this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2024
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Personally, I wouldn't start with Wizard of Earthsea, that book was published in 1968 and definitely has the prose and flow modern readers are not as used to, especially for the fantasy genre.
I read Left Hand of Darkness for school, but it was The Dispossessed plus her non-fiction essays that got me into her. Omelas is also a good short story starting point, and I think it's only 20 pages.
I'm not super versed in modern Fantasy, in what ways does Earthsea flow different? I always thought the first book was a very accessible Hero's Journey deal and a good jumping off point
Oh the story itself is very accessible, I agree, and foundational for a lot of "magician's journey"-type storytelling we see today. The issue is that the writing itself is very...not dry per se... but definitely almost academic. It's closer to Tolkien's Two Towers than any of the Song of Ice and Fire series, to make a basic comparison.
Even reading the first chapter of Wizards, you see a lot of exposition and sentence structures that aren't as popular in modern writing today. For example, we have the author talk to us (the reader) directly, instead of through Sparrowhawk. That really isn't used anymore nowadays unless for comedic effect. Sparrowhawk himself is also kind of distant to us readers. We're reading his journey as a tale, but we're not necessarily experiencing it with him, if that makes sense.
If you're used to reading older sci-fi/fantasy, you'll be fine with most of this. If you've grown up in the Harry Potter/Percy Jackson/Song of Ice and Fire/ era, this will be incredibly jarring. I would actually say that Tombs of Atuan (the second book) is a better entry point to the series for these readers.
None of this means Wizards is badly written by the way. It is intentionally written like a "modern" (1960s) saga akin to the Poetic Edda, and it works extremely well in that sense. For me personally, the Earthsea Cycle is probably my favourite fantasy series of all time, and nothing (sorry Tolkienites, not even LotR) comes close to the experience I had reading for the first time. But I can't recommend Wizards of Earthsea as the entry point to le Guin without asking whether or not you read the Silmarillion by yourself front to back of your own volition, lol.
But if you read Atuan first you miss the experience of going
Minor Tombs of Atuan spoiler
oh shit that's my boyI think a good way to counteract the dryness is by listening to an audiobook. That way it feels more like a story being told to you
LOL
Don't worry, I actually originally started with Atuan first (just what my grandma had on the shelf), and then went back to the first book. I still had that moment like a chapter into Wizards.