The Use of Metaphors in the Book, The Left Hand of Darkness by Le Guin - Essay Example

Le Guin talks metaphorically about suppression of darkness as a time of days which symbolizes period of great tragic happenings. In chapter thirteen, Orgoreyn strives for order and political stability, a factor that really impressed Ai at the beginning. Later he discovers the darkness, which is the dirty deeds by the same government he so much admired. The government sent off transgressors to a concentration camp where even he was sent to. Ai, together with other prisoners was drugged to become sexless but Ai became unconscious and confused in most times (Le Guin 21).

This is androgynous moment in that in one of his darkest times he discovered that maybe he misjudged just like very human being does most of the time in their lives. it is sometimes dark times that sheds light in our lives. Le Guin lies to us that the Gethenians are androgynous in order to prove a point on vices and virtues of every society. This sis displayed by Ai, a dense gentleman who is on mission in Gethen .He is quite impressed and fascinate by the inhabitants of Gethen and refers to them as strong willed men who he happens to see as women with feminine wiles and hips when he notices awful attributes in them.

This proofs that Gethenians are basically a sexless population but are qualified as male of female when they do bad or good. Gender biasness is a community vice that Ursula wanted to clearly point out. Weather or climate is one of Le Guin’s metaphors. The winter, summer and spring all represent a time in a human beings life.Le Guin the cold season, which metaphorically means a literal cold war.Genly’s story begins in thee semi-anarchic monarchy called Karhide as a representative for the United States versus the opponent, Orgoreyn where as a representative for the U.S.S.

R he almost looses his life (Le Guin 11). This cold war plays with history. She, Le Guin claims tat human beings are androgynous in that, as much as the inhabitants of Gethen are ambisexual, they also have a double standard factor to their sexuality. When Ai became so isolated in his prejudice in a strange world, he sticks to discrimination against the others who were not human. Estraven took a lot of patience to enable him to recognize that he was human.Le Guin explains that "Ai, later looked past the tags of man and woman and loved and the prejudice he had about and loved Estraven just as a plain human being despite the countless trials he went through to get to this stage".

Human beings alike want to be appreciated just as they are, not as women or men but as people. This also explains what females and males become when their tags are and labels are taken off, they simply become creatures of humanity. Human beings treasure life above everything else. If interpreted the title of the book means light. Light alone isn’t enough to human life. Good life alone is not satisfactory to human life. From the books Le Guin states that "it is yin and yang. Light is the left hand of darkness, how did it go?

Light, dark. Fear, courage. cold, warmth. Female, male. It is yourself, Therem. Both and one. A shadow on snow’