wedrifid comments on Three Worlds Collide (0/8) - Less Wrong

48 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 30 January 2009 12:07PM

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Comment author: wedrifid 01 July 2013 03:58:11AM *  1 point [-]

'm willing to accept that JohnWittle means it literally, although, seriously? You'd trade Shakespeare and James Joyce--Neil Gaiman and Tolkien and Ursula K. Le Guin--for HPMOR? It's pretty hard for me to wrap my head around that.

  • Shakespeare I would trade for those weeks of my highschool life back, to spend on learning something more valuable.
  • James Joyce is an author I have heard of and have an intuition that I would experience social pressure against me if I did not assign him high status. From the reviews I read of Ulysses I would pay money to not have to read it. I don't object to other people reading it or enjoying the sophistication.
  • Tolkien's stories I would trade for MoR. His stories are rather dull. I wouldn't trade his world or, especially, the overwhelming influence he had on fantasy fiction in general and elves in particular.
  • Neil Gaiman's work I would trade, but reluctantly. I enjoyed Stardust. But Gaiman's work is more typical and substitutes more easily found. Extreme Rational characters and worlds are overwhelmingly rare.
  • Ursula K. Le Guin? Haven't read. Is her work closer in style and significance to Joyce, Shakespeare, Gaiman or MoR? If one of the last two I'd add her to my to read list.

I'm not sure "You'd trade?" is the right comparison to make. Perhaps "you would assign higher status to" or "you believe is more sophisticated and polished artwork" would give you the answer desired.

Comment author: [deleted] 01 July 2013 04:41:33AM 1 point [-]

Le Guin is a death worshipper. The major theme of the Earthsea is the folly of the quest for immortality or even survival, and the naturalness of death.

Comment author: wedrifid 01 July 2013 05:19:39AM 2 points [-]

Le Guin is a death worshipper. The major theme of the Earthsea is the folly of the quest for immortality or even survival, and the naturalness of death.

Thankyou. That is the kind of attitude that at times makes me abandon a book in disgust. If I don't identify with the goals or decisions of the protagonist I tend to be either disinterested in or repulsed by the work. I'll avoid the author.

Comment author: RichardKennaway 01 July 2013 08:21:23AM *  0 points [-]

I agree about the deathism of Earthsea. And it has other faults, such as the fourth volume (Tehanu) being her turning against (although not entirely) the misogyny of the whole setup of the first three, and with the zeal of the newly enlightened retconning "men evil, women good" onto it. Always Coming Home is full of fluffy woo.

But she also wrote the short story The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas, which is worth finding, because it's about a standard utilitarian problem. I'm sure some philosopher posed it in exactly the form in which her story presents it, but I've not been able to track that down. Imagine a utopia — whatever utopia you like — except that it must be sustained by the suffering of a little girl confined in a cell and tortured for ever. It is part of the thought experiment that the utopia and the suffering are necessarily connected: the little girl can only be freed at the cost of ending the utopia. It is alluded to in HPMOR.

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