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“A SHADOW ON SNOW”:
GENDER, SEX, AND SEXUALITY IN URSULA K. LE GUIN’S
THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS
by Gryffin Robin Winkler Honors Thesis Appalachian State University Submitted to the Department of English and The Honors College in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts May 2021 Approved by: Dr. Michael Wilson, Thesis Director Dr. Conrad Ostwalt, Second Reader Dr. Başak Çandar, Third Reader Dr. Jennifer Wilson, Departmental Honors Director Dr. Jefford Vahlbusch, Dean, The Honors College
Abstract This thesis examines the way gender, sex, and sexuality are portrayed in Ursula K. Le Guin’s 1969 novel, The Left Hand of Darkness , as well as her two short stories that take place on the same planet, “Coming of Age In Karhide” and “Winter’s King”. All center around the planet Gethen, inhabited by humans without gender who remain sex-less except for a short period every month. The novel is narrated by Genly, a human from Earth sent to explore and reach out to the Gethens. Genly has an obvious aversion to the Gethen’s ambisexuality, inaccurately referring to all the Gethens as “he” and as “men.” I analyze Genly’s problematic language and viewpoints, and his journey to acceptance and understanding. It takes Genly most of the novel to self-reflect and realize that the Gethens are neither men nor women. Taking a broader view, I also look at Gethen society and its relation to gender, as well as how the Gethens Other those who are different. I argue that Le Guin is making a point against gendered divisions; not only separating the feminine and masculine is something that causes harm, but also putting a judgement on femininity in favor of masculinity. The Left Hand of Darkness makes a case for unity, cooperation, and equality.
and described as a man, acts in any way feminine, Genly, as a narrator, points it out, often with a negative connotation. The word effeminate, a word meant particularly for men, is used twice to describe Estraven and his actions (8, 14). Genly’s view and descriptions of Estraven do not just reveal Genly’s attitudes towards femininity, but also towards the Gethen ambisexuality. For most of the novel, Genly does not view Estraven as his equal. Genly gives Estraven his mistrust, finding him impossible to read and understand, all the while Estraven is doing everything in his power to aid Genly. Genly’s refusal to try and understand Estraven, to understand somebody he puts in the place of the Other, leads him into trouble again and again. At the start of the novel, Estraven has carefully tried to make sure Genly’s meeting with the King comes at an opportune time without putting Genly in danger. Genly misunderstands Estraven’s good intentions and views Estraven with suspicion: Estraven’s performance had been womanly, all charm and tact and lack of substance, specious and adroit. Was it in fact perhaps this soft supple femininity that I disliked and distrusted in him? For it was impossible to think of him as a woman, that dark, ironic, powerful presence near me in the firelit darkness, and yet whenever I thought of him as a man I felt a sense of falseness, of imposture: in him, or in my own attitude towards him? His voice was soft and rather resonant but not deep, scarcely a man’s voice, but scarcely a woman’s voice either. (12) Genly is aware of his own perceptions. He struggles to fit Estraven into a single category as Estraven is neither a woman nor a man. His inability to categorize Estraven leads to frustration and suspicion. In his pondering, Genly finds it impossible to think of Estraven as a woman but thinking of him as a man feels “false.” Estraven cannot be a woman due to his “powerful presence,” but he cannot be a “true” man solely because, to Genly, he is not masculine enough to
be convincing. Later in the novel when both Genly and Estraven are in the nation of Orgoreyn, Karhide’s rival, Estraven comes to Genly to offer advice. Estraven, once again attempting to aid Genly, is met with misunderstanding. This leads Genly to eventually being taken away and put in an Orgoreyn prison camp, as he is seen as a threat to the government. During their time on the Gobrin Ice, traveling from Orgoreyn back to Karhide, Estraven’s attention to detail and carefulness helps both Genly and Estraven survive their trek. Genly genders Estraven’s careful actions as “house-wifely” (242) and feels frustration: “I resented my companion’s methodical, tyrannical insistence that we do everything and do it correctly and thoroughly. I hated him at such times, with a hatred that rose straight up out of the death that lay within my spirit. I hated the harsh, intricate, obstinate demands that he made on me in the name of life” (246). His attitude comes from not seeing Estraven as an equal, as somebody who might be able to give him the help that he needs. When Estraven tries to aid Genly when he is ill, Genly feels frustration at Estraven’s aid: “I was galled by his patronizing. He was a head shorter than I, and built more like a woman than