Friday, September 29, 2006

The Word For World Is Forest

Book from Ursula K. Le Guin.
Some time in the future, when people on Earth run out of wood they sent ship to planet where forest covers most of land. On this planet there are also people, much smaller then humans and covered with green fur all over the body. Humans enslave all of them that they encounter. They use them for working force to help humans chopping trees and shipping them back to earth.
Planet lies 27 light years away from Earth. That is why they do not have any contacts with their home planet and no explicit instructions how to or how not to handle race on this planet.
Even though the people here are much different and smaller then humans, the man are raping women, because there are no human women there yet. The autochthon people are harmless and do not show any signs of aggression until …
One day when homey pupil Sam finds out that some commander has raped and killed his wife. And that is when the forest people start to show signs of aggression. Sam tries o kill his wives killer but he fails. He sure is half as tall as human but his will is very strong. He manages to run away from sure death. And after some time he returns with army of his own and burns down whole camp, kills all the humans and frees all of his kind.
Soon after a ship arrives to the planet that brought an interstellar communication device that enables immediate communication with Earth and many women for workers and soldiers on the planet. They told them that the world alliance was established and that all the known worlds were connected in this alliance.
The commanders from Earth order that there must be no killing any more from their side, and that all the slaves must be freed. The chief commander obeyed the order but one of his inferior commanders did not. He continued to kill forest people. Meanwhile the space ship continued to its destination.
That is why it happened. Soon an assault was carried out in which the main human base was demolished, all the women were killed and many man to. Survivors were imprisoned.
The disobedient commander was not captured so the killing wasn’t ended. They hunt him and his team down and put him on a devastated island. They made peace with others and they were allowed to stay on the planet.
In three years time the great spaceship returned. There was another ship with them. All the humans were embarked on the ships. There were also two members of alliance on the ship and they talked with some of forest people. They told them that they have their peace back.

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