Ch 18-20 More Quotes and Thoughts (LHOD)

First of all, I would just like to yell at Le Guin for a minute... The part where Estraven and Genly are on the Ice is my favorite part of the entire book.  I don't often read for plot (unless it's a murder mystery...but even then I'm so engrossed in trying to find the clues myself that I have to re-read the section where they say they catch the murderer), I read for emotional connections and philosophical/psychological statements.  Why did it take her until 2/3 of the book was already gone (chapter 15 in a 20 chapter book) to get to the climax?!? And even then it took about another chapter or so to get anywhere in the realm of discussion between the characters...Not going to lie, I hated most of this book (the thought experiment was cool, but I think it could have been done differently), I started LOVING it around chapter 16 or 17 and by that point it was over.

Okay, my ranting is finished and I have some real thoughts on the literary construction.  The first full paragraph of page 242 explains how the day usually went, with Genly waking up first, and after Estraven woke up they helped each other start to pack, ate breakfast when it was ready, then finished packing and went on their way.  It is all very methodical in the explanation of it, but it's almost as if this routine is the connection between the two men.  At first, they were struggling to work together, figure out each others weaknesses and how to compensate for them; now they work seamlessly together and without the other the journey would never work.  A page previous to that Genly describes waking up in the tent with Estraven and it being the only warmth around them, and outside of that tent is "the great darkness, the cold, death's solitude."  I didn't think much of this as I read it, but after reading how their routine fell into sync with one another, I realized that Genly explained his dependence on Estraven in that previous page the only way he knew how.

"The faint dampness and confining cling of my sleeping-bag; the sound of the snow; barely audible, Estraven's breathing as he sleeps; darkness.  Nothing else.  We are inside, the two of us, in shelter, at rest, at the center of all things.  outside as always, lies the great darkness, the cold, death's solitude."

This is Genly's way of expressing that Estraven, for him, means his life may continue.  Genly may not consciously realize this yet, but somewhere in his mind the idea is planted and it only continues to grow as he tells the story of how their travels work purely because they learned how to compliment and compensate for one another.


A quote from these chapters finished a thought from the previous set of readings for me.  The quote from page 199 that I discussed in my first blog of the week:

"I am the only man in all Gethen that has trusted you entirely, and I am the only man in Gethen that you have refused to trust."

Before Genly trusted Estraven, he did not allow himself to truly know/understand him.  Maybe this was a subconscious protection for Genly.  If Genly truly connected with Estraven, he may have thought that his connection with the world he left would disolve (this proves to be true, as we come to find out at the end of the novel when the ship lands on Gethen).  It also may have been something more innate that had nothing to do with the difference of species.  People who have been hurt, tend not to trust again very easily.  They have found that the more you put into a relationship (romantic or otherwise) the more you have to loose.

"But it was from the difference between us, not form the affinities and likenesses, but from the difference, that that love came: and it was itself the bridge, the only bridge, across what divided us....A profound love between two people involves, after all, the power and chance of doing profound hurt."  (p. 249)

Genly finally let himself care about Estraven here and realized that the differences in the two species were a good thing.  They were able to help each other out and compensate for the shortcomings of the other, as well as teach the other many things about their various cultures.  Also, Genly realized that he had put so much trust and care into Estraven that they were connected to a point that if something were to split them apart, he would be worse off than before he and Estraven became friends.  This is not a foreign concept to the reader; in fact, it is quite relate-able. Everyone we come into contact with and have some sort of connection to, changes us, for better or for worse.  In this case Genly realized that Estraven changed him For Good.