Product Description

George Orr is a mild and unremarkable man who finds the world a less than pleasant place to live: seven billion people jostle for living space and food. But George dreams dreams which do in fact change reality - and he has no means of controlling this extraordinary power. Psychiatrist Dr William Haber offers to help. At first sceptical of George's powers, he comes to astonished belief. When he allows ambition to get the better of ethics, George finds himself caught up in a situation of alarming peril.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #82000 in Books
• Published on: 2001-08-09
• Binding: Paperback
• 192 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
First published in 1971, Ursula Le Guin's SF novel The Lathe of Heaven combines a sheaf of future possibilities--including an early evocation of global warming--with a parable about wishes that has the terrible clarity of a fairytale.

The uncomfortably gifted George Orr is desperately drugging himself to avoid sleep, because he knows his dreams can change the world. Psychiatrist Dr Haber begins with good intentions of curing Orr, but when he finds he can shape Orr's "effective dreams" and force his own wishes into reality, the lure of power is too much. Though Haber believes he wants only to do good, he's also quick to upgrade himself from obscurity in a windowless office to Director of the prestigious Oregon Oneirological Institute.

During his flawed attempts to create an earthly paradise, we see that each sweeping change makes matters worse. Let's fix over-population: suddenly there's a new past in which humanity was almost destroyed by plague, billions of people are written out of existence, and Haber drinks a toast--"to a better world". Let's fix war: the hapless Orr's dreaming mind can only imagine and create a new threat that unites Earth against outside foes. Let's fix racism: the result is even more painful. As Orr broods:

The end justifies the means. But what if there never is an end? All we have is means.

In this mad round of poisoned wishes, it becomes necessary to stop. But power-crazed Haber refuses to stop....

Beautifully written, jolting in its moral force, The Lathe of Heaven is one of Le Guin's finest SF excursions. --David Langford

Synopsis
George Orr is a mild and unremarkable man who finds the world a less than pleasant place to live: seven billion people jostle for living space and food. But George dreams dreams which do in fact change reality - and he has no means of controlling this extraordinary power. Psychiatrist Dr William Haber offers to help. At first sceptical of George's powers, he comes to astonished belief. When he allows ambition to get the better of ethics, George finds himself caught up in a situation of alarming peril.

About the Author
SALES POINTS #43 in the Millennium SF Masterworks series, a library of the finest science fiction ever written. Le Guin is one of the finest writers of science fiction in the world Winner of many Hugo and Nebula Awards, as well as a National Book Award, a Pushcart Prize, the Harold D. Vursell Memorial Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters; a Newberry Honor and the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement

Customer Reviews

Lovely stuff
It's been a while since I've enjoyed reading something so much, especially Sci-Fi, as it usually tends to be so out of touch with reality that I cannot at all identify. This book is relatively short, you could push it and describe it as a novella, and the prose is fluid and rich and it's just an incredibly erudite piece of work. A good follow-up to this would be Dancing at the Edge of the World, a collection of essays by Le Guin, in which, amongst other things, she describes the writing process for The Lathe. Definitely a book that's worth reading over and over again.

Beware megalomaniacal psychiatrists....
The Lathe of Heaven introduces us to one of the most genuinely understated heroes in science fiction. George Orr is a man whose dreams alter reality. He cannot control them however, so he has great reason to fear his dreams and sleep in general. The book is quite short at 184 pages but with only 2 major characters it never feels like a lightweight.

To control his dreams he has been taking drugs to stay awake and the book opens with him being hauled away to a psychiatrist to see what’s wrong with him. Dr. Haber is an ambitious, beardy doctor who has an excellent record in dealing with people’s dream problems. Slowly however, he too realises that Orr is altering the world around him and decides to use him for the benefit of the world. He is not a malicious person at all; in fact one could liken him to a controversial genetic scientist of today who wants to play God. He means well it’s just the power he has at his fingertips is just too tempting. Orr understands this but has to continue to see Haber or else he would be sent to a more ‘institutional’ type of treatment.

This book reminded me very much of Philip K. Dick’s UBIK in that both build a number of well-fleshed out realities that only the protagonist is aware of. Indeed it has been noted that this is Le Guin’s homage to PKD and as a fan of his I was very impressed; particularly her writing style which was highly descriptive and sometimes very poetic. Somehow she has managed to craft a very rational villain yet at the same time one that you despise for what he does to his patient.

We also get to see some interesting alternate history situations with the many worlds created. For example Haber mentions to Orr before he is put to sleep that it would be great to have a world without racism. When he awakes, everybody is gray! Also it is set in 2002 where the world is overpopulated with 7 billion people (not a bad prediction from 1971) which worries Orr so he dreams of a plague and wakes up with 6 billion less people!

Overall very good – 8/10!

Provoking and thoughtful "what-if"
One of the "non-ekumen" works of LeGuin, this book poses a lot of "what-if" questions.

The basal plot is that George Orr has dreams that changes reality, and in unexpected ways. Just like when you let the genie out of the bottle, the answers to your wishes may not be what you dream of.

George gets treatment from a psychiatrist, who undertakes to use George's ability to make the world better. He has no more luck than George, who fears his own powers and wants them to go away. The story ends in chaos and catastrophy.

LeGuin asks whether the world really would become better if we had our wishes fulfilled, and shows us that what we wish for might easiest be given us in ways that makes the world much worse.

Interesting book that I would recommend, both to LeGuin fans and others.