The above quotes are from a professional and an amateur critic, respectively. The first suggests the guerrilla marketing ploy of making red book covers with wavy white stripes and expansively printed "Instant Classic" labelling. The second leaves my mind dry and lifeless, but feel free to post your interpretation.

Given the steady beat of critical acclaim, I won't ask if this is a classic. Instead, do you think it deserves that status?

Very much deserves to be a classic. When I read it for the first time a few years ago it blew my mind wide open.

On a related note, take a peak at this.

I read this a couple of years ago, after it had been in publication for nearly 40 years. I think it deserves the designation of "classic". I truly believe that The Left Hand of Darkness is capital-L literature. It's timeless and really examines what it means to be human.

Greyweather wrote: "On a related note, take a peak at this."

Oh my gosh! Do you think that editor is still kicking himself (or herself)?

I'd like to think so, but it has been forty years, so probably not.

I say it's a full out classic, but I understand the thought that it is "dull, dull, dull." I've used this book a few times in novel and short story classes, and first and second year college students often express their boredom, at least until our discussions start opening the text up for them. There is a density in the early part of the story that can make it a tough go until one's engaged, so I sympathize with the readers who respond in the second way.

Personally I think a work needs to be in print for at least 100 years to be considered a 'classic', a much overused term, IMO. Is there a technical definition of a 'classic'?

I last read TLHOD when it was new on the shelves and I was in college. It did not do much for me then and I have ignored Le Guin since, except for Earthsea. I am now reading all of Le Guin and find her SF most compelling.

I can understand why some think it dull, too, esp SciFi addicts. This work is not action, plot or character driven. It is idea driven. And, the ideas are only presented without much debate. The Mobile and the PM give their opinions leaving the reader to develop his own. I find a lot of Ganly's gender ideas rather naive, but likely typical of how a straight male would react to true androgynes. These are part of what make the novella great, I think, and also a reason it appeals to lit. types.

I also find it a slow read. Now, usually I read slowly because I am savoring the prose. This is a bit different, partly due to what I think Brad means by density— few wasted words. I also find Le Guin's style a bit difficult. I have had to re-read a number of sentences to get the meaning, because a word is in a funny place, words are used strangely or punctuation is lacking.

All in all I think it among the great short stories of SciFi. I know it is technically a novella and usually called a novel, but to me its structure is more like that of a short story. Is she up their with, say Katherine Ann Porter?

I think it may become a classic like a Dickens or Twain story. Time will tell, though I wont be here.

i read this pretty recently, and definitely come down on the side of classic. i think all Great sci-fi revolves around what it means to be human, and this one does that better than most.

Kernos wrote: "I can understand why some think it dull, too, esp SciFi addicts. This work is not action, plot or character driven. It is idea driven. And, the ideas are only presented without much debate"

I'm in agreement with Kernos’ comments. I read this awhile back and found it to be dull. I do appreciate a fair amount of idea-driven literature but simply wasn't pulled in by this book- especially since in this century many of the ideas are not exactly "new" anymore.

When I picked this book up a few years ago, I did not know much about it apart from the title and expected a different book, especially since I was familiar with Le Guin's Earthsea series. I think my incorrect expectations affected by opinion and I'm curious to re-read it this month and see if I have a different take in light of what I know now.

I might have to try to re-read this with so many people thinking it is a classic. I've tried it a few times over the years - loved her Earth Sea trilogy & a couple of others - but could never get into this book.

I am going to get beat up now.

I hated this book. I hated it when I read it 30 years ago I hat it now.

I have read much of her work including the earth sea and Only thing I liked was the "lath of heaven"

I may be in the minority but I feel that the entire time she is looking down her nose at me and sneering.

Then many of her book just seem to stop. Its not an ending point it is just over.

I am left very dissatisfied. not unhappy with the ending but actually checking other copies of the book to see if mine is defective and missing the final chapter.

I beleive this is a classic. The story is great . the concept of a genderless society and how that would effect the human condition is grand.
the presentation left me gritting my teeth.

