The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin [Spoiler Free Review][Masterpieces of SF Ep. 115]

Added: 2026-05-25

[00:00:00]The Dispossessed by Ursula K.

[00:00:06]So, this book was copyright 1974 and I have this Avon paperback of this one and it won a Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Award when it came out. It's a very popular book. One of Ursula K. Le Guin's most notable works and it's really kind of broken out and you get a lot of even non-science fiction readers reading this one and for a very good reason. It's a It's a great book.

[00:00:34]But, I This is a reread for me and when I originally read this over 20 years ago, I did not like this book. I only gave it two stars and the only notes I'd written down were slow and boring.

[00:00:47]But, after this reread, I can appreciate this book a lot more and I've elevated my rating up to four stars.

[00:00:56]Now, I'm definitely a more mature reader and a more mature person and I have a lot more patience when when reading a book like this now than I did back then. Plus, back then I was definitely more into the hard sciences as opposed to the soft sciences being discussed in the science fiction I was enjoying and now I like both and I can appreciate both. So, there's there's that and then the other thing that made me appreciate this book a bit more is I've been reading through this collection of essays from Samuel R.

[00:01:29]Delany called The Jewel Hinged Jaw and in this collection, there's an essay called To Read The Dispossessed and this is a fairly long essay. It's about 50 pages and after I completed this reread, I I went ahead and read his essay and if you like this book, you got to check out this essay. It It is amazing to see a professional author and critic kind of break this book down. He does He He talks about its flaws and its pros and he he kind of tears it apart this way and that.

[00:02:07]And he really brought up some of the use of language that Le Guin uses in this book.

[00:02:13]He breaks down certain scenes and describes some of the magic that's kind of going be going on behind the scenes that maybe only another really good author could could show someone. And after finishing that essay, it made me appreciate the book even more. So, like I said, if you like this book, go check out that essay. I think it is it adds a lot of insight into the the skill of writing and what she was trying to do with this story.

[00:02:41]So, let's get into what this one is about now.

[00:02:44]So, this is part of her Hainish Cycle that's There's a quite a few novels and short stories that take place in this kind of universe she's created. I don't think you'd necessarily have to know anything about the Hainish, but it might help a little bit. And I don't think it would spoil anything knowing, you know, maybe how humans got out here. So, this book takes place around the the star of Tau Ceti.

[00:03:09]And there's these two worlds that are orbiting each other as they're orbiting the star.

[00:03:16]And this is where this this whole novel takes place. And we've got a a very large population of humans on this kind of Earth-like planet here called um Urras.

[00:03:29]And up here on Anarres, this is more of a more desolate planet with a very small population.

[00:03:36]And when we you start off in chapter one, you're introduced to our main character eventually named Shevek.

[00:03:43]But you're first just kind of shown the differences between these planets and how they've been isolated. And there's this kind of walled-off spaceport on Anarres where a ship comes a few times a year to transport some supplies back and forth between the planets. And that seems to be the only communication and interaction these two planets have with one with one another.

[00:04:12]But during one of these cargo transfers, we have Shevek kind of run to this ship and get aboard. There's There's kind of a crowd who's who's upset about this.

[00:04:23]They're kind of staging a bit of a protest. There's a scuffle that goes on.

[00:04:28]And Shevek ends up getting inside this ship and and heading off to this um beautiful home world of Urras.

[00:04:38]And so uh you you're kind of brought up to speed kind of on this in this first chapter of what's been going on. It seems like there this colony on Anarres has been there for about 150 years or so.

[00:04:52]And no one has left this planet and traveled back to this home planet. And no one from the home planet has traveled to Anarres. So there's there's really no interaction between these planets. And and and Shevek is the first person that's going to be doing something like this. And it's kind of a big deal.

[00:05:13]So after that first chapter, you'll get alternating chapters where you're going back to Shevek's childhood on Anarres as he's growing up. And that's alternating with the current plot line that's taking place on on Urras where he's traveling to to go there and and do his thing.

[00:05:36]And as you read through each you know pretty early on in the beginning, you realize that that Shevek is this brilliant physicist who's come up with some concepts that could really open up a lot of technology and communication between the whole galaxy.

[00:05:53]And he really felt like on his home world this this technology couldn't be used.

[00:06:00]They've isolated themselves, so why would they want to communicate with anyone outside their community?

[00:06:07]And so he does something that's kind of considered taboo in going to this other planet.

