¶ … Wind -- Science Fiction for Adults, a Drama of the Human Heart and Mind rather than Light-Sabers Ursula Le Guin, the Modern Female Conscience of Science Fiction

Ursula Le Guin is one of the most highly respected authors of fantasy and science fiction of the 20th century. The award-winning Le Guin has long been praised for combining traditional elements of literary fiction, science fiction; with philosophical and ethical speculations on ways humans have experimented with alternative societies and philosophies as well as technology. Thus, Le Guin writes from a subjective humanist perspective, usually avoiding technical sciences as physics and chemistry in favor of cultural anthropology, political science, and psychology. This made her write 'against the grain' of other of her fellow contemporary science fiction authors when she began to gain fame in the 1960's. Her multifaceted focus has enabled her to remain popular today, long after the technological obsessions of travel to Mars and the Moon have become dated. Her fiction makes use of psychic phenomena, including telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition, and commonly incorporates the philosophies of Taoism and Zen, resulting in themes of reciprocity, unity, and holism. By presenting complex, often paradoxical symbols, images, and allusions, Le Guin stresses the need for individuals and societies to balance such dualities as order with chaos and harmony with rebellion to achieve wholeness. "The social sciences inform Ursula K. Le Guin's fantasies with far more earthly substance than the usual imaginary space flight, and her hypothetical futures have strong flavor of familiar history." (Updike, 275) Her books thus function as science fiction for adults, dealing with individual characters and internal struggles. The action take place...

The last book of the Earthsea Cycle is entitled The Other Wind. The Other Wind tells the tale of Alder, an ordinary conjurer of the land who specializes in fixing the broken pots and repairing the fence lines of Earthsea. When Alder's wife, Lily, dies and he cannot mend his beloved spouse's health or, ultimately her life, he begins to dream of the wall between the land of the living and the land of the dead being dismantled. He both hopes and fears this means the dead will invade Earthsea, as their spirits beg Alder to 'set us free.' Thus, the book, although a work of science fiction set in land where magicians are as common as electricians and plumbers, they are still concerned with such ordinary aspects of life as death, life, and grief, and how these aspects of individual life are mirrored in larger societal conflicts. "If there were a central metaphor to describe Le Guin's life and work, it might be the interplay of individual and society." (Sanders, entry on "Ursula Le Guin," The St. James' Encyclopedia of Pop Culture, 2002)
As the narrative of The Other Sea progresses, the reader is introduced one of the great heroes of Earthsea, named Ged, once Archmage of Earthsea. He sends the troubled Alder to King Lebannen. The protagonists also learn that dragons of Earthsea, which for centuries have kept their promise to abide in their western lands, have suddenly begun moving east, burning farms and cropland. Alder and King Lebannen learn they must join with one of the women burned by these attacks, a wizard of forbidden lore, and a being that is woman and dragon both to save Earthsea in a spirit of mutual cooperation.

From leading restful, almost ordinary lives, the King and Alder are thrust into conflict that tears them apart,…