Repeatedly in [Le Guin's] fiction we confront individuals who are of society and yet not quite a part of it. The outsider, the alien, the marginal man, adopts a vantage point with rather serious existential and philosophical implications. For Le Guin this marginality becomes a metaphor whose potency is fulfilled in a critical assessment of society. (p. 50)

The "chronic uprootedness," the disconnectedness, endows the protagonists with a vision that transcends that of the others around them, who see the world through culture-bound categories and characterizations. Yet theirs is not a happy plight. Their vision isolates them, while their attempts to promote understanding seem only to remove them further from their compatriots. Ultimately, despite her concern with utopias, Le Guin's view is not optimistic. It can be argued that her heroes' lack of success is due in fact to the failures of society—a failure to examine, to reappraise...