its own authority. Sutty’s patience is rewarded in the end, but along the way her stamina is tested, her objectivity is challenged, and her beliefs are questioned. The Telling gives you ideas to contemplate in a story you can savor. Like I said, it left a lasting impression on me and there will be a second date with UKL.
Pretty cheesy review, huh?
To be more precise, I am comparing my reading of The Telling to the beginning of a love affair ... to the first date. That’s how I see it, anyway ... my first date with UKL ... the first of many, I hope.
UKL is the woman at the edge of my circle of friends. Not that she’s unpopular or lonely, mind you. She has a circle of her own. A rather large circle, from what I gather. It’s just that my circle only slightly overlaps her own. She is beautiful from a distance, and she certainly looks pretty enough up close, too. She always seems to be involved in conversation and everybody always has nice things to say about her. I have checked her out across the room at parties but never really had the motivation to introduce myself. On the one hand I’m always game for flirting with a pretty girl, but on the other hand I have plenty of friends and I’m not eager to spend the energy cultivating another relationship.
Eventually, a friend of mine leads UKL over and introduces us, thinking we might hit it off, which in fact we do. At the end of the party we both play it cool, exchange phone numbers, and part on a hug.
I let a few days pass before I make the call. For one thing, I want to keep playing it cool; that’s my style. But really, I’m afraid of getting involved in something right now. Life is plenty busy. A new relationship can be work, you know? And it’s always a risk. I like the known quantity. Still, I can’t stop thinking about the pretty girl that captured my attention so completely the other night, so I pull out the digits and dial. We agree to meet for drinks after work. Nothing too big. Nothing too committal. Something from which either of us could exit if we don’t have a good feeling about things.
For me, The Telling began as drinks after work, and ended late that night with a reluctant parting and a lasting impression. There will, without a doubt, be a second date.
As I read The Telling I discovered a rich imagination, a vibrant story teller, and a fair and thoughtful judge of character. UKL impressed me greatly. I thought at first that her writing reminded me of Herbert, but with a softness around the edges and woven through the words. But that was just a first impression; I quickly fell in love with UKL on her own merits and not because she was reminiscent of anyone else.
The Telling is about “The Telling” – an ancient way of life among a remarkable people on a planet called Aka. The Telling is a religion, a philosophy, a cosmology, a sociology, and an economy tied and woven inseparably together. It is a bit utopian, really. But it has become fragmented, hidden, and perhaps a bit distorted. Our protagonist is a historian-anthropologist-sociologist from Earth named Sutty. She has come to Aka to learn from its people, and she must patiently peel back the concrete-and-steel surface imposed by the modern Corporation-State. The State has criminalized The Telling, seeing it as a threat to progress and, as you might guess, as a threat to its own authority. Sutty’s patience is rewarded in the end, but along the way her stamina is tested, her objectivity is challenged, and her beliefs are questioned. The Telling gives you ideas to contemplate in a story you can savor. Like I said, it left a lasting impression on me and there will be a second date with UKL.
Pretty cheesy review, huh?
July 1, 2025
Reread 2025: I think this may be my third of fourth reading of this book. It's like coming back to an old friend. Though Le Guin is dealing with challenging ideas about totalitarianism, she writes with such grace, and the depictions of river boats, mountain villages, and sharing connections with others, are so relaxing and enjoyable to read. In my review from 2018, I dislike the ending of the book; in 2025, I admired how assured and swift it was, and how Le Guin left herself no room for complacency.
Read 2018:
Sutty is a lesbian of Indian descent who is from a future Earth that has been racked by a terrible war between those who believe in monotheist religion and those who believe in scientific progress. Sutty trains to become an ambassador to the world Aka, a world of humans which has only just been given access to technology such as computers and aeroplanes. Le Guin writes an elusive narrative about conflict and nuance. On the world of Aka, scientific progress is everything, and the government has banned the world's religion in favour of capitalism, the reverse of the situation on Sutty's earth, where science had been forced underground. Le Guin is arguing against any belief system that is totalitarian, that has no room for dissent or subtlety.
But it's also a work about stories, and an evocation of culture. Part of what I love about Le Guin is that her SF isn't very interested in technology or science, but she is very interested in anthropology and biology. She's the only SF writer I can think of who writes about the herd animals of other worlds, who cares where the vegetables come from, or who educates children. The world of Aka feels organic and real -- I could almost feel its cold winds and see its slow rivers, and her descriptions of its landscapes, its mountains, cities, and people are beautiful and compelling. The religion of Aka is known as "The Telling", an elusive belief system that has no deities or afterlife, but involves the telling of stories. It reminds me somewhat of ideas from Zen Buddhism and Taoism: the importance of the moment, of deliberate, thoughtful action, of seeking wisdom from from the natural world, of admitting ignorance. But it's also based on the importance of storytelling. I think it's hard for a writer to write well about storytelling, but when they do it's catnip for me, the avid reader.
I really enjoyed this book, and I loved the study of Sutty, and her slow grappling with her grief at the loss of her partner, and her love for the people of Aka. My complaint is that the ending felt too sudden and too complete. It leaves things fairly open, but I felt in a book that was so careful to think about its characters and consider motivations and reasons that it was too fast and too easy. Another twenty pages would have helped.
Still: this is highly recommended.
