On Tue, Jul 05, 2005 at 05:36:21PM -0400, Casey Rousseau <casey at the-bat.net> wrote: > Ah, but of course "someone else" wrote the book. That's the point I've made > time and again. LeGuin could not help being a different person in the late > 80's writing Tehanu than the one who wrote the original trilogy twenty years > earlier. Likewise, I was a different reader when I arrived at Tehanu than I > was when I first listened to Aunt Ursula weave her tales of a wizard named > Sparrowhawk. To expect either of us to remain the same is an exercise in > frustration. > > I think we can agree that the caution Matthew urges with respect to this > book should be observed carefully, especially with younger readers, or ones > with a strong emotional connection to the Ged, Tenar, & Co. of the original > books. I don't think it will be necessary for all such readers, but > certainly given the sample at hand, one may not say that there are no > readers for whom Tehanu would be disturbing and potentially traumatic. > > Matthew, is this fair? I don't know about anyone else, but I'd like to put > this particular issue to bed. I wouldn't say that Tehanu was *traumatic* in a personal sense. I'd say it was traumatic to the characters and the story, such that it damages the enjoyment of the story. But that's not real trauma; it's just a story (that happens to be pretty good), and since people generally prefer to enjoy their stories... Having given my original caution I'm more than willing to let it rest. I'd never say no one should read the book or insist that anyone else give cautions. I just think it's the right thing for me to do. Your summary is quite fair. -- Homepage: http://matthew.infodancer.org/ Politics: http://triggerfinger.org/ Literature: http://speculativefiction.org/ Public Key: http://matthew.infodancer.org/public_key.txt