a man, more fat than muscle; when he hauled together I had to shorten my pace to his, hold in my strength so as not to out-pull him: a stallion in harness with a mule” (219). Estraven’s height or build is not relevant in terms of taking care of Genly, but it is relevant in terms of hurting Genly’s masculinity and pride. For Genly, not only is he showing weakness in front of another person, but he is showing weakness in front of somebody who is more feminine than he is. In a rare moment of self-awareness, Genly realizes that “[Estraven] had not meant to patronize […] He, after all, had no standards of manliness, of virility, to complicate his pride. On the other hand, if he could lower all his standards of shifgrethor, as I realized he had done with me, perhaps I could dispense with the more competitive elements of my masculine self-respect, which he certainly understood as little as I understood shifgrethor”
Genly points out deviations from masculinity for all Gethens, not just Estraven. In particular, Genly expresses judgement towards the King of Karhide through demasculinizing or feminine coded adjectives. None of them are used as compliments, such as “potbellied,” “less kingly, less manly, than he looked at a distance,” “his voice was thin,” “he laughed shrilly like an angry woman” (31). The language used creates the effect of King Argaven as a man, but just effeminate. This false portrayal of the King as a man is disrupted by his pregnancy later in the novel, an event that surprises Genly but does not change his views of the King as a man. Genly laughs at the news of the King’s pregnancy. It does not turn the King into a woman in Genly’s eyes, but instead, a man imitating a woman, an action Genly finds ridiculous ( Left Hand 99, Serano 15, 46-47). While Genly is most often awkward or reacts with suspicion towards femininity, he is not put-off by all displays of femininity. In cases where he feels an attraction to it, he does not denote any negative connotation. Early in the novel Genly meets Faxe, a member of the Karhide religion of the Handdara. Genly comments on Faxe’s feminine aspects without judgement: “He was […] slender, with a clear, open, and beautiful face (57), “soft, rather high voice” (58), “[h]is face, one of the most beautiful human faces I ever saw” (67). He is immediately drawn to Faxe the moment they meet. Genly is able to view a Handdara foretelling ritual firsthand while it occurs. Faxe, as the weaver, sits at the center of the ritual and is the focal point. Due to Genly having the ability to mindspeak, something unheard of on Gethen, Genly reaches out and has a vision of the ritual while it occurs. Despite not being in kemmer, Faxe is seen as a woman in Genly’s vision, “in the center of all darkness Faxe: the Weaver: a woman, a woman dressed in light. The light was silver, the silver was armor, an armored woman with a sword” (65). The vision during the ritual is described erotically: Faxe as a woman yells “Yes!” repeatedly as she is
surrounded by a burning, bright light. Genly sees Faxe in his vision as he sees Faxe, closer to a woman than a man. Genly completely accepts Faxe’s femininity. There is no judgement because he does not perceive Faxe as falsely portraying the feminine while being male. Since Faxe is viewed more as a woman than a man, if Faxe took any action or role that was more masculine, there would not be the same judgement by Genly. Because Genly views masculinity as the default, any expressions of masculinity would merely be normal (Serano 46-47). Since Faxe not only leans more towards the feminine, but is also somebody Genly finds attractive, Genly does not treat Faxe being a woman in his vision as something suspect or negative. Genly does not treat the King acting feminine the same way as Genly feels no physical attraction towards the King, he even feels somewhat repulsed. Genly is truly forced to face his discomfort with being unable to categorize Estraven after Estraven enters kemmer. While they are both incredibly tempted to have sex with each other, both Genly and Estraven prevent each other from having sex or any kind of sexual contact with each other: “[Estraven] explained, stiffly and simply, that he was in kemmer and had been trying to avoid me, insofar as one of us could avoid the other. ‘I must not touch you,’ he said, with extreme constraint; saying that he looked away. I said, ‘I understand. I agree completely’” (249). Estraven does not give any more details about why he avoids sex with Genly, but there is a mutual understanding between the two that they should avoid it As Genly puts, “For us to meet sexually would be for us to meet once more as aliens” (249). As Genly said earlier to Estraven, “In a sense, women are more alien to me than you are” (234). Genly continually proves himself to be a gender essentialist, somebody who believes “that women and men represent two mutually exclusive categories, each born with certain inherent, nonoverlapping traits” (Serano 8). He creates an artificial division between him and women by referring to women as “alien” from him.