Read 2018:
Sutty is a lesbian of Indian descent who is from a future Earth that has been racked by a terrible war between those who believe in monotheist religion and those who believe in scientific progress. Sutty trains to become an ambassador to the world Aka, a world of humans which has only just been given access to technology such as computers and aeroplanes. Le Guin writes an elusive narrative about conflict and nuance. On the world of Aka, scientific progress is everything, and the government has banned the world's religion in favour of capitalism, the reverse of the situation on Sutty's earth, where science had been forced underground. Le Guin is arguing against any belief system that is totalitarian, that has no room for dissent or subtlety.
But it's also a work about stories, and an evocation of culture. Part of what I love about Le Guin is that her SF isn't very interested in technology or science, but she is very interested in anthropology and biology. She's the only SF writer I can think of who writes about the herd animals of other worlds, who cares where the vegetables come from, or who educates children. The world of Aka feels organic and real -- I could almost feel its cold winds and see its slow rivers, and her descriptions of its landscapes, its mountains, cities, and people are beautiful and compelling. The religion of Aka is known as "The Telling", an elusive belief system that has no deities or afterlife, but involves the telling of stories. It reminds me somewhat of ideas from Zen Buddhism and Taoism: the importance of the moment, of deliberate, thoughtful action, of seeking wisdom from from the natural world, of admitting ignorance. But it's also based on the importance of storytelling. I think it's hard for a writer to write well about storytelling, but when they do it's catnip for me, the avid reader.
I really enjoyed this book, and I loved the study of Sutty, and her slow grappling with her grief at the loss of her partner, and her love for the people of Aka. My complaint is that the ending felt too sudden and too complete. It leaves things fairly open, but I felt in a book that was so careful to think about its characters and consider motivations and reasons that it was too fast and too easy. Another twenty pages would have helped.
Still: this is highly recommended.
February 9, 2022
Synopsis This novel is set in the Hainish universe, Le Guin's last novel in that cycle and also the first Hainish novel after her phenomenal The Dispossessed (my review). You can read it perfectly well as a standalone, although I recommend reading her Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed first - not because there would be a huge logical connection beside the general setting, but because these two novels are the magnum opus of Le Guin.
The Telling follows Sutty, a human from India and a specialist in language and literature, working as a diplomat for the Hainish Ekumen on planet Aka. Aka was a backwater planet some years before and its society transformed heavily towards a fundamentalist monoculture with technophilic orientation due to Hainish technology advancements.
Sutty experiences a mix of political and religious conflicts between a horrible suppressive central government and an indigenous culture. The old beliefs and customs have been banned by the state. It takes a long time before Sutty is allowed to leave the controlled environment of the sterile capital city with its "producer-consumers" into the rustic country-side where the indigenous people live.
There, she slowly finds traces of a (forbidden) oral tradition, the titular Telling - imagine Tibetan practices in a Chinese environment during the Cultural Revolution, or in Aka's terminology "The March to the Stars". She digs ever more into this fascinating culture, trying to find (forbidden) books and learn (forbidden) practices. Ever hard on her heels is a government agent who tries to find the last (forbidden) library of the indigenous people.
Despite the fact that it was all banned, all illicit, people talked to her quite freely, trustfully answering her questions. She had no trouble finding out about the yearlong and lifelong cycles and patterns of feasts, fasts, indulgences, abstinences, passages, festivals. These observances, which seemed in a general way to resemble the practices of most of the religions she knew anything about, were now of course subterranean, hidden away, or so intricately and unobtrusively interwoven into the fabric of ordinary life that the Monitors of the Sociocultural Office couldn't put their finger on any act and say, "This is forbidden."
Sutty's new found friends suffer on the agent's repressions, though they secretly accompany Sutty deep into the mountains to find an old monastery and center of wisdom.
Can Sutty and the Ekumen save this culture who is about to get completely destroyed?
Review A human visitor witnessing the traditions of a strange culture is the essence of Le Guin's anthropological SF. The Telling doesn't deviate from that topic. It features Le Guin's interpretation of industrial revolution, Taoism, and Chinese long way to modernity, and is as such relevant as 20 years ago when it was published.
The author's narration feels grounded, as the reader can immerse into smells, sounds, colors, and every day rituals
Yellow of brass, yellow of turmeric paste and of rice cooked with saffron, orange of marigolds, dull orange haze of sunset dust above the fields, henna red, passionflower red, dried-blood red, mud red: all the colors of sunlight in the day. A whiff of asafetida. The brook-babble of Aunty gossiping with Moti's mother on the verandah.
It's not everywhere as flowery as this citation, but you can get the gist of it. Add to this lucid prose a good portion philosophical explanations, an extremely rich setting filled up to the last nook, and remove any notion of a juicy Space Opera's spaceship battle.
On the negative side, I found the novel somewhat heavy-handed in messaging, and burdened with exposition.
I didn't need the action to get moved and involved. Starting with the horrors of an oppressive state it soon soothed my reading tastes with the beauty of upcountry traditions.
The novel is linked to a similar novella, The World for World is Forest (review) which has also pacifist people with a strange tradition threatened by Terrans. But this novel is not yet another retelling of the same topic. It expands and transports the reader to a rather new world and situation, extrapolating Asian issues to a different planet to provide the reader with a different angle. That's SF's core value!
While it doesn't have Left Hand of Darkness's outstanding quality, the novel nevertheless won the Locus Award and is well-worth reading, didn't age at all. Time to immerse yourself in another book by Le Guin!
