Celebrated science fiction and fantasy author Ursula K. Le Guin was born in 1929 in Berkeley and currently lives in Portland, Oregon. She has published numerous novels, short stories, poems, and other creative works. She knows the world of publishing inside and out, and she has something to say about changing the way it works.

While accepting the National Book Foundation’s Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, Le Guin urges authors to remember why they do what they do. She calls on her fellow science fiction authors, the “realists of a larger reality,” to imagine a world where things are not done the same way as they are here, a world we could be in the future if we work at it. Her argument that writing is an art form rather than a commodity is inspiring and one any avid reader must watch!

“The profit motive is often in conflict with the aims of art,” she laments. Which will you choose? Watch the video to be inspired!

https://youtu.be/Et9Nf-rsALk&start=17&end=333