on, with one side being “good” and the other “bad”. Men, masculinity, humanity, the mind, and so on are on the “good” side of the binary while women, femininity, animals, and nature are on the “bad” side, on the side of the Other (McCance 88-89). At the core of many societies, the male, men, and masculinity are “superior,” which functions as the justification for women’s subservience to men and masculinity placed as more important over femininity. Patriarchy places both women and animals on the side of the “Other,” bringing them together under a common concern over their oppression (McCance 89). This simple dualistic thinking, towards femininity and animals, is the same kind that Genly prescribes to: beasts and women on the “bad” side of the binary, humanity and masculinity on the “good” side. In Left Hand, the animal/human binary is reified through Genly’s narration. Genly uses animals in his language in a variety of ways. When trying to discern Estraven’s intent through his expression and failing to understand, Genly thinks of the inscrutability of animals: “Can one read a cat’s face, a seal’s, an otter’s? Some Gethenians, I thought, are like such animals, with deep bright eyes that do not change expression when you speak” (15). Just as the divide between human and animal is quite wide in Genly’s perception, so is the divide between Genly and the Gethens. Genly returns to using animal-related language for Estraven later in the novel, using an otter as a point of comparison. Genly referring to Estraven’s “dark, otter’s glance” (204), his movements as “otterlike” (204), and his “otter’s smile” (278) distance Estraven by adding the animal comparison. The enigmatic Gethenians are like women and animals through the eyes of Genly. Activeness and directness both fall under stereotypical “masculine traits,” while the mysterious and the inscrutable fall under the “feminine”. For Genly, animals, the feminine, and the Gethens all belong on the side of the Other.
Similarly to how Genly uses feminine centered language for actions or people he is averse to, he uses animal-centered language for the same ends. When describing the King as “sullen as an old she-otter in a cage” (35), Genly is not just overtly gendering the ambisexual King with his analogy, but also comparing him to that of a female animal. There are two layers of insult, and direct Othering, in the language Genly chooses to use that reflect his view of the King. However, he does make a conscious decision to avoid using animal-focused language when describing a female human, who like him, is not ambisexual. Speaking to the King in Karhidish, the King’s own language, he refers to her with “the word that Gethenians would apply only to a person in the culminant phase of kemmer, the alternative being their word for a female animal” (35-36). When discussing Gethenian society and their lack of war, Genly says “[The Gethens] behaved like animals, in that respect; or like women. They did not behave like men, or ants” (49). The “capacity to mobilize ” (49) is something attributed to men, something women apparently lack. Once again animals and women are placed upon one side of a binary, with men (and ants) on the other. When describing the guards surrounding the labor camp Genly is forced into, they are described with more feminine leaning words. He uses the word “bovinity” alongside “effeminate” (176) and the guards are written as very passive, not very threatening or violent. Genly’s perspective of animals as the Other remains at the end of the novel when his fellow humans from the Ekumen arrive on Gethen. As he describes them, “[t]hey were like a troupe of great, strange animals, of two different species; great apes with intelligent eyes, all of them in rut, in kemmer” (296). It is humans like him, non-ambisexual, who are now placed on the side of the Other with animals, away from the side of Genly and the Gethens. Not only does he face shock at again seeing humans psychologically like him, in “kemmer” all the time, but the comparison to “great apes” increases the divide further. The animal comparison implies incivility
pets. It must color your thinking, this uniqueness […] it’s extraordinary that you arrived at any concept of evolution, faced with that unbridgeable gap between yourselves and the lower animals. But philosophically, emotionally: to be so solitary, in so hostile a world: it must affect your entire outlook.” (232) This distance of the Gethens from other non-human animals makes Goss’s comparison of the Pervert to an animal all the more notable as it is clearly a large act of Othering. The Pervert is Othered just because his physiology is different from the norm. The kemmerer and the Pervert do not have sex with each other during the ceremony; instead the Pervert is denied any kind of intimacy while he prods, whispers, and moves close to the kemmerer: “The Pervert kept talking softly, leaning towards the kemmerer, who answered little and seemed to recoil […] The Pervert laid his hand quickly and softly on the kemmerer’s hand. The kemmerer avoided the touch hastily, with fear or disgust, and looked across at Faxe as if for help” (63-64). Genly, having the ability to mindspeak, is able to see and experience the ritual firsthand. He experiences unrepentant and unfulfilled sexual desire during the Foretelling ritual: “a stew of wild images and notions, abrupt visions and sensations all sexually charged and grotesquely violent, a red-and-black seething of erotic rage. I was surrounded by great gaping pits with ragged lips, vaginas, wounds, hellmouths” (65). Sex, sexuality, and erotic desire are utilized in the ceremony, creating an altered state in each participant. Sex is still denied after the ceremony: “The kemmerer lay with his head on Faxe’s knees, breathing in gasps, still trembling […] The Pervert was off by himself in a corner, sullen and dejected” (66). Beyond the Handdara ritual, sexual tension and unreleased sexual desire come up throughout the novel in different forms. The scene where the Pervert is trying to touch and get close to the kemmerer is the reverse of when Genly is being transported in Orgoreyn with the