The Telling follows Sutty, a human from India and a specialist in language and literature, working as a diplomat for the Hainish Ekumen on planet Aka. Aka was a backwater planet some years before and its society transformed heavily towards a fundamentalist monoculture with technophilic orientation due to Hainish technology advancements.
Sutty experiences a mix of political and religious conflicts between a horrible suppressive central government and an indigenous culture. The old beliefs and customs have been banned by the state. It takes a long time before Sutty is allowed to leave the controlled environment of the sterile capital city with its "producer-consumers" into the rustic country-side where the indigenous people live.
There, she slowly finds traces of a (forbidden) oral tradition, the titular Telling - imagine Tibetan practices in a Chinese environment during the Cultural Revolution, or in Aka's terminology "The March to the Stars". She digs ever more into this fascinating culture, trying to find (forbidden) books and learn (forbidden) practices. Ever hard on her heels is a government agent who tries to find the last (forbidden) library of the indigenous people.
Despite the fact that it was all banned, all illicit, people talked to her quite freely, trustfully answering her questions. She had no trouble finding out about the yearlong and lifelong cycles and patterns of feasts, fasts, indulgences, abstinences, passages, festivals. These observances, which seemed in a general way to resemble the practices of most of the religions she knew anything about, were now of course subterranean, hidden away, or so intricately and unobtrusively interwoven into the fabric of ordinary life that the Monitors of the Sociocultural Office couldn't put their finger on any act and say, "This is forbidden."
Sutty's new found friends suffer on the agent's repressions, though they secretly accompany Sutty deep into the mountains to find an old monastery and center of wisdom.
Can Sutty and the Ekumen save this culture who is about to get completely destroyed?
Review A human visitor witnessing the traditions of a strange culture is the essence of Le Guin's anthropological SF. The Telling doesn't deviate from that topic. It features Le Guin's interpretation of industrial revolution, Taoism, and Chinese long way to modernity, and is as such relevant as 20 years ago when it was published.
The author's narration feels grounded, as the reader can immerse into smells, sounds, colors, and every day rituals
Yellow of brass, yellow of turmeric paste and of rice cooked with saffron, orange of marigolds, dull orange haze of sunset dust above the fields, henna red, passionflower red, dried-blood red, mud red: all the colors of sunlight in the day. A whiff of asafetida. The brook-babble of Aunty gossiping with Moti's mother on the verandah.
It's not everywhere as flowery as this citation, but you can get the gist of it. Add to this lucid prose a good portion philosophical explanations, an extremely rich setting filled up to the last nook, and remove any notion of a juicy Space Opera's spaceship battle.
On the negative side, I found the novel somewhat heavy-handed in messaging, and burdened with exposition.
I didn't need the action to get moved and involved. Starting with the horrors of an oppressive state it soon soothed my reading tastes with the beauty of upcountry traditions.
The novel is linked to a similar novella, The World for World is Forest (review) which has also pacifist people with a strange tradition threatened by Terrans. But this novel is not yet another retelling of the same topic. It expands and transports the reader to a rather new world and situation, extrapolating Asian issues to a different planet to provide the reader with a different angle. That's SF's core value!
While it doesn't have Left Hand of Darkness's outstanding quality, the novel nevertheless won the Locus Award and is well-worth reading, didn't age at all. Time to immerse yourself in another book by Le Guin!
December 25, 2023
THE TELLING eluded me for years. For a long time it's been the only Hainish novel I haven't been able to get my hands on. Finally, with the Library of America collection of Hainish stories, I've been able to get a proper paper copy of it. It took some time off in the winter and me deciding to read the books I truly want to read, and now I've finally finished this book.
It's so interesting to read a Hainish story so late in Le Guin's career. It's so different from the other Hainish stories- it feels less narrative-driven and more "I've got something to say" than usual. Many of Le Guin's core themes and passions are featured here-- the importance of narrative, revolution, the obliteration of one culture by another... all so quietly, gently brought. A magnificent read.
It's so interesting to read a Hainish story so late in Le Guin's career. It's so different from the other Hainish stories- it feels less narrative-driven and more "I've got something to say" than usual. Many of Le Guin's core themes and passions are featured here-- the importance of narrative, revolution, the obliteration of one culture by another... all so quietly, gently brought. A magnificent read.
March 22, 2024
The parallels to India (Bharat) and Hinduism are expertly linked. A lot of my energy has been spent in this sector myself, so to read The Telling at this time is quite…providential. Sutty’s character speaks a lot to myself. Not just me, I’m sure there are plenty of people who feel as though they don’t belong to any category and can’t quite capture the truth they’re searching for. From a spiritual or religious perspective knowing that someone or something in the culture is right (or maybe aligned with truth), but the society, or some other SOMETHING, is not quite so…
It’s so apt to use a blend of religions centrally sticking to the ones that are more akin to lifestyles rather than belief systems. The dissection of linguistics, histories and philosophies to show the complicated and simple cunning of censorship and…whatever word(s) describe this. And very obviously how this is what India is/had undergone. Many people continually use colonialism as a term to explain what’s happening here, and while they’re not wrong, as this book highlights they’re not quite completely right. Sutty’s very much like the private eye exploring what was lost, what was changed, and in a weird way it’s for HER gain. The truth is flowering within and without. And in that weird contradiction that is the concoction of truth she stands alone.
/sigh
I don’t necessarily like Leguin’s prose. Her writing is brilliant . It’s like medicine. Bitter until better.
