Incomplete map of Earthsea
For example, despite the northern European climate and culture on Earthsea, a sea-faring world with lots of rain, mist, snow and mountains, most of the people are supposed to have dark skins. The ones that don’t – the white-skinned, blond-haired Kargs – are the bloodthirsty baddies of A Wizard of Earthsea (1968), the first book in the series. Balls to biology, in other words: there’s propaganda to propagate. So it’s not surprising that Le Guin’s father was a famous and respected figure in the mostly disreputable discipline of anthropology. Earthsea is fantasy for Guardian-readers, in short.
But I still like the idea of an archipelago-world: sea and islands, islands and sea. As Le Guin herself says: “We all have archipelagos in our minds.” That’s one of the reasons I like the Ulam spiral: it reminds me of Earthsea. Unlike Earthsea, however, the sea and islands go on for ever. In the Ulam spiral, the islands are the prime numbers and the sea is the composite numbers. It’s based on a counter-clockwise spiral of integers, like this:
145←144←143←142←141←140←139←138←137←136←135←134←133
↓ ↑
146 101←100←099←098←097←096←095←094←093←092←091 132
↓ ↓ ↑ ↑
147 102 065←064←063←062←061←060←059←058←057 090 131
↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑
148 103 066 037←036←035←034←033←032←031 056 089 130
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑
149 104 067 038 017←016←015←014←013 030 055 088 129
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑
150 105 068 039 018 005←004←003 012 029 054 087 128
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑
151 106 069 040 019 006 001→002 011 028 053 086 127
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑
152 107 070 041 020 007→008→009→010 027 052 085 126
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑ ↑
153 108 071 042 021→022→023→024→025→026 051 084 125
↓ ↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑ ↑
154 109 072 043→044→045→046→047→048→049→050 083 124
↓ ↓ ↓ ↑ ↑
155 110 073→074→075→076→077→078→079→080→081→082 123
↓ ↓ ↑
156 111→112→113→114→115→116→117→118→119→120→121→122
↓ ↑
157→158→159→160→161→162→163→164→165→166→167→168→169→170
The spiral is named after Stanislaw Ulam (1909-84), a Polish mathematician who invented it while doodling during a boring meeting. When numbers are represented as pixels and 1 is green, the spiral looks like this – note the unique “knee” formed by 2, 3 (directly above 2) and 11 (to the right of 2):
(If the image above does not animate, please try opening it in a new window.)
Some prime-pixels are isolated, like eyots or aits (small islands) in the number-sea, but some touch corner-to-corner and form larger units, larger islands. There are also prime-diamonds, like islands with lakes on them. The largest island, with 19 primes, may come very near the centre of the spiral:
Island 1 = (5, 7, 17, 19, 23, 37, 41, 43, 47, 67, 71, 73, 79, 103, 107, 109, 113, 149, 151) (i=19) (x=-3, y=3, n=37) (n=1 at x=0, y=0)
Here are some more prime-islands – prIslands or priminsulas – in the Ulam-sea that I find interesting or attractive for one reason or other:
Island 2 = (281, 283, 353, 431, 433, 521, 523, 617, 619, 719, 827, 829, 947) (i=13) (x=6, y=-12, n=619)
Island 3 = (20347, 20921, 21499, 21503, 22091, 22093, 22691, 23293, 23297, 23909, 23911, 24533, 25163, 25801, 26449, 27103, 27767, 28439) (i=18) (x=-39, y=-81, n=26449)
Island 4 = (537347, 540283, 543227, 546179, 549139, 552107, 555083, 558067, 561059, 561061, 564059, 564061, 567067, 570083, 573107, 573109) (i=16) (x=375, y=-315, n=561061)
Island 5 = (1259047, 1263539, 1263541, 1268039, 1272547, 1277063, 1281587, 1286119, 1290659, 1295207, 1299763) (i=11) (x=-561, y=399, n=1259047)
Island 6 = (1341841, 1346479, 1351123, 1355777, 1360439, 1360441, 1365107, 1365109, 1369783, 1369787, 1369789, 1374473, 1379167) (i=13) (x=-585, y=-297, n=1369783)
Island 7 = (2419799, 2419801, 2426027, 2426033, 2432263, 2432267, 2438507, 2438509, 2444759, 2451017, 2457283, 2463557) (i=12) (x=558, y=780, n=2432263)
Island 8 = (3189833, 3196979, 3196981, 3204137, 3204139, 3211301, 3211303, 3218471, 3218473, 3218477, 3225653) (i=11) (x=-894, y=858, n=3196981)
Overlord In Terms of Core Issues Around Maximal Engagement with Key Notions of the Über-Feral 
Why shouldn’t characters in a fantasy world have any and every skin colour? When the book was written and even today, so much of fantasy concerns light-skinned characters. Le Guin wanted to balance things out a bit. She does so in a very modest way. The Kargads are indeed portrayed as vicious, but this would be a natural view to hold for a Gontishman. Remember, the hero of the second novel in the series is from Kargad and we learn a lot more about those lands!
The culture of Earthsea is not Northern European. Because of magic in its various forms, it is not really comparable with any Earth culture.
Why shouldn’t characters in a fantasy world have any and every skin colour?
Because even fantasy worlds should follow some kind of logic and there’s no logic in Earthsea to explain how dark skins go with cold, cloudy climates. The dark skins are imposed from outside the fantasy world by Le Guin’s political correctness. As are the white skins and blondness of the villains.
Kargads are indeed portrayed as vicious, but this would be a natural view to hold for a Gontishman. Remember, the hero of the second novel in the series is from Kargad and we learn a lot more about those lands!
Yes. We learn how vicious and cruel they are there (starving prisoners to death etc). Reinforcing what we learnt in the first book (abandoning children on bleak islands etc).
The culture of Earthsea is not Northern European. Because of magic in its various forms, it is not really comparable with any Earth culture.
It’s much closer to Northern European than to anything else. It’s certainly not African, because time-travelling racist Europeans stole the sailing technology (and everything else) developed by Black geniuses in Africa in 40,000 BC.
Hey there!
I subscribed here because I think we may disagree or have different views about a lot of stuff. I think it is really important to expose oneself to many differing worldviews, experiences, etc etc. Thanks for replying so quickly! I won’t be able to do the same atm, but I will get back to you.
The other reason I subscribed was because your posts seem to cover a lot of cool topics and I like how you write.
Chat soon :@)
I will quickly ask if you agree with me about the nature of online “debate”…
…that it all too often descends into ad-hominem attacks and hatred? The flip side being the “echo chambers”, of Facebook groups, websites and whatnot, where people just agree and reinforce each others views, or prejudices, or blindspots.
I try to avoid this; I would be lying if I claimed not to indulge in the occasional troll, however.
Cheers
I try to avoid it too. The anonymity and distance of the internet allow people’s true natures to come out. Which is interesting but too often unpleasant.