Ten Videos on Ursula K. Leguin’s A Wizard Of Earthsea

free online video lectures exploring themes, plot, characters and the narrative world of Leguin’s first Earthsea novel

The middle school me who first read through Ursula K. Leguin’s Earthsea trilogy of novels — A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, and the Farthest Shore — would doubtless be surprised to find his much later fifty-something self not only still rereading those stories, but leading college students into them.

This semester, I am teaching an online course, “Philosophy and Fantasy: Leguin’s Earthsea”, at Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. Equipped with the recently published — and massive (5.4 lbs!) — omnibus volume that gathers all the books and stories of Earthsea along with Charles Vess’ illustrations and Leguin’s own reflections and reminiscences, we are working our way through the entirety of her Earthsea writings.

If you enjoy fantasy, and like it with darkness and depth, but also thoughtfulness and wisdom, you will definitely want to read Leguin’s novels and short stories set within — exploring and expanding — the narrative universe of Earthsea. Each of the six books in the series are short, especially by comparison to contemporary fantasy tomes that often number several hundred pages. Leguin is an…