Le Guin's Earthsea Cycle

Abstract

This paper attempts to evaluate Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea Cycle from the perspective of eco-criticism, arguing that though critics have praised the achievement of the Earthsea Trilogy from the perspectives of anthropology, Taoism, rites of passages, and feminism, the environmental consciousness in the Earthsea has been ignored. Le Guins Earthsea Cycle is an anti-anthrogocentric heroic saga, the outstanding for bringing oriental philosophy and contemporary environmental ethics into western literary tradition. The Earthsea Cycle shall be treasured as a pioneering achievement of an ecological myth on an epic scale, and a successful discovery of an alternative narrative mode to the romantic heroic myth, which we desperately need in this era of environmental crisis.