A Wizard of Earthsea

, #1

Paperback, 183 pages

English language

Published Aug. 12, 1980 by Bantam Books.

ISBN:
978-0-553-14863-3
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5 stars (4 reviews)

A boy grows to manhood while attempting to subdue the evil he unleashed on the world as an apprentice to the Master Wizard.

60 editions

reviewed A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin (Earthsea Cycle, #1)

I suppose

3 stars

Prose is slim and considered, the imagery vivid without being exhausting, but I did not feel engaged with Ged, personally, philosophically, etc.

I appreciate how concise and capable a novel this is; that it is in its way rubbing against the grain of what, in 1969 especially, are the expectations of a fantasy novel and setting.

But I read it today, in a different cultural milieu. While Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed still felt compelling and relevant, Wizard of Earthsea is something I can only imagine once having a greater potency.