{"id":1064,"date":"2016-02-19T19:57:30","date_gmt":"2016-02-20T02:57:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/?p=1064"},"modified":"2020-12-20T01:29:26","modified_gmt":"2020-12-20T08:29:26","slug":"worlds-of-ursula-k-le-guin-spread-the-word-about-this-film-and-kickstarter-campaign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/?p=1064","title":{"rendered":"Spreading the Word about the ‘Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin’ Documentary and Kickstarter Campaign"},"content":{"rendered":"

I recently learned about this feature documentary<\/a> about Ursula K. Le Guin and the fundraiser that the filmmaker, Arwen Curry, is currently running through Kickstarter<\/a>. It looks like a wonderful project, and\u00a0Arwen Curry has been filming and working closely with Le Guin for a number of years; the film is scheduled to come out in 2017.\u00a0 The project has been awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, but to get the funds from the grant released, the producers have to raise the balance of their budget, which is $200,000.\u00a0 While they set their initial Kickstarter goal for $80,000, they\u2019ve already doubled that, and with two more weeks to go, it looks like there’s a good chance they\u2019ll get the full amount and then be able to focus entirely on finishing the film — I\u2019ve got my fingers crossed that they\u2019ll make it!<\/p>\n

As anyone who knows me (or who\u2019s read much on this site) is well aware, Le Guin is both my favorite author and my greatest inspiration as a writer. It may seem that I go on about her a bit much, but it\u2019s hard to put into words the significance of the epiphany I had when I first discovered her work.\u00a0 As I mention in my bio here<\/a>,\u00a0it was because of her that I learned that there was such a thing as social science fiction, and realized that all these story ideas I had running around in my head fit perfectly\u00a0into that subgenre.\u00a0 (And one could argue that much of my fantasy is essentially social SF with a fantasy-type setting and a few other elements that give it that fantasy feel instead.)<\/p>\n

Because Le Guin writes both SF and fantasy and a wide variety of other things — including poems, essays, plays, contemporary fiction, and children\u2019s picture books — she\u00a0also provided\u00a0an example of the kind of writer I want to be, since I\u2019m interested in writing many things and wouldn\u2019t want to be pigeon-holed into any category.\u00a0 And as soon as I was old enough to fully appreciate the brilliance of her style, it\u00a0also contributed to inspiring me to strive toward that level of mastery as a writer.<\/p>\n

It’s intriguing how a person you’ve never even met can have as much\u00a0of an impact\u00a0on you as, say, a favorite teacher, or even a grandparent. When you read someone\u2019s words (and I love reading Le Guin\u2019s essays almost as much as reading her fiction) and find that those words feel familiar yet also teach you new things that\u00a0relate to your own ideas and goals, it\u2019s a great deal like having a mentor who plays an active role in your life.\u00a0 It was actually a bit unsettling when I first read Le Guin\u2019s work, because I discovered that some of the elements, such as the settings, the concepts involved, and the type of storylines, made her stories seem remarkably similar to my own.<\/p>\n

For instance, much of Planet of Exile<\/em> and parts of Tombs of Atuan<\/em> gave me the odd feeling that here was something I could have written in another life, or perhaps in a parallel universe where I was a slightly different version of myself.\u00a0 But I should also clarify that I\u2019m referring to the content and \u2018flavor\u2019 of those stories — not, alas, that I\u2019m suggesting that there was a marked similarity in the writing!\u00a0 (I only wish<\/em> I could say that my style was similar to hers when I was a young teenager!) \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