[00:06:13]They also learn a lot more about these planets and how different they are.

[00:06:18]We find out that the these humans had mostly settled this, you know, beautiful planet of of Yuris, and at some point there was this political uprising and a revolution happened by this political figure named Odo.

[00:06:35]And when she died, a bunch of people just tried to convince the government to let them go up to this planet that was really only being used as a mining operation. And let them go up there and do their own thing. Let them set up their own civilization with their own political structure and their own ideals.

[00:06:56]And that's what they ended up doing.

[00:06:58]And it's a very harsh planet. It's It's It's a struggle to survive.

[00:07:03]And they're living in this anarchistic state where there's not much government control, but there are there are some things that the government does to help kind of help help assign people jobs and do things like that. But even if you're assigned a job, it's all voluntary because of this system of anarchy. And they don't have things like the use of money. It's not really needed.

[00:07:30]Everything is kind of communal and shared.

[00:07:33]And so they they have a lot of very liberal concepts and ideas that they've incorporated into this planet.

[00:07:40]They also treat men and women completely equal and it doesn't really matter what your sexual orientation is. It was all very open.

[00:07:49]And that's that's what's going on there.

[00:07:52]So this is where Shevek comes from. This is all he knows besides, you know, some correspondence that that trickles back and forth between these worlds.

[00:08:02]So when he travels and goes to Urras, what he finds there is kind of what you consider like a 1974 planet Earth. That's kind of how Le Guin wrote that. So there's a bit of a a cold war war thing going on. There's different countries kind of with their own political structures on the planet.

[00:08:24]And they definitely repress women. So Shevek is a scientist and one of the first things he finds out is women aren't allowed to be scientists on this planet, you know?

[00:08:36]And so there's a lot of differences and since he's being used as like an outsider, Le Guin can really explore these differences and while she of course is making some commentary on capitalism and some things like that, she shows you both sides of both of these worlds and and no no one of them is is completely perfect. And the byline of this novel is The Dispossessed, the magnificent new epic of an ambiguous utopia.

[00:09:11]But you'll find that this planet of Anarres is is not a utopia and a utopia is never something you finalize on. It's always something you're kind of striving for.

[00:09:24]And so there's a lot of dialogue going on in this novel about the differences between these civilizations and how you could make a civilization better.

[00:09:34]And she put a lot of thought there's a lot of world building in both of these alternating chapters on both planets seeing life >> [clears throat and cough] >> from both sides of things.

[00:09:46]And then seeing Shevek kind of question a lot of things on the planet Urras. So, it's a really good deep dive into that.

[00:09:55]But, like I said, it is slow. There's very little action going on in this book. There's a lot of thought experiment being thought through and the world building is is there to kind of support these two planets. And And that that's kind of the the characters in this in this book. Because even Shevek, our main character, is not a very well-drawn out character. And he's not a perfect character, either. He definitely has his flaws.

[00:10:24]And he does some pretty bad things in this book, as well. But, >> [clears throat] >> you know, I can definitely appreciate this book a lot more. And I'm really excited now to read more in the Hainish cycle because knowing what little I know about the Hainish and kind of you you do get teased a little bit more at the end about some other worlds that are populated in other parts of the galaxy.

[00:10:51]And it it really makes me want to read more of her work. Not only for her great writing and her the elaborate themes, but also the science fictional element of of what she's got going on here.

[00:11:04]And you know, there is a little bit of hard science. Like I said, Shevek, he's been working on this thing called the general temporal theory.

[00:11:13]And if you know anything about simultaneity and the block universe, really fascinating concepts.

[00:11:20]I really wish she could have wrote more about that. But, that's just my own personal kind of wants in this book. Um, so she you you're just kind of teased in those concepts. And it's enough to keep me, you know, like hoping there was more but in the end it it's not the point of this book. The the point of this book is, you know, all these other things she's these themes that she's diving into. So, you know, let me know. I know this is a book that it's it probably hits you different depending on how old you are when you read this, what's going on in your life when you read this, and on subsequent rereads she's got so many layers in this. I could see how each time you could get more and more out of it.

[00:12:04]So, let me know what your thoughts are on that on that book. Um but that's going to do it for that review.

[00:12:10]Next up I'm reading Beyond Another Sun by Tom Goodwin. So, that's the next in the wife's wild card pick. So, look for that one coming out soon and thanks for watching.