Ursula K.

Le Guin (1929-2018)
wrote both poetry and prose, and in various modes including realistic fiction, science fiction,
fantasy, young children’s books, books for young adults, screenplays, essays, verbal texts for
musicians, and voicetexts. She published seven books of poetry, twenty-two novels, over a
hundred short stories (collected in eleven volumes), four collections of essays, twelve books for
children, and four volumes of translation. Few American writers have done work of such high
quality in so many forms.
 This inventor of worlds grew up in Berkeley. Her father was the University of California’s first
professor of anthropology. Kroeber Hall, the campus building that houses the department, is
named in his honor. A pioneer of cultural anthropology, today Professor Kroeber is best
remembered for his association with and research on Ishi, the man believed at the time to have
been the last of the California Yahi tribe. He was even called “the last wild Indian in North
America.” That was the subtitle, in fact, of the book Ishi in Two Worlds, written by Le Guin’s
mother, Theodora Kroeber, who met Le Guin’s father while she was a graduate student at
Berkeley. The book made her famous in her own right.
“They were very loving and very patient, but
they didn’t hover. I wasn’t very rebellious
because there wasn’t anything to rebel against,
if you know what I mean. It was kind of easy to
be a good girl. And I had three big brothers, and
that was kind of cool, too.”
Ursula's father, Alfred Kroeber, was
an anthropologist who spoke
several languages and was
renowned for his work on the
California Indians. Even before she
could read, Ursula would listen to
her father tell Indian legends and
myths.
 With her brother Karl and cats Figaro and Nero

This home was an excellent greenhouse for nurturing a writer, and Ursula, from an early age,
enjoyed the best training in psychology, anthropology, sociology, and writing. "I had an emotionally
and psychologically and intellectually very rich and very serene childhood," she told me. "I loved
where we lived. I had a large, warm family. It was a place where a small girl could grow and
flourish like a flower in the garden."
 As a child Ursula read everything
she could get her hands on: myths,
legends, fairy tales. Once, when she
was about twelve, she picked up a
book in the family's large library, and
while reading it, she was struck by
the realization that people were still
making up stories and myths! It was
a decisive moment. She had
discovered her native country and
her inner lands.
She graduated from Radcliffe
College with a major in French
in 1951 and earned her
master's degree in French and
Italian from Columbia
University in 1952. A year later
she began to study for her
<Ph.D>. and won a Fulbright
grant to study in France.
Crossing the Atlantic on the Queen Mary,
she met her future husband, Charles
LeGuin, a professor of French history.
Their marriage in Paris signaled the end of
her doctoral studies and the beginning of a
long and happy family life which later
included two daughters and a son. In 1959
Charles was assigned to teach history at
Portland State University and she spent all
her life living with the family in Portland,
Oregon.
"Some of us are Norman Mailer," said Ursula K. LeGuin in a 1976 interview with science-fiction
fanzine Luna Monthly, "but others of us are middle-aged Portland housewives." And though Le
Guin may have thought of herself as one of the latter, "middle-aged Portland housewife" is
hardly the way the rest of us would describe her. Over a nearly 60-year-long career, Le Guin
produced an enormous body of literary work, including but not limited to the six books in which
she created the world of Earthsea and other acclaimed sci-fi novels like The Left Hand of
Darkness, The Dispossessed, and The Lathe of Heaven. And somehow she managed to write
all of it between 7:15 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. each day.
Le Guin settled in Portland, Oregon, where she raised three children and wrote prolifically. She
and her husband, historian Charles Le Guin, balanced work and parenting by following what
she has called Le Guin’s Rule: “One person cannot do two full-time jobs, but two persons can
do three full-time jobs—if they honestly share the work.”
Her first science fiction novel to be published was Rocannon's World (1966). This signaled the
beginning of a brilliant career that has produced science fiction stories and novels, children's and
young adults' books, essays and poetry. "I have cut across so many boundaries that the critics
don't know what to do with me, I write in so many categories."
Two more science fiction novels,
Planet of Exile (1966) and City of
Illusion (1967), followed almost
immediately, but her real success
came with the publication of A
Wizard of Earthsea (1968) which
won the prestigious Globe-
Hornbook Award for Excellence.
With the award came national
recognition. Then, The Left Hand
of Darkness (1969) won both the
Hugo and Nebula Awards, and
when her novel The Dispossessed
(1974) appeared and also won the
Hugo and Nebula, LeGuin became
the first science fiction writer to
have won both awards twice.
Many feminists have complained that Ursula LeGuin's
characters are predominantly male, and even her
Gethenians, the people on planet Winter, who are both men
and women in one, appear to be basically male. However,
her own life can serve as a model of the successful, modern,
sophisticated, and liberated woman who managed a brilliant
career, successful marriage, and motherhood, without
sacrificing any of them.

"When the kids were babies I wrote at night, from nine to

eleven or as long as I could stay awake. Then, as they
began school, I had the whole schoolday to work; I felt as if I
grew wings. Now, I try to work in the morning, from about
seven to two."
Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin is a feature documentary
exploring the remarkable life and legacy of the late
feminist author Ursula K. Le Guin. Best known for
groundbreaking science fiction and fantasy works such as
A Wizard of Earthsea, The Left Hand of Darkness, and
The Dispossessed, Le Guin defiantly held her ground on
the margin of “respectable” literature until the sheer
excellence of her work, at long last, forced the mainstream
to embrace fantastic literature. Her fascinating story has
never before been captured on film.

Produced with Le Guin’s participation over the course of a

decade, Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin is a journey through
the writer’s career and her worlds, both real and fantastic.
Viewers will join the writer on an intimate journey of self-
discovery as she comes into her own as a major feminist
author, opening new doors for the imagination and
inspiring generations of women and other marginalized
writers along the way. The film features stunning
animation and reflections by literary luminaries including
Margaret Atwood, Neil Gaiman, David Mitchell, Michael
Chabon, and more.

Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin was created with the

generous support of the National Endowment for the
Humanities, California Humanities, the Berkeley Film
Foundation, and 3,185 backers on Kickstarter.
Ursula K. LeGuin drew a sharp line between herself as a person, woman, wife and mother and
herself as a writer. An introvert, she jealously kept her private life to herself, shielding her family
and her private self from the limelight.

In her entire body of stories and novels nothing was autobiographical. Her friends and family
members didn't find themselves in her books as is so often the case with fiction writers. Although
the integration of polarities emerged as a central theme in her writing, it seems that hers was a
sharply divided world between the private and the professional.
“I am not predicting, or prescribing,” she wrote. “I am describing.”