Funnily enough,\u00a0much more recently\u00a0I’ve had the experience of\u00a0something feeling familiar in the opposite way.\u00a0 I haven\u2019t read Patrick Rothfuss\u2019s books (I\u2019m afraid I always have a big backlog of books I want to read, just as I\u00a0have a backlog of stories to write!), but on several occasions\u00a0I\u2019ve picked one up\u00a0and read a passage or two.\u00a0 And each time I\u2019ve come away with the feeling that there are uncanny similarities in our styles — rather than getting the \u2018this sounds like something I would write about\u2019 feeling I\u2019ve had with Le Guin\u2019s stories, I found myself thinking \u2018boy, that sounds like the kind\u00a0of phrasing and\/or descriptive details I would use\u2019.\u00a0 It isn’t that\u00a0anything about the content feels particularly familiar,\u00a0only the style, and\u00a0from looking at\u00a0Rothfuss\u2019s\u00a0website<\/a> and\u00a0some interviews, we don\u2019t appear to have any influences in common — other than Tolkien, which is practically a given when it comes to\u00a0writers of fantasy.\u00a0 (But\u00a0perhaps that\u2019s not insignificant; sadly,\u00a0I\u2019ve encountered some young fantasy writers online who\u00a0admit to strongly disliking Tolkien\u2019s style.) \ud83d\ude15<\/span><\/p>\n

But I also thought of Rothfuss just now because one thing I really admire about him relates to fundraisers; he founded a charity called Wordbuilders<\/a> that raises money for projects like Heifer International<\/a>, which I think is fantastic.\u00a0 Whenever an artist has had enough success to give them some visibility, that visibility may be helpful in raising awareness of a good cause, so it gives me the warm fuzzies to see an author putting so much of their energy into charity work, and Mr. Rothfuss certainly deserves kudos for all he does in that arena.<\/p>\n

Le Guin is also someone who\u2019s done countless wonderful things that go well beyond her own writing. She\u2019s always been a vocal supporter of authors and artistic freedom, as well as setting a great example for being open-minded and passionate about the positive potential in all us, artists and non-artists alike.\u00a0 I confess it\u2019s kind of wild for me to read some of the comments on the Kickstarter<\/a> page and on Facebook<\/a> about how she\u2019s inspired and moved other people.\u00a0 In spite of her stature as an author,\u00a0the truth is that if I don\u2019t count people I\u2019ve come across on websites that have to do with writing or reading, in \u2018real life\u2019 I\u2019ve met no more than half a dozen individuals who knew her name and had perhaps read one of her books.<\/p>\n

So in many ways it\u2019s always felt as if my zeal for Le Guin as a writer is a personal thing that\u2019s part of my identity alone, although of course I\u2019ve always known — on a logical level — that it was\u00a0impossible\u00a0that I was\u00a0her only devotee!\u00a0 It\u2019s always nice to meet fellow fans who share a common interest, but being an author whose own work has\u00a0been influenced by hers also means that it\u2019s\u00a0important\u00a0for me to learn more about\u00a0her other readers\u00a0and\u00a0find ways to connect with them.\u00a0 One of the obvious answers to the question of who the audience is for my own books is \u2018Le Guin fans\u2019; I\u2019m sure most people would identify In the Shadow of the She-Wolf<\/em> as the same type of literary social science fiction as Le Guin\u2019s SF novels.\u00a0 (Hey, for that reason alone it\u2019s exciting to see confirmation that the folks who read those books really do<\/em> exist!)\ud83d\ude00<\/span><\/p>\n

In all seriousness, it\u2019s great to see the depth of support for this documentary and to know there are many of us who are looking forward to it, and I\u2019d like to encourage anyone reading this to contribute to funding the project if you\u2019re able to (and haven\u2019t done so already), and also to pass this along to anyone else you know who might be interested.\u00a0 Here\u2019s the link<\/a>\u00a0to the Kickstarter campaign again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I recently learned about this feature documentary about Ursula K. Le Guin and the fundraiser that the filmmaker, Arwen Curry, is currently running through Kickstarter. It looks like a wonderful project, and\u00a0Arwen Curry has been filming and working closely with … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science-fiction-fantasy","category-thoughts-on-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1064"}],"version-history":[{"count":68,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1343,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1064\/revisions\/1343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lcmcgehee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}