I have to admit that I'd never even heard of this book until it came up here, and I'm no stranger to sci-fi, classic or otherwise. At least I thought I wasn't. From just a few chapters in, I can see why TLHOD could be considered a classic, at least in sci-fi circles.

I'd like to know what both critics had to say to back up their respective points. Are the "classic" and "dull" quotes pulled from larger critiques?

Ryan,

Both of them come from Amazon.com. "An Instant Classic" is a snippet of a review I have not seen, but it is pasted on the book's cover and all over Amazon. The "dull, dull, dull" comment is from one of the one-star reviews. While it's not really a scientific survey of opinion, I think the comparison encapsulates two basic ways of thinking about this novel. I don't think they are incompatible, but they sound very diffferent.

There are a lot of classics that are dull, dull, dull. I never could get into Herman Melville, that guy was as boring as boring can be, but his books are considered classics and read in high schools and colleges all over the place.

Kernos wrote: "Personally I think a work needs to be in print for at least 100 years to be considered a 'classic', a much overused term, IMO. Is there a technical definition of a 'classic'?

I last read TLHOD whe..."

I wouldn't go quite that far ... personally it it survives for 3 generations (in other words, we see our children reading it ... i.e. 40-50 years after first publication), then it should be considered a classic. There are a lot of books that are candidates, but are not time tested yet.

Kernos wrote: "Personally I think a work needs to be in print for at least 100 years to be considered a 'classic', a much overused term, IMO. Is there a technical definition of a 'classic'?

Not that I've ever heard of. The connections between social class and education make this a very murky issue. My interpretation sort of combines the two, which not everyone may agree with, is that it's a book that I would use to teach a class with, on some subject. Of course this only pushes back the problem to defining the subject but it's a start. Similarly saying that they are the 'best of their kind' only requires us to specify the kind.

I thought that the origins of the word "classic" were in the classical education received by many students during the 1700s and 1800s. Such an education focused upon the classical authors of the ancient Hellenic and Hellenistic world. To be a bona fide classic, a book must be over a thousand years old and written by someone with a name like Eristratos. The current practice could honestly replace the phrase "a classic" with "I liked it" or at least "I think you should like it." Thus, "Born to be Wild" is a classic, as is "Goodnight, Moon."

I think you would have to rank Le Guin with Theodore Sturgeon, as probably the two most significant authors, in terms of changing the nature of Science Fiction (making it psychological rather than technological). I think I would call her work pivotal, rather than classic—perhaps in the way that Jane Austen took the sentimental novel of the 18th Century and gave it a literary face.

BTW, I don’t think anyone has mentioned Le Guin’s parents. She obviously had a special, nurturing childhood, and her mother’s book on Ishi was required reading in anthropology, while Le Guin was writing her Hainish Cycle.

The first time I read this novel I was blown away by the world building. I had been reading Asimov and Bear and found the world of Winter extremely engaging. This work stands up to the test of time and has something to say. To me that makes a classic whether it fits all definitions of classic is a debate I find pointless.

To young minds or immature minds or minds that don't take the time LHOD can be dull. As Kernos wrote LHOD is about ideas. If you are not engaged by those ideas then you will not enjoy the book. I read it when I was young. As I re-read it now I am engaged in it at different levels. Could the trait of finding new meaning in a work give it classic status. I believe it should.

LHOD was both to me. Anything involving the characters and ideas was excellent, while I wasn't particularly thrilled by the descriptions of the places. This is no fault of the book or LeGuin, just that I'm not much for pure description in my reading.

I did really like the intermediate myths and stories, they made the book somehow more real to me.

I've picked this book up and put it down numerous times in the last twenty years, and never got past the first page. Last week I sat down and forced myself through the part that had always stopped me, and found it to be an excellent read once I got into it.

To me, it read like The Lord of the Rings: a little heavy on description and world building. So I read it like I did those books, skimming lightly over some passages. When I finished it, I started over and read the first chapter more carefully, and other passages that I knew I might not have grasped the first time through.

I absolutely loved it.