Running from Moonlight: Reading Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Left Hand of Darkness and The Word for World is Forest as Models for Writing Characters

Abstract

This project presents an original manuscript of speculative fiction, which is contextualized within a discussion of fictional techniques in selected writings of Ursula K. LeGuin. By examining some of the ways LeGuin’s science fiction achieves social critique, the foreword attempts to answer criticism that suggests speculative fiction creates environments for the purpose of escapism. While some scholarship maintains that science fiction and fantasy are simply diversions from the realities and troubles of everyday life, creating fantastic and easy solutions to complex problems, the foreword to this thesis posits ways that speculative fiction uses the creation of imaginary environments to enlarge ideas in our current society and to offer social critique by extrapolating or speculating upon potential outcomes. The foreword explores the role of characterization, suggesting that the characters through whom readers view the stories are integral to the understanding of the concepts therein, and thereby key to offering social critique. This scholarship speaks to the need for characters that are formed not from simple stereotypes, but thoughtfully as an amalgamation of the events that have shaped their lives. This foreword argues the benefit of creating characters from their environments, identifying techniques in Ursula K. LeGuin’s science fiction The Left Hand of Darkness and The Word for World is Forest to contextualize the original fantasy novel Running from Moonlight in the position that speculative fiction can offer social critique through characterization and other elements of fiction craft. This discussion argues that writers who wish to write fiction that critiques social issues such as gender can emulate LeGuin’s character- and world-creation in order to create complex characters and facilitate social critique. Analyses of characters in LeGuin’s novels provide context for analyzing the construction of the character Saelana in the manuscript Running from Moonlight.