Gethen in kemmer beside him. In the ritual the male Pervert is trying to gain the attention of the female kemmerer and is refused and faced with disgust, while Genly, a male pervert by Gethen standards, faces the interest of the female kemmerer, and refuses any sexual advances. Estraven also experiences an attempt at seduction by an Orgota politician, Gaum. Guam induces kemmer in himself, through the use of artificial hormones, and meets Estraven on the street, and attempts to seduce him for political reasons. Guam takes advantage of kemmer by artificially inducing it, guaranteeing that his kemmer will coincide with Estraven’s kemmer, knowing it will be difficult for Estraven to refuse sex while in kemmer. Unfortunately for Guam’s intentions, Estraven rejects his advances due to his “detestation” of Guam and his underhanded scheming (154). The one time in the novel that both parties are interested and desire sex with each other is when Estraven and Genly are alone traveling across the Gobrin Ice Sheet to Karhide from Orgoreyn. They both hold themselves back, refusing each other’s sexual desires. Genly fears that any sexual contact will impede any progress he has made in connecting with Estraven. “For us to meet sexually would be for us to meet once more as aliens. We had touched, in the only way we could touch” (249). In this scene the sexual tension gives rise to a closer, but still platonic, relationship between the two. With Genly and the kemmerer, and Guam and Estraven, the sexual advances drive them further apart, but the mutual desire between Genly and Estraven works to bring them closer. It is the only scene in the book where denial of sex brings two people closer together. It is not just Genly who withholds sex, Estraven as well makes every attempt to not indulge in his desire for sex (249). Genly still might have a lingering complex about Estraven’s ambisexuality, and maybe even Estraven has trouble with Genly’s alien physiology. Genly fears that engaging in sex will drive them apart again:
The seeming nation, unified for centuries, was a stew of uncoordinated principalities, towns, villages, “pseudo-feudal tribal economic units,” a sprawl and splatter of vigorous, competent, quarrelsome individualities over which a grid of authority was insecurely and lightly laid. Nothing, I thought, could ever unite Karhide as a nation. Total diffusion of rapid communication devices, which is supposed to bring about nationalism almost inevitably, had not done so. (99) Karhide is aligned towards the feminine because it is compared to a family, many different members brought together by a common relationship. Karhide leans more anarchic while Orgoreyn leads more towards totalitarianism. Karhide is thus closer to what Le Guin sees as more feminine aspects: “To me the ‘female principle’ is, or at least historically has been, basically anarchic. It values order without constraint, rule by custom not by force” ( Dancing at the Edge 11). She explains that the “family” is a unit without coercion or rule by force, which is why women have traditionally been those in charge of the family. The family as a feminine domain connects Karhide to the feminine even more, as Karhide is a “family quarrel”. Orgoreyn, compared to Karhide, leans more towards the masculine. Le Guin defines the male principle as one “who enforces order, who constructs power structures, who makes, enforces, and breaks laws” (11). While Karhide’s central government is fairly weak, Orgoreyn is much stronger. Orgoreyn relies heavily on bureaucracy, Genly’s papers and documents are routinely checked everywhere he goes in Orgoreyn. There are strict rules about proper identification, Estraven is even threatened with being sent to a prison camp when he enters Orgoreyn without proper papers ( Left Hand 79). Law and order is enforced with an iron fist in Orgoreyn. Those who break these laws or people who are seen as political enemies, as Genly learns firsthand, are sent to forced labor camps as punishment. Genly does not technically break
