Silver Lining

I think there are a few themes in The Left Hand of Darkness. The most obvious one i noticed was her exaggeration of the male pronoun, "he", to the point of over using it. I think Le Guin definitely is trying to send a message here that our society is centered around the male gender. I think she also may believe the male gender dominates our society and wants to point that put so people will be obliged to change that.

Another theme i noticed was the theme of the silver lining. Estraven's character illustrates this on numerous occasions as well as Genly. Estraven, when he first met Genly was exiled because he helped Genly. Genly also achieved his mission at the cost of losing his closest friend: Estraven. This comes back to the Yin and Yang which is another theme of the story. Light cannot exist without dark, bad without good, questions without answers, rich without poor and gender without inequality?

Between a Rock and a Hard Place

Estraven seems to be in quite a pickle now and has no where to go, at least that we know of. He has been exiled from Karthide, and is now a fugitive in Orgoreyn. I don't see how the Orgoreyn authorities could not connect the disappearance of Estraven and the escape of Genly. I think Estraven is hoping to leave Gethan and possibly be an ambassador of some sort or just a tourist on other worlds. He seems to be one of the only Gethanians interested in the Ekumen and what they have to offer. If I were Estraven, I would have no idea what to do once Genly reaches Karthide. I would probably either go into hiding, and stay in contact with Genly or just tag along with him. Estraven seems not to care any more for his own well being and appears to be working for a higher cause than his survival. I guess, Estraven could go and stay with his former Kemmer brother because he would most likely take him in yet Estraven shows no sings of wanting to do so.

A World Apart?

How different is our society from Orgoreyn's? Is it better or worse?

Besides the whole gender topic, Orgoreyn seems to be a much more censored and controlled society than ours. Estraven mentions that there was no mention of Genly arriving on the radio and, most likely, not many, if any, of the common folk know that he is in Orgoreyn. Our society is practically run by the media and news stations, although there is still some secrecy. I do believe that we would have treated an alien life form in a very similar way, even if it looked very similar to us. People are very scared of the unknown and they would want to know everything they could about the extraterrestrial, with or without its consent.

I believe out society is better, but maybe not as productive. I mainly believe it is better because we enjoy many more rights and liberties than the Orgota. The Orgota seems to be much more productive and efficient but at the expense of their people's freedom. Our society is not perfect, however, and I despise the "every man for himself" mentality of free market capitalism.

The grass is always greener on the other side...

Is is beginning to look like Orgoreyn is not as perfect as we assumed after all. There seem to be so many factions, rules, and regulations and hardly anything is really how it appears. The diner conversation made this very apparent. Everyone seems to be working for their own personal motives and nobody seems to be genuinely working for the good of the domain. Genly somewhat realizes this when he says on pg 147:

" and yet each of them lacked some quality, some dimension of being; and they failed to convince. They were not quite solid. "

This seems to complicate Genly's job significantly because now he is being used as a political tool and could very easily attract enemies. I would be very scared if I were in his position ( although I probably would not have taken the job in the first place). HE is getting too involved with the affairs of Gethen and should remain neutral and stick to his task.

Sticks and Stones

While reading Left Hand of Darkness, i noticed, a couple times, the mention of the ansible as a method of communication. The main character also mentions that, on his journey, he traveled close to the speed of light and could return to try another generation. These two concepts are fascinating to me. I remember reading in another science fiction novel, Ender's Games, about a device called an ansible which could transmit instantaneous communication, disregarding distance. In Ender's Game, this was breakthrough and monumental technology which defied the laws of physics. The society was able to obtain this technology from an alien species which used it to communicate telepathically. Space travel was also a common theme in the Ender's Game series and allowed the main character to spend only thirty years in space as thousands of years passed on his home planet. Unfortunately, I feel both of these technologies are impossible for humans to attain, or at least not any time in the near future. I was mystified by the fact that the Gethan people saw no interest in learning about any of the foreign technology brought to the planet by Genly. This seems odd because it is usually human nature to try and learn more and adapt to our environment but the Gethans seem too isolated and foreign. So much of the Gethan's behavior seems inhuman to me that i wonder whether they can really be classified as the same race as ourselves.