Thursday, May 11, 2017

From Selvers point of view what is the lasting consequences of the enraged Athsheans having learned to murder others in Le Guin's The Word for World is Forest?

The novel The Word for World Is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin explores the effects of a violent, ruling society taking over a peaceful and acquiescing one. The native Athsheans are a peace-loving, gentle race who are enslaved by the humans who come in to begin colonizing the world and using its resources (the world is heavily forested so there is a booming logging industry that develops when the humans begin colonization).
During the events of the novel, Selver grows enraged with the humans, in particular Captain Davidson, who had raped and killed Selver's wife. His hatred leads him to start a riot and destroy the city they inhabited, eventually leading to a revolt against their human captors which resulted in the Athsheans killing the majority of the humans on the planet, including many who were innocent of the crimes for which they were being killed. This, Selver says later, teaches the Athsheans to murder.
Selver pontificates that, while they have overcome their rulers and thrown out the invading humans, they have lost their identity as a society and that it wasn't a victory of Athshe—in fact there was no hope for victory in that situation because they would otherwise have remained enslaved and eventually exterminated.
The lasting consequence is that Athshe society will collapse and reform as they know it, in a more cruel and violent form than it ever was before. Prior to the riot, Athsheans had no concept of murder—killing for the sake of killing. When this is introduced, it has corrupted the natives and they will now find murder an acceptable substitute for arbitration or judicial hearings. The introduction of murder has reduced them from a civilized society to one of base instincts and destructive tendencies. In this way, it has destroyed the native culture and removed their peaceful habits, replacing them instead with vengeance and cruelty, as well as a willingness to commit murder if they feel it is justified, when prior to the events of the novel, murder was so heinous that nothing could be perceived of that would justify it.

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