any laws while in Orgoreyn but is seen as a threat to the ruling party of the government, so he is stowed away to a labor camp. That isn’t to say Karhide does not have a legal system, but Orgoreyn is stricter and defined concerning exercising authority and power. Karhide’s government also exerts its power in violent ways, such as through assassinations, but Orgoreyn is more methodical and organized in stowing away political enemies. Strictly defining these particular aspects as “masculine” or “feminine,” however, does rely on stereotypes of traditional masculine and feminine traits and roles. Le Guin, writing about gender and Left Hand , wrote about “ the two polarities we perceive through our cultural conditioning as male and female ” ( Dancing at the Edge 12). The mention of “cultural conditioning” is important; “masculine” and “feminine” are not inherent traits respective to people who are male and people who are female. If all women were inherently feminine and all men inherently masculine, there would not be masculine women, feminine men, and people who are neither entirely one or the other like there (Serano 96-97). Gendering the different traits of Karhide and Orgoreyn would have no meaning to the Gethens. They would recognize that the two countries are different and possess some opposing characteristics, but “feminine” and “masculine” would mean nothing to them, the same as how Genly’s gendering of the Gethens has no meaning to them. Orgoreyn leaning towards the masculine is reflected in its culture. Orgoreyn mythology and religion focuses on the center, while Karhide mythology and religion have more emphasis on the wholeness of two halves, or the wholeness of two different forces. The Orgota religion of Yomeshta is more closely aligned to the traditionally patriarchal Christianity, with Meshe as the figure of enlightenment. Meshe was a foreteller on the Handdara, the weaver of the ritual when the Lord of Shorth asked “what is the meaning of life?” ( Left Hand 60). No answer was
something feminine, a refusal of the abstract, the ideal, a submissiveness to the given” (212-213). However, the Handdara aren’t completely feminine coded. The religion focuses on unity, such as how light and darkness function together. The Yomeshta disparage the Handdara, referring to them as “those that call upon the darkness” (163). Light is important to the Yomeshta, as Meshe saw no darkness, only light when he achieved his religious awakening (163). During the foretelling ceremony, both darkness and light are utilized to reach an answer. Genly experiences darkness, and then light through Faxe. The Handdara represents a path that involves both darkness and light, feminine and masculine, and how both together function to create a whole. Left Hand ’s emphasis on the Handdara, in contrast to the masculine leaning Yomeshta, show a clear inclination towards the ideas and philosophy of the Handdara. The Handdara focus on unity and polarity over the disunity and focus on the center over the whole. It is through unity, darkness and light together, that Genly and Estraven make it out alive, and through crossing over divisions that the nations of Gethen join the Ekumen. When Genly finally realizes Estraven can fit neither into the category of man or woman, and accepts that, he becomes capable of giving Estraven his friendship and trust. Estraven’s indirectness and association with darkness also lead to distrust from Genly. The feminine yin is associated with darkness and the shadow. Estraven is continually put in the place of shadows, of indirectness, “Dark, in dark clothing, still and shadowy […] the specter at the feast” (120). Genly sees Estraven as inscrutable without attempting to understand Estraven from his point of view. Estraven, from the start, has given Genly his trust and sincerity, while Genly has not: “‘I am the only man in all Gethen that has trusted you entirely, and I am the only man in Gethen that you have refused to trust’” (199). After finally giving his trust to Estraven, Genly also realizes the usefulness of Estraven’s darkness. Across the ice, the shadows are useful, allowing them to see
dangers and cracks in the snow and ice. When Genly realizes and understands the yin and yang in Estraven, he refers to him as a “‘shadow on snow’” (267). Le Guin discusses the harm of division in terms of the binary of male over female. She describes the problem that plagues human culture (on Earth) as this division: “Our curse is alienation, the separation of yang from yin [ and the moralization of yang as good, of yin as bad ]. Instead of a search for balance and integration, there is a struggle for dominance. Divisions are insisted upon, interdependence is denied” ( Dancing At the Edge 16). The curse of Orgoreyn and Karhide is that they are divided, a division that leads only to misery. The King of Karhide undergoes constant stress and paranoia thinking of his enemies in Orgoreyn, and in Karhide, and the politicians in Orgoreyn worry about Karhide and rival Orgoreyn factions. To Le Guin, not only has the separation of male and female led to misery, but also the Othering of the female and placing the male as superior (11-12). To Karhide, Orgoreyn is the Other, and vice versa. As Estraven says at the start of the novel concerning patriotism, “‘No, I don’t mean love, when I say patriotism. I mean fear. The fear of the other. And its expressions are political, not poetical: hate, rivalry, aggression. It grows in us, that fear. It grows in us year by year’” ( Left Hand 18). The divisions also tie into the major religions of each nation, a Yomeshta book decries the Handdara, “[The Handdara] are made fools of and spat out from the mouth of Meshe” (163). While the Gethens do not have male and female to divide themselves, they still find ways through religion, and patriotism, to form an Other; the Gethens still practice tribalism. That is not to say that tribalism has to occur or is inherent in humanity, the Ekumen itself is an example of an anarchist group without borders, a group which seeks connection over division and separation.
