Actually, one of my favorite “there are wizards among us” stories is entitled “El Regalo” (The Gift) by Peter S Beagle (of The Last Unicorn fame.) Part of his anthology The Line Between, Beagle chronicles the misadventures of a 15 year old Korean American girl named Angie and her 8½ year old brother named Marvyn, both of whom come to discover that they have magical powers. In this tantalizing tidbit that is just calling to be expanded to a full length novel, they find themselves pitted against an ancient, malevolent sorceror only known as El Viejo, The Old Man.
The multicultural environs necessarily places this novella in a major metropolitan area. Given my Southern California-centrism, I immediately imagine that this is L.A. (Beagle did write a novel entitled Unicorn Sonata that was set in L.A.) But I suppose this could just as easily be NYC, particularly since Beagle grew up there.
Which leads to why, of all the fantasy series that I’ve read, The Earthsea Cycle exercises such a strong hold on my imagination.
Never mind the wonderful elucidation of the system of Magic, the interweavings of Taoist philosophy, and the beauty and the lyricism of Le Guin’s writing. True, these alone make the series worth reading. But as a person-of-color who aspires to be a writer of speculative fiction, the fact that Ged is a brown guy is awesome.
Pam Noles’ essay on how groundbreaking it was to have a non-white major character pretty much encompasses anything I have to say about the subject, and is far more articulate than anything I could write. But suffice it to say that I was eminently saddened by the Sci-Fi Channel’s wanton rape of Le Guin’s material, of which UKL herself has much to write about: (1) A Whitewashed Earthsea: how the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books (2) Frankenstein’s Earthsea.
But Earthsea resonates with me and my cultural heritage far more than just due to the coincident skin color. I ought to write UKL some day to ask her if certain concepts were deliberate. Like Ged himself, my parents come from an archipelago. My distant ancestors were all seafarers, some of whom braved the open seas, reaching as far as Madagascar to the west and Easter Island to the east, and some even theorize that they might have actually made it to the South American mainland. And in the beginning of certain Filipino creation stories, just like the creation myth of Earthsea, there was only sea and sky.
The Old Powers recall the indigenous animistic beliefs of Southeast Asia. And even the magic system, where to name something is to bind it, resonates.
(Not that this has anything to do with it, but the concept of the Verdunan, the Division, is key to the final book in the cycle. For some reason, I automatically think of the Ati-Atihan, which is a festival on the isle of Aklan which supposedly commemorates the arrival of the Borneans and their agreement to share the land with the indigenous Ati. And these are probably just false cognates, but what if Ati is related to the word “hati”, which means “half” in some Austronesian languages. Given the typically diminuitive stature of the Ati, does this connote “halfling”? OK, I’ve probably read way too much J.R.R. Tolkien. But getting back to the Verdunan, what if the Ati-Atihan is actually hati-hati’an, meaning “division”, which makes sense if the festival commemorates the partition of the island between the Ati and the Borneans. Anyway.)
In summary, The Earthsea Cycle inspired me to find my own authentic voice with regards to speculative fiction, to leverage my unique cultural background in order to build worlds that have not yet been described. I have yet to actually take pen to paper. And while I lament that there have yet to be any Filipino Americans to brave the genre of science-fiction and fantasy, I know that there are writers out there, some of whom are writing such stories. And I can’t really say much unless I’m going to put in some effort, too.
I’m still ruminating about the end of the Harry Potter saga. The mainstream media’s reaction has always interested me. They continue to be bemused by the idea of a novel taking the world by storm, and infiltrating popular culture. Never mind the fact that people were writing “Frodo Lives!” on subway walls 40 years ago, or the fact that “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy was extraordinarily successful, and, as far as wizards go, Gandalf the Grey is as well-known as Merlin, and is arguably the favorite and most-beloved of wizards amongst nerds and geeks world-wide.
I’m not trying to take away anything from J.K. Rowling’s accomplishment. It is not an easy thing to write one book, much less seven. And to have them become extraordinarily popular is a wonderful feat.
A quantitative comparison of the Harry Potter series versus the Earthsea Cycle.
Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling title page ct Sorcerer’s Stone 309 Chamber of Secrets 341 Prisoner of Azkaban 435 Goblet of Fire 734 Order of the Phoenix 870 Half-Blood Prince 652 Deathly Hallows 759 TOTAL 4,100
The Earthsea Cycle by Ursula K. Le Guin title page ct Wizard of Earthsea 192 Tombs of Atuan 192 Farthest Shore 272 Tehanu 288 Other Wind 224 TOTAL 1,168 Contrast this to The Lord of the Rings, which is only a measly 1,216 pages including the Foreword, Prologue, and Appendices.
Sources: amazon.com, wikipedia
But I think that literary debts need to be accounted for. Whether intentional or not, Hogwarts owes a lot to the Island of Roke, the center of Earthsea, which is the world created by the inimitable author Ursula K. Le Guin.
Interestingly, the titular character of the first book, Sparrowhawk, later known as Ged the Archmage, has a lot in common with Harry Potter. Which therefore means he also has a lot in common with Lord Voldemort. In fact, it seems more apt to compare Ged to Voldemort. Both were orphans, both were born with incredible power, both had massive egos, and both screwed around with the Dark Arts. But while Ged learned his lesson about playing with the Dark Side, and with this hard-earned wisdom eventually became the Archmage of Roke, slaying dragons, restoring kingdoms, returning balance to the Force, umm, to the balance, and even settling down with a woman, Voldemort went on to be a ruthless mass-murderer and was generally not a nice guy.
Which brings in another comparison: Anakin Skywalker. I suppose he falls somewhere midway in the continuum. While not an orphan, he was born to pretty crappy conditions, considering that he was a slave. But like Ged and Voldemort, he was born with incredible power. Like Ged (and presumably, like Voldemort), he grew impatient with his Master and felt that he was being held back. Like Ged, this eventually leads him to dabbling with the Dark Side of the Force. But whereas Ged learns the error of his ways, Anakin gives himself up wholly to the Dark Side. But whereas Voldemort dies a wondrously anti-climactic death, still convinced that he was going to win, Anakin redeems himself by showing mercy to his son, and, naturally, in the process, ends up dying.
To go full circle, you could compare Anakin to Severus Snape. Both grew up, again, in crappy conditions. Both were extremely gifted in the Force/in magic. Both (probably) turned to the Dark Side both to escape the fear, ridicule, and distrust of their peers, and probably to win back/save the woman they loved. But whereas Anakin marries Padme, turns to the Dark Side, contributes to the cause of her death, gives himself wholly in service of the Dark Side and the Emperor, then attempts to capture and probably kill, or at least pervert, his kids, Snape loses Lily to James, turns to the Dark Side, contributes to the cause of Lily’s death, but then ends up switching sides completely, giving himself wholly in service to Albus Dumbledore, and attempts to protect the son of the woman he loves. Both are killed by their respective Dark Lords (Anakin by absorbing all that Force Lightning from Palpatine, Snape by getting killed by Voldemort’s pet snake.) And while both end up redeemed, I think Snape gets the raw deal here. Anakin got what he deserved, but Snape just ends up screwed.
(For some reason, finishing Deathly Hallows has only reinforced my belief that I am going to someday die a pointlessly violent death.)
There was a point to this post, but it seems to have eluded me.