Ursula K. Le Guin: Biographical Data (2004)

Ursula K. Le Guin

Biographical Data (2006)

Born in 1929 in Berkeley, California, daughter of writer Theodora Kroeber and anthropologist Alfred L. Kroeber. In 1953 married historian Charles A. Le Guin. Three children, four grandchildren. Lives in Oregon.

Education

Radcliffe College B.A. 1951; Columbia University M.A. 1952

Academic honors

Phi Beta Kappa 1951
Columbia University Fellow 1952
Fulbright Fellow 1953.

Honorary degrees

Bucknell University, Lawrence University, the University of Oregon, Western Oregon State College, Lewis & Clark College, Occidental College, Emory University, Kenyon College, Portland State University

Teaching positions

Instructor in French

Mercer College
University of Idaho

Lecturer or Writer in Residence

Clarion West
Portland State University
Pacific University
Reading University (England)
First Australian Workshop in Speculative Fiction
Indiana University Writers Conference
Revelle College of the University of California, San Diego
Kenyon College
Tulane University Mellon Lecturer
Bennington College Writing Program
Beloit College
Haystack Summer Program of Portland State University
Flight of the Mind Writing Workshop
Stanford University
San José State University
Malheur Field Station Summer Writing Workshop

Publications

Twenty novels; many short stories in ten collections reprinted from periodicals including The New Yorker, Omni, Redbook, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Fantastic, Amazing, Playboy, Playgirl, Tri-Quarterly, Kenyon Review, etc. Six volumes of poetry, many poems reprinted from periodicals including Calyx, Milkweed, Kenyon Review, Mr Cogito, Seattle Review, NW Review, Open Places, Backbone, Orion, Parabola, Paradoxa. Four volumes of translation. Thirteen books for children. Criticism in periodicals including The Yale Review, Antaeus Foundation, SF Studies, Calyx, Critical Inquiry, Parabola, and four collections of essays. Screenplays; sound recordings.

Literary honors and awards

2006 Maxine Cushing Gray Fellowship for Writers for distinguished body of work. Washington Center for the Book.

2004 Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement (YALSA)

2004 Arbuthnot Lecturer (American Library Association)

2003 Grand Master, SFWA

2003 Locus Readers Award: "The Wild Girls"

2003 Asimov's Readers Award: "The Wild Girls"

2003 Endeavor Award: Tales from Earthsea

2002 PEN/Malamud Award for Short Fiction

2002 Willamette Writers Lifetime Achievement Award

2002 Locus Readers Awards: Tales from Earthsea, "The Bones of the Earth,"

2002 Locus Readers Awards: Tales from Earthsea, "The Finder"

2001 Endeavor Award: The Telling

2001 Locus Readers Awards for The Telling and "The Birthday of the World."

2001 Lifetime Achievement Award, Pacific NW Booksellers Assoc. UKL Interview.

2000 Robert Kirsch Lifetime Achievement Award, L.A. Times

1998 Bumbershoot Arts Award, Seattle
Introduction: "Ursula K. Le Guin: Mutinous Navigator," by Vonda N. McIntyre [offsite link]

1997 James Tiptree Jr. Award for "Mountain Ways"

1996 Locus Readers Award for Four Ways to Forgiveness

1996 James Tiptree Jr. Retrospective Award for Left Hand of Darkness

1995 Nebula Award for "Solitude"

1995 Theodore Sturgeon Award for "Forgiveness Day"

1995 Locus Readers Award for "Forgiveness Day"

1994 James Tiptree, Jr, Award for "The Matter of Seggri"

1995 Asimov's Readers Award for "Forgiveness Day"

1995 Hubbub annual poetry award for "Semen"

1992 H.L.Davis Fiction Award from OLA for Searoad

1992 Searoad shortlisted for Pulitzer Prize

1991 Harold Vursell Award, American Academy & Institute of Arts & Letters

1991 Pushcart Prize for "Bill Weisler"

1990 Nebula Award for Tehanu

1988 Hugo Award for "Buffalo Gals"

1988 International Fantasy Award for "Buffalo Gals"

1987 Prix Lectures-Jeunesse for Very Far Away from Anywhere Else (tr. Laroche)

1986 Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize for Fiction for Always Coming Home

