The Dispossessed
On sale
12th August 1999
Price: £10.99
One of the very best must-read novels of all time – with a new introduction by Roddy Doyle
‘A well told tale signifying a good deal; one to be read again and again’ THE TIMES
‘The book I wish I had written … It’s so far away from my own imagination, I’d love to sit at my desk one day and discover that I could think and write like Ursula Le Guin’ Roddy Doyle
‘Le Guin is a writer of phenomenal power’ OBSERVER
The Principle of Simultaneity is a scientific breakthrough which will revolutionize interstellar civilization by making possible instantaneous communication. It is the life work of Shevek, a brilliant physicist from the arid anarchist world of Anarres.
But Shevek’s work is being stifled by jealous colleagues, so he travels to Anarres’s sister-planet Urras, hoping to find more liberty and tolerance there. But he soon finds himself being used as a pawn in a deadly political game.
‘A well told tale signifying a good deal; one to be read again and again’ THE TIMES
‘The book I wish I had written … It’s so far away from my own imagination, I’d love to sit at my desk one day and discover that I could think and write like Ursula Le Guin’ Roddy Doyle
‘Le Guin is a writer of phenomenal power’ OBSERVER
The Principle of Simultaneity is a scientific breakthrough which will revolutionize interstellar civilization by making possible instantaneous communication. It is the life work of Shevek, a brilliant physicist from the arid anarchist world of Anarres.
But Shevek’s work is being stifled by jealous colleagues, so he travels to Anarres’s sister-planet Urras, hoping to find more liberty and tolerance there. But he soon finds himself being used as a pawn in a deadly political game.
Reviews
An extraordinary work ... [Le Guin] created a working society in exquisite detail ... a fully realised hypothetical culture [as well as] living breathing characters who are inevitable products of that culture
Written with thought, care - even love
This remains a challenging and urgent book
One of the great American political novels . . . Full of intrigue and drama
A well told tale signifying a good deal; one to be read again and again
Le Guin's book ... is so persuasive that it ought to put a stop to the writing of prescriptive Utopias for at least 10 years
One of our finest projectionists of brave old and other worlds
A seamless creation: everything is made up, nothing seems arbitrary
Dystopia and utopia are entwined in Le Guin's story of hierarchy-bound Urras and its anarchist neighbour planet Anarres. With stylish prose and intellectual rigour, Le Guin charts the journey of young physicist Shevek, whose theories cause upheaval on both planets, as he struggles to survive, falls in love and contemplates human society
The book I wish I had written ... It's so far away from my own imagination, I'd love to sit at my desk one day and discover that I could think and write like Ursula Le Guin
The Dispossessed paints a hopeful; and complex portrait of a society rooted in collectivism
Le Guin's storytelling is sharp, magisterial, funny, thought-provoking and exciting, exhibiting all that science fiction can be
Le Guin is a writer of phenomenal power
[Le Guin had] the heart of a poet who knew all too well the difference between miracle and eureka, revelation and revolution
A deeply imagined work of art
The Dispossessed is still one of Sci-Fi's' smartest books . . . Remains a thoughtful exploration of politics and economics nearly 50 years later
