- Publisher Harper Perennial Modern Classics
- Published Date: 2014
- Original Publish Date: 1974
- Pages: 387
- ISBN-10: 0-06-051275-X
- ISBN-13: 978-0-06-051275-0
- Author: Ursula K. Le Guin
The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the few novels to win all three, Hugo, Locus and Nebula Awards. This was the fifth of Le Guin’s Hainish Cycle novels, but chronologically would be the first of them to occur in this universe. The novel traces the life of Shevek who is the physicist would come to develop the theories required to create the ansible. The ansible is critical to the Hainish Cycle stories as it allows instantaneous communication across any distance, but it does not factor into The Dispossessed directly.
The story is set between the twin worlds of Anarres and Urras. These planets are kept distinct from each other with no visitation allowed in either direction except for limited trade. Urras is the older of the two civilizations, having a very Earthlike social structure with multiple nations and two ‘super powers’, A-Io and Thu. A-Io is a capitalistic state and Thu is more Soviet style authoritarian.
Anarres was the mostly uninhabited ‘moon’ of Urras until about two hundred years before the story begins. At that time, revolutionary followers of the philosopher Odo migrated from Urras to Annares to start an anarchistic society. Without laws or government or property, Annarres is an almost-Utopian society. Citizens do what is needed voluntarily and no one (theoretically) is above anyone else. This is the Odonian society into which Shevek was born and raised.
The novel swaps back and forth from Shevek’s early life on Annares and his later life when he finds a way to travel to Urras. On his home world, he is thought of as talented but odd and not quite fitting in with his colleagues. He perhaps believes too much in the Odonian philosophies to fit in the increasingly bureaucratic nature of the supposedly anarchistic community.
On Urras , he is celebrated and supported lavishly as an award winning physicist. In the capitalistic nation of A-Io, they hope to take advantage of his talents to commercialize his latest theories. He is both drawn to and disgusted by the ‘property-ists’ and their lavish but unequal lifestyles .
This is a really wonderful book, positing on a potential anarchistic society and how that might differ from the current government central nations. The book is both an exploration of a communal society and of the world Le Guin was living in. The conflicts between Thu and A-Io mirror the Soviet Union and America of the time, and perhaps of China and the USA today. Capitalism versus Authoritarian Socialism and gives a glimpse of a possible alternative to both of them.
Having lived in a Capitalistic environment my whole life, I have doubts whether the anarchistic Anarres is really possible given my understanding of human nature. Perhaps Le Guin did not believe it either, as she wrote selfishness, hierarchy and bureaucracy worming their way into the Odonian community over time. It is still an interesting thought experiment, and the story it is set in, is a great story regardless.