What’s most fascinating about all of this is Leguin just pointed the way to my own heart. It’s a realization. How I’ve always felt laid bare in front of me. I feel seen, truly.
How and why Ursula Leguin is not on school reading lists is CRIMINAL. On any and all levels of education. The women is a MONUMENT. A MONUMENT.
While she would shush my cries, someone has to speak up.
“This system wasn’t a religion at all, Sutty told her noter with increasing enthusiasm. Of course it had a spiritual dimension to it. In fact, it was the spiritual dimension of life for those who lived it. But religion as an institution demanding belief and claiming authority, religion as a community shaped by a knowledge of foreign deities or competing institutions, had never existed on Aka.” ~page 105
- Unrelated highlights of the book -
Coffee and Starbucks…akakafi and Starbrew. Haha, xD
I think I’m most enamored with the off-the-cuff statements that left me feeling profound are what delights me in this novel. For instance, one of the characters drops the knowledge that progress is the death of literacy, at least, reading literacy. These assertions, though minor details in the story, strike me as true.
It’s so apt to use a blend of religions centrally sticking to the ones that are more akin to lifestyles rather than belief systems. The dissection of linguistics, histories and philosophies to show the complicated and simple cunning of censorship and…whatever word(s) describe this. And very obviously how this is what India is/had undergone. Many people continually use colonialism as a term to explain what’s happening here, and while they’re not wrong, as this book highlights they’re not quite completely right. Sutty’s very much like the private eye exploring what was lost, what was changed, and in a weird way it’s for HER gain. The truth is flowering within and without. And in that weird contradiction that is the concoction of truth she stands alone.
/sigh
I don’t necessarily like Leguin’s prose. Her writing is brilliant . It’s like medicine. Bitter until better.
What’s most fascinating about all of this is Leguin just pointed the way to my own heart. It’s a realization. How I’ve always felt laid bare in front of me. I feel seen, truly.
How and why Ursula Leguin is not on school reading lists is CRIMINAL. On any and all levels of education. The women is a MONUMENT. A MONUMENT.
While she would shush my cries, someone has to speak up.
“This system wasn’t a religion at all, Sutty told her noter with increasing enthusiasm. Of course it had a spiritual dimension to it. In fact, it was the spiritual dimension of life for those who lived it. But religion as an institution demanding belief and claiming authority, religion as a community shaped by a knowledge of foreign deities or competing institutions, had never existed on Aka.” ~page 105
- Unrelated highlights of the book -
Coffee and Starbucks…akakafi and Starbrew. Haha, xD
I think I’m most enamored with the off-the-cuff statements that left me feeling profound are what delights me in this novel. For instance, one of the characters drops the knowledge that progress is the death of literacy, at least, reading literacy. These assertions, though minor details in the story, strike me as true.
January 27, 2019
I’m running out of positive superlatives I can describe Le Guin’s work with. I could happily spend the rest of my life listening to her anthropological observations. This story is an intellectual exercise in listening but also in storytelling, and while our Terran main character functions mainly as a vessel through whom we explore the culture and language on the planet she has been sent to by the Hain, it does not prevent us from caring about her or the people she interacts with, and it’s always a little hard letting them go afterwards.
December 27, 2018
Reviewed for The Bibliophibian.
It’s been a long time since I read this — longer than I thought, in fact, and I’ve come to the conclusion I must have read it originally as a very young teen. I’m not sure how well I really took it on board, then: I wasn’t as much into the kind of cerebral, considering, anthropological fiction that Ursula Le Guin did so beautifully. Granted, I was excited about Sutty being a lesbian, and I found aspects of the world interesting, but I really wasn’t ready to enter into the spirit of the teaching. I was more worried about the man who walked up into thin air than about the tradition he was part of — which fortunately, the POV character never does lose sight of.
Now, well, the love of books and the desire to save a lost language and lost ways of being hits a lot closer to home. (Partially through knowing, for example, about the Welsh Not and the Treachery of the Blue Books — knowing that Welsh history, language and culture have been lost through the feeling that they were not civilised, not focused toward advancement.) I’d completely forgotten the ending and what Yara does to reconcile his conflicting loyalties, but now I’m not sure I can get the image out of my head.
It’s beautifully written — of course, it’s Le Guin — and though Sutty as a character is a bit passive at times, when you know what you’re in for there’s a lot of beauty in Le Guin’s work, in the quiet spaces around her words (“to hear, one must be silent”, after all) that let the imagination breathe.
It’s been a long time since I read this — longer than I thought, in fact, and I’ve come to the conclusion I must have read it originally as a very young teen. I’m not sure how well I really took it on board, then: I wasn’t as much into the kind of cerebral, considering, anthropological fiction that Ursula Le Guin did so beautifully. Granted, I was excited about Sutty being a lesbian, and I found aspects of the world interesting, but I really wasn’t ready to enter into the spirit of the teaching. I was more worried about the man who walked up into thin air than about the tradition he was part of — which fortunately, the POV character never does lose sight of.
Now, well, the love of books and the desire to save a lost language and lost ways of being hits a lot closer to home. (Partially through knowing, for example, about the Welsh Not and the Treachery of the Blue Books — knowing that Welsh history, language and culture have been lost through the feeling that they were not civilised, not focused toward advancement.) I’d completely forgotten the ending and what Yara does to reconcile his conflicting loyalties, but now I’m not sure I can get the image out of my head.
