In 1974 The Dispossessed won the Nebula Award for best science fiction or fantasy novel of the year and that year also won the Hugo Award for Best Novel of the year. Le Guin was one of America’s most popular and prolific writers, publishing nineteen novels in her lifetime. Further the novel stumbles in its discussion of spacetime. The Dispossessed also earns sci-fi stripes by virtue of its philosophical considerations of time that elegantly structure the fiber of the novel, but are feeble–scientifically at best. Although The Dispossessed is enriched with evocative descriptions, Le Guin doesn’t bother to provide a description of the solar system Anarres and Urras inhabit: a surprising oversite for a sci-fi novel of its stature. Anarres and Urras are presumably a planet and its satellite, though it’s ambiguous as to which is which or if these worlds are a binary-planetary system: two planets orbiting each other. Published in 1974, The Dispossessed earns its entry into the sci-fi genre by virtue of its settings. Le Guin’s best known novels, The Dispossessed, are Anarres-the smaller of the two, a barren desert devoid of nonhuman fauna and almost all flora but rich in valuable natural resources-and Urras, an paradise resplendent with lush flora and diverse fauna but lacking the resources it acquires from the Anarresti populating Anarres.

The worlds that provide the settings for one of sci-fi maestra Ursula K. Four Stars–From Each According to Her Ability.

The dispossessed an ambiguous utopia