Author Ursula Le Guin sure is sharp and punchy for an old lady. She’d probably hate my saying that, because she’s also a feminist. But listening to her talk about her short story The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas at rontoms last night was a pure joy, and not in the “go spend time with your granny” sense. The free event was organized by the Oregon Council for the Humanities, which could have charged big bucks and filled a bigger venue, although there was something pleasingly Parisian Salon about cramming such a small space with citizens eager to hear a luminary expound on “morality and self deception.” Some even had to listen through open windows from out on the sidewalk.
The roots of the Omelas story can be traced to philosopher William James and Dostoyevsky, said Le Guin. And the title, literally, from “reading a road sign backwards.” Salem, Oregon! Last night Le Guin re-told a short version of the story, reflected on it, and took questions along with PSU philosophy professor Lani Roberts. The most frustrating thing about having written the story for Le Guin, it seems, is that people want to change its premise all the time—that a city of happy people must depend on the suffering of an isolated child. “But you can’t do that,” said Le Guin. “That’s the deal.” Le Guin also described the child in the story as like the proverbial “turd in the punchbowl,” a phrase I’m hereby stealing for future use. Here’s video:
Roberts also talked provocatively about the way people lie to themselves to justify negative behavior in life. There’s “flipping the telescope,” where we see our positive deeds as universal and minimize the bad, then there’s comparing ourselves to others who have done worse—”at least I’m not Dick Cheney,” chimed in Le Guin—or comparing ourselves to successful people who have also done wrong. What can I say? I do all of those things. But I’m still a wonderful person. And hey: At least I don’t talk about turds in punchbowls while others are eating, like Ursula Le Guin.
Damn wish I had gone to this 🙁
I do not read her stories but I could listen to her speak forever.
is Lani Roberts now at PSU? i was in her class at OSU as a freshman.
This was such a stellar event. Feminist philosophers & cheap well whiskey? Thought I’d died and gone to heaven. Loved how Ursula jabbed out at the insinuation that “A Little Bit of Women’s Lib” was a meaningless placation for the larger ongoing wrongs of civilization.
FIERCE!
Thank you so much to the Oregon Council for the Humanities for putting this on!
That was such a fun event. I had a really good question and was too timid to ask. Curses! Also, Matt Davis sat at my table and single-handedly recruited me as a devoted reader of the Mercury or at least this blog through sheer charm. Great article, great event, god I love Portland.
So that’s how I look after six hours of biking? Wow…
I was kinda disappointed in the cyclical nature of the Q&A session, but the talk as a whole was still good.
The best part was that fact that Le Guin felt a need to remind people that she is, in fact, not god.
Too much Q&A from people who just wanted to soapbox and didn’t actually have a Q.
Yet Roberts and Le Guin were great to listen to and handled some of the asinine comments/questions with fantastic humor and insight.
Damndamndamn I wish i’d of knowed about this!
I love LeGuin because she’s such an unabashed Oregon writer. Back when I was falling in love with SF I read stories like The Lathe Of Heaven in which Portland is almost a supporting character and Omelas (I grew up in Salem so I not only was illuminated by the message but also honored that in using “Salem O” as an inspiration as a title elevated ol’ Snailem to a honor it in no way deserved) and thought about how cool it was that a famous SF writer wrote about Oregon when nobody else was.
Then I fell in love with how intelligent she was. She’s on of my favorite authors and we should be proud that she should spend her creative time on earth amongst us.