It’s beautifully written — of course, it’s Le Guin — and though Sutty as a character is a bit passive at times, when you know what you’re in for there’s a lot of beauty in Le Guin’s work, in the quiet spaces around her words (“to hear, one must be silent”, after all) that let the imagination breathe.
June 15, 2022
I don't know what it is with Ursula Le Guin, but every one of her books, whatever the rate I end up giving the whole, have at least one instance where she emotionally wreaks me, and it's always exquisite. It's like looking at the page and feel like telling her "Damn, that's one beautiful dagger you are stabbing me with"*
I feel like pointing it out "just because" in this case, since it happens to clear my 3stars Le Guin base bar with ease to nestle on the podium by World is Forest, Forgiveness, and Left Hand. Maybe even like a caveat. Just so I can qualify that I'm biased and it's all emotionally stabbed city here.
And what stabs ME particularly, beyond the punctual sad, is the theme. While at first sight the theme seems to be religion and spirituality vs technological advance or consumerism, what it is actually about is culture and all the infinite components that make it, and all the ways introducing an outsider element, even with the best intentions, can fuck it up enough for it to devour itself, or at least severely up-heave and endanger it. What it is about is balance, and fanaticism, and dogmatic corruption. The Telling is the passing of cultural information. In it's basis, it is words, stories oral and written, and funnily enough, when it comes down to it, science and religion are part of it too, right along with dances, meals, music, rites, customs, history.
That is my interpretation for this book. As a person that loves books, and myths, and folklore, that seats to watch movies and series as a bonding activity with my family, that cleans while blasting music, that was taught religion formally even if never practiced, that learnt my regional dances from my grandmother and uncles, to cook from my grandfather, to love reading from my mother, and science from my father, this is like a love letter received, and like a verbalization of all that strange juggling or balancing act one does inside with all the pieces that make home/root/culture and seem incongruous, or even like they'd require alternate suspense of disbelief and double-though. Culture is a mess, and it's incongruous, and unfathomably vast, and it's made of big and little pieces that sometimes contradict, and it does never really make sense. But it's the ground you stand upon; to try to erase it is to loose your step. And its life-blood is the word.
*(and if you get internet in heaven, I hope you get this... from my catholic raised, agnostic leaning towards atheism ass... which is a bad joke that only makes sense in theme)
I feel like pointing it out "just because" in this case, since it happens to clear my 3stars Le Guin base bar with ease to nestle on the podium by World is Forest, Forgiveness, and Left Hand. Maybe even like a caveat. Just so I can qualify that I'm biased and it's all emotionally stabbed city here.
And what stabs ME particularly, beyond the punctual sad, is the theme. While at first sight the theme seems to be religion and spirituality vs technological advance or consumerism, what it is actually about is culture and all the infinite components that make it, and all the ways introducing an outsider element, even with the best intentions, can fuck it up enough for it to devour itself, or at least severely up-heave and endanger it. What it is about is balance, and fanaticism, and dogmatic corruption. The Telling is the passing of cultural information. In it's basis, it is words, stories oral and written, and funnily enough, when it comes down to it, science and religion are part of it too, right along with dances, meals, music, rites, customs, history.
That is my interpretation for this book. As a person that loves books, and myths, and folklore, that seats to watch movies and series as a bonding activity with my family, that cleans while blasting music, that was taught religion formally even if never practiced, that learnt my regional dances from my grandmother and uncles, to cook from my grandfather, to love reading from my mother, and science from my father, this is like a love letter received, and like a verbalization of all that strange juggling or balancing act one does inside with all the pieces that make home/root/culture and seem incongruous, or even like they'd require alternate suspense of disbelief and double-though. Culture is a mess, and it's incongruous, and unfathomably vast, and it's made of big and little pieces that sometimes contradict, and it does never really make sense. But it's the ground you stand upon; to try to erase it is to loose your step. And its life-blood is the word.
*(and if you get internet in heaven, I hope you get this... from my catholic raised, agnostic leaning towards atheism ass... which is a bad joke that only makes sense in theme)
January 1, 2016
At her best, Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the most inventive of writers. In The Telling, she writes about a world, called Aka, which has received fragmentary information from Earth and interpreted it the wrong way, creating a corporation state which attempted to create a Stalinist bureaucracy and destroy the old ways that prevailed before first contact.
Arriving on the scene is an Anglo-Indian representative, named Sutty, who task it is to investigate what remained of the old ways and report back to the Ekumenical government to see what could be done to salvage it. Which she proceeds to do, as she discovers what is central to the old ways, a practice known as The Telling:
Arriving on the scene is an Anglo-Indian representative, named Sutty, who task it is to investigate what remained of the old ways and report back to the Ekumenical government to see what could be done to salvage it. Which she proceeds to do, as she discovers what is central to the old ways, a practice known as The Telling:
So without the telling, the rocks and plants and animals go on all right. But the people don't. People wander around. They don't know a mountain from its reflection in a puddle. They don't know a path from a cliff. They hurt themselves. They get angry and hurt each other and the other things. They hurt animals because they're angry. They make quarrels and cheat each other. They want too much. They neglect things. Crops don't get planted. Too many crops get planted. Rivers get dirty with shit. Earth gets dirty with poison. People eat poison food. Everything is confused. Everybody's sick. Nobody looks after the sick people, the sick things. But that's very bad, very bad, eh? Because looking after things, that's our job, eh?Le Guin proceeds to invent a culture, a religion, a language, a society and deeply absorbs us in it. This may well be one of the very best books I have read this year.
