The Dispossessed is a science fiction novel taking place on a pair of sister planets Annares and Urras. Written in 1974, the book is really a utopian fiction, an effort to reimagine a world unencumbered by poverty, capitalism, sexism, and the military industrial complex, while at the same time celebrating a varied continuum of sexual expression and a symbiotic relationship with the environment.
LeGuin gives us a lot to consider, but does not take for granted her reader’s understanding of the social problems she seeks to re-imagine. The book begins in the revolutionary Socialist land of Annares which had been settled 200 years ago by Settlers seeking relief from poverty and oppression on Urras. We follow Shevek, the protagonist and prodigy physicist as he struggles to find balance between the demands of his society – shared assignment to the drudgery jobs, communal living, fear of “egotizing” or being an individualist – and his desire to study physics. Through Shevek’s eyes we see the respect granted to women colleagues, his open and honest sexual life, and his freedom of movement in a society with with no sense of possession.
In my book group it was pointed out that writing a pro-communist novel at the height of the Cold War was a radical act. The context of 70s experimentation with free love is also quite evident (the book was written in 1974).
Shevek runs up against petty burocracy and decides to take the radical step to leave Annares to visit Urras. On Urras he is given access to labs, students, books from other worlds, and the riches of capitalism. But he is horrified by the inequality and baffled by the artificiality of their culture, and ends up escaping his handlers at the University to seek out the revolutionaries of Urras. It doesn’t take long before Shevek’s symbolic role as the visitor from radical Annares sparks the growing waive of discontent and protest erupts.
Shevek manages to escape and in the end returns to his family and culture on Annares, a changed man. Whether Annares has changed enough in his absence to welcome his return we do not know.
This description only skims the surface of this very dense book. I found the description of the utopian Annares a little tedious at the beginning, where each character seemed a trope for some social ideal. But as Shevek’s tale unfolds the characters become more complex and his struggle for integrity as an intellectual, a loving partner and father, and a citizen made me question my own egotizing and propertarianism.
One aspect of the book that might take me more than one reading to fully understand is Shevek’s musings on physics and the philosophy of simultaneity. This one passage is probably the clearest explanation and beautifully conveys these ideas.
“It is only in consciousness, it seems, that we experience time at all. A little baby has no time; he can’t distance himself from the past and understand how it relates to his present, or plan how his present might relate to his future. He does not know time passes; he does not understand death. The unconscious mind of the adult is like that still. In a dream there is no time, and succession is all changed about, and cause and effect are all mixed together. In myth and legend there is no time. What past is it the tale means when it says ‘Once upon a time’? And so, when the mystic makes the reconnection of his reason and his unconscious, he sees all becoming as one being, and understands the eternal return.”
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