1985 Always Coming Home shortlisted for National Book Award

1984 Locus Award for The Compass Rose

1979 Gandalf Award (Grand Master of Fantasy)

1979 Lewis Carroll Shelf Award for A Wizard of Earthsea

1976 Jupiter Award for "The Diary of the Rose"

1975 Nebula Award for The Dispossessed

1975 Hugo Award for The Dispossessed

1975 Nebula Award for "The Day Before the Revolution"

1975 Jupiter Award for "The Day Before the Revolution"

1974 Hugo Award for "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas"

1973 Locus Award for The Lathe of Heaven

1973 Hugo Award for The Word for World is Forest

1972 National Book Award for Children's Books for The Farthest Shore

1972 Newbery Silver Medal Award for The Tombs of Atuan

1969 Hugo Award for The Left Hand of Darkness

1969 Nebula Award for The Left Hand of Darkness

1968 Boston Globe-Horn Book award for A Wizard of Earthsea

Other Media

Audio:

(*read by author)

A Wizard of Earthsea (read by Harlan Ellison), Tales from Earthsea,* The Other Wind; Fantastic Audio 2001

Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching, accompanied by Todd Barton on various instruments, Sounds True/Shambhala, 1997*

Uses of Music in Uttermost Parts, seven pieces for orchestra, chamber group, voice &/or chorus, with composer Elinor Armer; Koch International Classics CD :3-7331-2Y6x2 (1995)*

The Word for World is Forest, Book of the Road 1988

Music and Poetry of the Kesh, with composer Todd Barton 1985 *

Rigel 9, A Space Opera, with composer David Bedford, Charisma 1985

The Left Hand of Darkness, Waldentape/Warner Audio 1983 *The Earthsea Trilogy, Colophone 1981

Gwilan's Harp, Caedmon 1977 *

The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, Alternate World, 1976 *

Film

The Lathe of Heaven, PBS-TV, 1979, remastered 2000.

Dance

Blood Lodge Dances (1990)

Stone Dances (1992) with choreographer Judy Patton, designer Christine Bourdette, others

Bibliography

Ursula K. Le Guin: A Primary Bibliography by David S. Bratman, 1995

Ursula K. Le Guin: A Primary and Secondary Bibliography by E. C. Cogell, Hall, 1983.

Manuscript Collection

University of Oregon Library, Eugene, Oregon. (Access by request only):

Critical Entries, Articles, and Books (not a complete list):

Authors and Artists for Young Adults, Vol 9, Gale, 1992

Concise Dictionary of American Literary Biography 1968-1988, Gale,1989

Dictionary of Literary Biography by Andrew Gordon, Vol 52, Gale, 1986

Children's Literature Review Vol 3, Gale, 1978; Vol 28, 1992

Dictionary of Literary Biography by Brian Attebery, Vol 8, Gale, 1981

Contemporary Literary Criticism Vol 8, Gale, 1978; Vol 13, 1980; Vol 22, 1982; Vol 45, 1987; Vol 71, 1992;

"Ursula Le Guin Issue" of Science-Fiction Studies, March 1976

Cummins, Elisabeth: Understanding UKL, University of South Carolina Press, 1990

Bittner, James: Approaches to the Fiction of UKL, UMI Research Press, 1984

Bloom, Harold: "UKL" in Modern Critical Views, 1985; "Le Guin's Left Hand of Darkness" in Modern Critical Interpretations, 1987

Bucknall, B. J.: UKL, Ungar, 1981

DeBolt, Joseph (ed.): UKL: Voyage to Inner Lands and Outer Space; Kennikat Press, 1979

Olander,Joseph D. and Martin H. Greenberg: Ursula Le Guin, Taplinger, 1979

Reginald, R. et al.: Zephyr and Boreas, Winds of Change in the Fiction of UKL, 1997

Rochelle, Warren G.: Communities of the Heart, The Rhetoric of Myth in the Fiction of UKL, Liverpool Univ. Press, Liverpool,England 2001

Selinger, Bernard: Le Guin and Identity in Contemporary Fiction, 1987

Slusser, G.E.: The Farthest Shores of UKL, Borgo Press, 1976.

Spivack, Charlotte: UKL, Twayne, 1984

Wayne, Kathryn Ross: Redefining Moral Education: Life, Le Guin, and Language, 1995

White, Donna R.: Dancing with Dragons: UKL and the Critics 1998

Literary Agent

Virginia Kidd Agency
P.O. Box 278
Milford, PA 18337
Voice: 570-296-6205
Fax: 570-296-7266
Email: agents (at) vk-agency (dot) com