December 28, 2018
I'm sad to give anything by Le Guin a 3/5, but this book just didn't do it for me. I simply didn't fall in love with the protagonist. This was my low point in the Hainish Cycle... but the only low point! We've moved quite far from planets with flying cats (Rocannon's World), anti-colonial revolution (The Word for World is Forest), epic adventures into the unknown (City of Illusions, Planet of Exile), and touching portrayals of human struggle (The Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed, and Four Ways to Forgiveness). I suppose The Telling is supposed to fall into the last category, but the main character wasn't dynamic enough to carry the story, the stakes felt contrived, and the overall narrative seemed didactic. There it is, and I'm sorry to have said so.
November 8, 2020
Leído en 2011.
Uff. Casi no lo acabo.
Excesiva, para mi gusto, la reiteración en el modo de vida ancestral, simplista, no tecnológico, espiritual, etc, etc, etc del pueblo protagonista de El Relato. Ya sabemos de la loable y profunda conciencia ecológica de esta autora, que entremezcla magistralmente con sus personajes. Pero en esta novela no me ha llegado para nada.
El aprobado -2,5/5- se le doy porque sigue siendo buena narradora y porque es Doña Úrsula. No se yo si hubiese llegado al 2,5 si hubiese sido de un autor que me fuese indiferente.
Uff. Casi no lo acabo.
Excesiva, para mi gusto, la reiteración en el modo de vida ancestral, simplista, no tecnológico, espiritual, etc, etc, etc del pueblo protagonista de El Relato. Ya sabemos de la loable y profunda conciencia ecológica de esta autora, que entremezcla magistralmente con sus personajes. Pero en esta novela no me ha llegado para nada.
El aprobado -2,5/5- se le doy porque sigue siendo buena narradora y porque es Doña Úrsula. No se yo si hubiese llegado al 2,5 si hubiese sido de un autor que me fuese indiferente.
August 15, 2020
Ursula K Le Queen ❤️
November 6, 2018
Kitap güzel, çeviri idare eder.
Le Guin okuyanlar bilirler, kendisinin en ünlü iki bilimkurgu eserinde (Mülksüzler ve Karanlığın Sol Eli) standart bir şablon vardır: belli bir kültürde yetişmiş bir karakteri alır ve onu çok daha farklı bir kültürün kök saldığı bir gezegene koyar. Biz de böylece hem o karakteri iyice tanırız hem de onun gözünden bu farklı, büyüleyici yeni kültürü görürüz. Anlatış'ta da bu şablon devam ediyor ve yine çok ilginç bir dünyaya, Aka gezegenine gidiyoruz. Başkarakterimiz ise pek yabancı değil, Yerküre'de doğup büyüyen Sutty. Ancak onun büyüdüğü Yerküre bizimkiyle tam olarak aynı sayılmaz, o bu toprakların çok daha karanlık bir zamanında yaşama talihsizliği göstermiş.
Aka'nın yaşadığı süreç önemli tabi ama gezegenin geçmişinde hakim olan ve Anlatış'ın da belkemiğini oluşturan gelenekleri, yani hikaye anlatıcılığı, beni hayran bıraktı. Le Guin'in Taoizme de atıfta bulunarak oluşturduğu bu sistem ve bu sistem üzerinden yaptığı din yorumlamalarını okumak çok güzeldi. Sutty de Le Guin'den umulacağı üzere iyi yazılmış, kağıt üzerinde ayağa kalkan bir başkahraman olmuş.
Çeviri konusuna gelince; özellikle ilk sayfalarda kitabın dünyasına girmekte çok zorlandım. Kemal Baran Özbek'in başka çevirilerini de okumuş birisi olarak kendisinin iyi bir çevirmen olduğunu biliyorum ancak Le Guin ile en azından bu eser için pek uyuşamadıklarını düşünüyorum. Zira romanın sonraki sayfalarında da okuru kitabın anlatımından düşüren cümleler vardı maalesef.
Sonuç olarak daha iyi Le Guin eserleri var tabi, ama Anlatış da muhakkak okunup düşünülmesi gereken bir roman olmuş.
Le Guin okuyanlar bilirler, kendisinin en ünlü iki bilimkurgu eserinde (Mülksüzler ve Karanlığın Sol Eli) standart bir şablon vardır: belli bir kültürde yetişmiş bir karakteri alır ve onu çok daha farklı bir kültürün kök saldığı bir gezegene koyar. Biz de böylece hem o karakteri iyice tanırız hem de onun gözünden bu farklı, büyüleyici yeni kültürü görürüz. Anlatış'ta da bu şablon devam ediyor ve yine çok ilginç bir dünyaya, Aka gezegenine gidiyoruz. Başkarakterimiz ise pek yabancı değil, Yerküre'de doğup büyüyen Sutty. Ancak onun büyüdüğü Yerküre bizimkiyle tam olarak aynı sayılmaz, o bu toprakların çok daha karanlık bir zamanında yaşama talihsizliği göstermiş.
Aka'nın yaşadığı süreç önemli tabi ama gezegenin geçmişinde hakim olan ve Anlatış'ın da belkemiğini oluşturan gelenekleri, yani hikaye anlatıcılığı, beni hayran bıraktı. Le Guin'in Taoizme de atıfta bulunarak oluşturduğu bu sistem ve bu sistem üzerinden yaptığı din yorumlamalarını okumak çok güzeldi. Sutty de Le Guin'den umulacağı üzere iyi yazılmış, kağıt üzerinde ayağa kalkan bir başkahraman olmuş.
