Summary
The American writer, Ursula Le Guin, was one of the most influential authors of the second half of the 20th century, publishing 20 novels in genres from science fiction to young adult. Le Guin pioneered feminist science fiction with The Left Hand of Darkness and created the enduringly popular Earthsea series of fantasy novels. She died in 2018. Simon Watts introduces the memories of Ursula Le Guin, as recorded in the BBC archives.
PHOTO: Ursula Le Guin in the 1980s (BBC/Marion Wood Kolisch)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Just before this BBC podcast gets underway, here's something you may not know. |
| 0:04.7 | My name's Linda Davies and I Commission Podcasts for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:08.5 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely engaging voices. |
| 0:18.0 | What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars, |
| 0:24.6 | poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories and that's just a few examples. |
| 0:29.7 | If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds. |
| 0:36.0 | Hello and thank you for downloading the podcast of Witness History from the BBC World Service |
| 0:46.8 | with me Simon Watts. Today I'm looking back at the career of Ursula Leguin, the American writer who's known for exploring |
| 0:54.8 | gender and politics through science fiction and for creating the Earth Sea |
| 0:59.7 | fantasy series. I've been listening to interviews with Ursula Le Gwyn in the BBC Archive. |
| 1:07.0 | I write science fiction, fantasy, young adult, children's historical, and then the so-called |
| 1:16.6 | mainstream fiction. |
| 1:18.9 | All my work tends to have this slight off-centeredness or magical realist quality or whatever you want to call it. |
| 1:25.4 | In a long career Ursula Leguin wrote 20 novels and more than 100 short stories. |
| 1:31.6 | Her work created imaginary worlds in order to shed light on our world, and |
| 1:37.1 | it's admired by everyone from Ian Banks and Neil Gaiman to Salmon Rushty and Zady Smith. She spoke to the BBC on several occasions. |
| 1:46.5 | What I've always assumed I'm doing is doing my best to describe the world I live in. |
| 1:51.1 | I mean that's what fiction does. Whether it's realistic or or whether it's |
| 1:55.3 | realistic at five or six removes, you can change society. You can change physiology. |
| 2:01.6 | It's a lovely playground. |
| 2:04.1 | Le Gwynne played around with gender in the left hand of darkness, |
| 2:08.4 | the novel from 1969, which made her name. |
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