11 thoughts on “January 24, 2018: The Farthest Shore”

  1. I've only read The Left Hand of Darkness. We also have The Dispossessed but I haven't gotten around to it yet. I'll have to push that to the top of the list.

    1. I read The Left Hand of Darkness many years ago. Then a couple years ago I got it from the library again, because I had forgotten I already read it. Fortunately, its good enough that reading it again was a perfectly acceptable thing for me to do. I really do need to read more from her.

    2. I've only watched the Ghibli "Earthsea" movie. Probably the lowest-regarded film from them, and I see it.
      Maybe they were trying to jam too much into one film? Also the name "Earthsea" made me think more "Waterworld, but with Islands and Dragons". I think I imagined something cooler.

      1. I read the Earthsea trilogy back in HS/college at some time, but I don't remember anything jumping out at me at this point. Pretty standard for quality fantasy reading.

      2. I really, really wanted the Scifi miniseries to be good. But it was awful. The bits below conform with my recollections.

        Reviewing the miniseries, the book The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy claimed Legend of Earthsea "totally missed the point" of Le Guin's novels, "ripping out all the subtlety, nuance and beauty of the books and inserting boring cliches, painful stereotypes and a very unwelcome 'epic' war in their place".[1] The Moria website's review of "Legend of Earthsea" states "Earthsea feels exactly like tv filler. In the books, Ursula Le Guin expended a great deal of time creating a world with a depth and culture, but nothing of this survives in the mini-series". The review also argues Legend of Earthsea "is shabbily and indifferently directed" and "The dialogue is dreadfully clunky and often excruciatingly bad".

        I don't really remember much of the books, which I read as a kid, or of others of hers that I've read (Dispossed, Left Hand, Lathe, etc.).

  2. Happy Hall of Fame Day! Mrs. Hayes wore her Thome shirsey to work today for good luck. (Possibly the first time a Thome shirsey has been worn to a faculty meeting on campus?)

    'Here’s my hypothetical ballot, ranked by enthusiasm:' SelectShow
  3. frightwig called it back in November:

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