Çeviri konusuna gelince; özellikle ilk sayfalarda kitabın dünyasına girmekte çok zorlandım. Kemal Baran Özbek'in başka çevirilerini de okumuş birisi olarak kendisinin iyi bir çevirmen olduğunu biliyorum ancak Le Guin ile en azından bu eser için pek uyuşamadıklarını düşünüyorum. Zira romanın sonraki sayfalarında da okuru kitabın anlatımından düşüren cümleler vardı maalesef.
Sonuç olarak daha iyi Le Guin eserleri var tabi, ama Anlatış da muhakkak okunup düşünülmesi gereken bir roman olmuş.
February 19, 2025
Not quite what I expected, this book is about halfway between a (short) novel and an anthropological study of an imaginary place. It is primarily concerned with a traditional culture/religion/way of life (the overlap between these and question of how to define them is a theme) being persecuted by a relentlessly progress-oriented government. Echoes of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, though longer-lasting and not quite as violent or pervasive. And also echoes of cultural loss today, with a diversity of local belief systems and a more holistic way of living being replaced by an authoritarian, corporate-driven centralization and an identification of people as “producer-consumers”—a lifestyle the book, perhaps fortunately, soon leaves behind to travel to the more traditional hinterlands. Certainly a meditative sort of book, and one I liked reading although it did not move quickly.
That said, the “plot” isn’t really much more than a scaffold on which to hang the exploration of a place and its history and way of thinking, nor is the protagonist much more than a vehicle for that. The title is unfortunately accurate as a descriptor—it’s certainly the telling rather than the showing, despite the vividness of place descriptions! And I don’t love outsider protagonists in these sorts of books and would have preferred a character with a personal stake in all this, though the protagonist’s background adds a degree of balance and symmetry to the treatment of themes. Although we don’t get to know the side characters well, I did appreciate the way Le Guin wrote them: they come across as products of their environment (geographically, economically, culturally) rather than transplanted modern Americans or recycled tropes, and yet are always treated with dignity.
Overall, a book written with wisdom but offering little in the way of excitement, and the end feels perhaps a bit too neat. I can certainly see someone getting more out of it, however.
That said, the “plot” isn’t really much more than a scaffold on which to hang the exploration of a place and its history and way of thinking, nor is the protagonist much more than a vehicle for that. The title is unfortunately accurate as a descriptor—it’s certainly the telling rather than the showing, despite the vividness of place descriptions! And I don’t love outsider protagonists in these sorts of books and would have preferred a character with a personal stake in all this, though the protagonist’s background adds a degree of balance and symmetry to the treatment of themes. Although we don’t get to know the side characters well, I did appreciate the way Le Guin wrote them: they come across as products of their environment (geographically, economically, culturally) rather than transplanted modern Americans or recycled tropes, and yet are always treated with dignity.
Overall, a book written with wisdom but offering little in the way of excitement, and the end feels perhaps a bit too neat. I can certainly see someone getting more out of it, however.
July 31, 2018
Kitabı okurken zorlandım, çok fazla betimleme vardı. Ursula'nın okuduğum ilk kitabı olan Yanılsamalar Kenti'ni daha çok beğenmiştim.
April 11, 2017
The Telling once more proves to me why UKL is one of my favorite writers. With themes concerning freedom of religion and the nature of religion, capitalism, cultural dissonance and appropriation, The Telling feels both absolutely contemporary and timeless.
Sutty crosses space to study Aka culture as an anthropologist, yet by the time she arrives (space travel takes decades), Aka culture has completely shifted from a literate society to an intentionally illiterate society of producer-consumers, where anything concerning the past is repressed in order to advance society. Books, written language, and religion are outlawed, and those found rebelling against The Corporation are sent to camps to be ‘rehabilitated.’
Sutty herself comes from Terra, a future Earth torn apart by religious extremism. Unists have taken over her world in the name of God, and she sought out other worlds in order to escape her past, only to find Aka culture as oppressive as the one she’s fled, though the oppressors on Aka are anti-religion, and the oppressors on Terra religious.
When officials of Dovza City decide to open up their countryside to the foreign anthropologists, Sutty is sent to a remote village, where the villagers still practice the old religion, The Telling, and hide their books in a secret location in the mountains. Though delighted by this opportunity, Sutty must also watch out for a city monitor, a fanatic of The Corporation, that seems to be following her.
UKL’s novels are often termed as ‘soft sci-fi,’ but there’s nothing soft about this, or any of her novels. She knows how to combine cutting political commentary with characters that feel as real as anyone I know.
Sutty crosses space to study Aka culture as an anthropologist, yet by the time she arrives (space travel takes decades), Aka culture has completely shifted from a literate society to an intentionally illiterate society of producer-consumers, where anything concerning the past is repressed in order to advance society. Books, written language, and religion are outlawed, and those found rebelling against The Corporation are sent to camps to be ‘rehabilitated.’
Sutty herself comes from Terra, a future Earth torn apart by religious extremism. Unists have taken over her world in the name of God, and she sought out other worlds in order to escape her past, only to find Aka culture as oppressive as the one she’s fled, though the oppressors on Aka are anti-religion, and the oppressors on Terra religious.
