Check out this six minute video of Ursula LeGuin’s acceptance speech for a lifetime achievement award at the National Book Awards ceremony, where she gave an impassioned defense of science fiction — and of writers in general.
A sampling: “I rejoice in accepting it and sharing it with all those who were excluded from literature for so long, my fellow writers of fantasy and science fiction, writers of the imagination,who for the last fifty years watched the beautiful awards go to the so-called realists. I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken societies and even imagine some real grounds for hope…the realists of a larger reality.”
She also had some choice words about the current state of the publishing industry. Worth a listen.
When Orah and Nathaniel enter the Temple of the Dreamers, high up on the mountain, I didn’t want them to immediately barge into the chamber holding the cocoons, a sterile room dominated by technology. Beyond needing to build anticipation, I felt the haughty dreamers would have embellished the place where they strove for immortality by creating spectacular anterooms as the approach to where their science worked
especially since most of my novels involve alternate worlds and unusual cultures. The short answer: I don’t have a clue. Ideas come to me rather than me seeking them out. They arrive at odd times, usually when I’m least rational. They appear out of thin air during
