I’m currently reading “A Wizard of Earthsea” and have read a number of other similar books, yet I’ll never understand this fascination with “the true name” of things. Why do so many authors of sword and sorcery rely on this idea that wielding the name of things enables enchantment.

It’s not like this idea is a simple anachronism, S&S authors of various eras have used it. At least Ursula K. Le Guin’s plots aren’t nearly as predictable as those of Terry Goodkind, even if the mechanics and names are.

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Ursula K. Le Guin: mundu berriak sortu, gurea ulertzeko

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I'm currently re-reading Earthsea. I really like the idea that true power resides in knowing the true names of things and letting them be, i.e. letting things flow according to their own nature. The flip side of this power would be domination, where names are taken from people and things and they are forced to do the bidding of a single will. This seems to be exactly the battle played out in the books, in a different way in each story.

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Only in silence the word,
Only in dark the light,
Only in dying life:
Bright the hawk's flight
On the empty sky

Ursula K. Le Guin

#ursulakleguin #earthsea

“You thought, as a boy, that a mage is one who can do anything. So I thought, once. So did we all. And the truth is that as a man's real power grows and his knowledge widens, ever the way he can follow grows narrower: until at last he chooses nothing, but does only and wholly what he must do. . . .”

― Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earthsea

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« Un Mago de Terramar », c. 1989

by Oscar Chichoni (Argentine artist, born 1957)
Cover illustration for Ursula K. Le Guin's "A Wizard of Earthsea", Minotauro, Argentina, 1989

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