When officials of Dovza City decide to open up their countryside to the foreign anthropologists, Sutty is sent to a remote village, where the villagers still practice the old religion, The Telling, and hide their books in a secret location in the mountains. Though delighted by this opportunity, Sutty must also watch out for a city monitor, a fanatic of The Corporation, that seems to be following her.
UKL’s novels are often termed as ‘soft sci-fi,’ but there’s nothing soft about this, or any of her novels. She knows how to combine cutting political commentary with characters that feel as real as anyone I know.
March 21, 2013
I've never wanted to review a book here before but for some reason this one makes me want to.
I should start by saying this is the only Ursula K. Le Guin novel I've read so I can't compare it to any others but I really really liked this novel. I bought it on a whim because it had a queer woman of colour as the main character and so many of the books I read about white straight men and I thought this would be a change. Which it definitely was. I thought the treatment of Sutty's relationships throughout the book was very well handled.
What I enjoyed the most about the book, however, was the way the story itself was told. I found the gentle way Le Guin leads the reader through the plot very absorbing so that even though the plot itself is not very gripping I got quite caught up simply in the telling of the story. And that's the thing that I found the most beautiful about it. I felt as though the novel itself, through its almost rhythmic style (I'm not sure what makes me want to call it rhythmic, it just was) became a part of the Telling of the story. As though Le Guin is herself preserving the history of the Akans by writing this novel. I have no idea if that was Le Guin's intention or is a coincidence or my imagination but I found that sense captivating.
Really, very well done and very interesting.The Telling
I should start by saying this is the only Ursula K. Le Guin novel I've read so I can't compare it to any others but I really really liked this novel. I bought it on a whim because it had a queer woman of colour as the main character and so many of the books I read about white straight men and I thought this would be a change. Which it definitely was. I thought the treatment of Sutty's relationships throughout the book was very well handled.
What I enjoyed the most about the book, however, was the way the story itself was told. I found the gentle way Le Guin leads the reader through the plot very absorbing so that even though the plot itself is not very gripping I got quite caught up simply in the telling of the story. And that's the thing that I found the most beautiful about it. I felt as though the novel itself, through its almost rhythmic style (I'm not sure what makes me want to call it rhythmic, it just was) became a part of the Telling of the story. As though Le Guin is herself preserving the history of the Akans by writing this novel. I have no idea if that was Le Guin's intention or is a coincidence or my imagination but I found that sense captivating.
Really, very well done and very interesting.The Telling
August 27, 2016
Another beautiful book by my favorite author. Each sentence is beautiful, even when terrible things are described. There is such a quiet strength and assurance in her writing.
I still have to digest it before I can truly review it. I hope I don't forget. But suffice it to say, if you are a fan of UKL or a fan of SF that leans toward the philosophical then this book comes highly recommended!
I still have to digest it before I can truly review it. I hope I don't forget. But suffice it to say, if you are a fan of UKL or a fan of SF that leans toward the philosophical then this book comes highly recommended!
December 9, 2024
This is the last novel in the Hainish Cycle. Honestly, not as much part of the cycle as others, since it's in the Ekumenical era, but lacks the reference to telepathy which has been one of the distinctive characteristics of this universe since Rocannon's World. I think, though, that this is the most overtly philosophical of her novels. Even more than The Dispossessed, which was a study in anthropology, this one focuses on two political dystopias. One is on a future Earth, which is always ravaged by disease, or famine, or climate change, induced by humanity’s constant greed and self sabotage (again, that mind speech thing was supposed to have solved this issue, but it kinda got lost in the intervening quarter of a century, I guess), where a unifying religious order wanted to isolate the whole planet from their alien allies, but was eventually overthrown by its own appointed godhead, a Terran Emmisary. The other is a world which just went through a secular purge of old beliefs and customs, and which is trying to catch up to the other, more technologically advanced, alien races.
Finally, here she makes overt references to religion and philosophical traditions. She talks about polytheism and monotheism, about their strengths and their pitfalls, about the dangers of accelerated technological development (the least of which are broken down traffic lights) and also about incomplete assimilation of cultural values and how power, if unchecked, transforms societies into authoritarian dictatorships. There's also a cultural revolution here, a somewhat cleaner and sharper cut than what happened in China, but which did not have time to spread out over the whole society.
Honestly, I was expecting more. I shouldn't have, I know, but I was already spoiled by two of the best novels I've read this year. It's a solid novel, though. The style is the same Le Guin that I've always found to get in the way of a good story, there's also a bit of the most boring part of The Left Hand of Darkness, namely a multi week long expedition to a remote place, described in too much detail, if you ask me. Nevertheless, this is still a solid work of literature.
Finally, here she makes overt references to religion and philosophical traditions. She talks about polytheism and monotheism, about their strengths and their pitfalls, about the dangers of accelerated technological development (the least of which are broken down traffic lights) and also about incomplete assimilation of cultural values and how power, if unchecked, transforms societies into authoritarian dictatorships. There's also a cultural revolution here, a somewhat cleaner and sharper cut than what happened in China, but which did not have time to spread out over the whole society.
Honestly, I was expecting more. I shouldn't have, I know, but I was already spoiled by two of the best novels I've read this year. It's a solid novel, though. The style is the same Le Guin that I've always found to get in the way of a good story, there's also a bit of the most boring part of The Left Hand of Darkness, namely a multi week long expedition to a remote place, described in too much detail, if you ask me. Nevertheless, this is still a solid work of literature.
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