An Analysis Of Earthsea Trilogy From Taoist Thoughts

Ursula Le Guin is a very famous female writer of America. She writes sciencefictions and fantasies, and most of them are worldwide known. Because of the effectionsof Taoism, Ursula Le Guin always shows us the traces of Taoist thoughts in her works,especially the famous fantasy work, Earthsea Cycle. It is one of the famous fantasiesfrom Ursula Le Guin. There are many scholars who analyze the famous fantasy fiction,Earthsea Cycle, from different points of views. They study this fiction from thecoming-of-age theme, the meanings of names, the narrative structures, and so on. Butthere are almost few people to analyze the fiction from Taoist thoughts. The obviouscharacteristic of this thesis is not describing the contributions of Ursula Le Guin, butusing Taoist thoughts to analyze the first three novels of Earthsea Cycle, EarthseaTrilogy.This thesis consists of three parts, introduction, main body and a conclusion. In thepart of introduction, the main purpose is showed, and also the biography of Ursula LeGuin. In this part, it also consists of the brief introduction, the writing characteristics, theresearch achievement, and the content of the necessity of the research on the novel.The text part of this thesis contains four parts.In main body of the text part, Chapter One first introduces some basic knowledge ofTaoism, and uses The Left Hand of Darkness, The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopiaand The Lath of Heaven as examples to states the traces of Taoist thoughts in works ofUrsula Le Guin. Ursula Le Guin is under the influence of Taoist thoughts, so her work isfull of the traces of the thoughts. She uses inactivity, and inter-promoting relation in fiveelements and balance to write the fiction, so the world of Earthsea is full of Taoistthoughts, such as the thoughts of magic, good and evil, and the operation of nature.Chapter Two analyzes the characteristics of fantasy fictions of Ursula Le Guin. Itwill be discussed from the characteristics of names, characters, and writing.Chapter Three analyzes the fiction from its themes, and then uses its three themes tolead to the balance of Yin and Yang, inactivity, and balance. And these three themes aredark and light, man and woman, life and death.Chapter Four uses the Taoist thoughts to analyze Earthsea Trilogy. First of all, the thought of everything has a right of living in the world and no one can capture that andquiet that has few wants; it reflects Le Guin’s worry of the real world, and Le Guin’srespect of the nature. Secondly, the thought of weak in doing some thing and do not pushto do things and inactivity, weak in treating some thing but not weak in body, it can helppeople face the hard situation; inaction, it reflects the developments of Universe, natureand the society are natural, no one or nothing can influence them. In the last part ofChapter Four it states the thoughts of syncretism between heaven, earth and man, andalso states the coordination of Yin and Yang. The heaven, the earth, and the people, thesethree elements are different, and also have interrelations. Forefather’s good reactions canlead to a good result for later generations, and forefather’s evil reactions can lead to anevil result for later generations, and these evil reactions always destroy the balance of Yinand Yang, in other words, they destroy the balance of the world, and cause lots ofproblems. So people should maintain the balance of nature to lead to a good result foreverything.The conclusion is the last part of this thesis. It states the necessity and the values ofanalysis on Earthsea Trilogy from Taoist thoughts, and the practical significance ofEarthsea Trilogy. Ursula Le Guin likes Taoist thoughts which come from China, and thisfiction is a good reflection of Taoist thoughts.