The Wave in the Mind: Talks and Essays on the Writer, the Reader, and the Imagination [Paperback]

Le Guin is stimulating company. A profoundly creative and prolific fiction writer who has won a half-dozen major awards and enticed readers to science fiction who otherwise might not have ventured into that fantastic terrain, she is also a forthright, incisive, and funny essayist. In her second nonfiction collection, a piquant, morally lucid, and enlivening volume graced with a well-chosen phrase of Virginia Woolf's, Le Guin considers the pleasures and significance of reading, the true meaning of literacy, the power of the imagination, and the writer's responsibility. On a memoiristic note, she remembers her anthropologist father and Native American family friends. On the literary plane, she praises libraries as sacred places that embody freedom, pays homage to Borges and Twain, dissects the assumptions behind the designation "creative nonfiction," and analyzes the "rhythms of prose." And Le Guin is breathtakingly hilarious on the subjects of age, beauty, and womanhood. Candid, earthy, and deeply involved in the human experience, Le Guin is artist, mentor, and friend. Donna Seaman
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"Essential reading for anyone who imagines herself literate and/or socially concerned or who wants to learn what it means to be such."—Library Journal

"What a pleasure it is to roam around in Le Guin's spacious, playful mind. And what a joy to read her taut, elegant prose."—Erica Jong

Join Ursula K. Le Guin as she explores a broad array of subjects, ranging from Tolstoy, Twain, and Tolkien to women's shoes, beauty, and family life. With her customary wit, intelligence, and literary craftsmanship, she offers a diverse and highly engaging set of readings. The Wave in the Mind includes some of Le Guin's finest literary criticism, rare autobiographical writings, performance art pieces, and, most centrally, her reflections on the arts of writing and reading.

Ursula K. Le Guin is the winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Gandalf, Kafka, and National Book Awards. She is the author of many short stories and more than fifteen novels, including The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed. She is also an honored author of children's books, poetry, and criticism.