The Dispossessed

Chapter-by-chapter summary

Spoiler warning: this section covers the whole plot, including the ending.

The book has 13 chapters that alternate between two threads. The odd chapters follow Shevek on Urras. The even chapters follow his life on Anarres, moving forward from his childhood to the point just before he leaves. Chapter 1 opens at the departure, and chapter 13 is the voyage home. The chapter labels below are our own short descriptions.

Chapter 1: The wall and the departure

The novel opens at a low stone wall around the only spaceport on Anarres. Shevek is about to board a ship to Urras, and an angry crowd has gathered, some of whom see him as a traitor. Rocks are thrown as he walks to the ship. On board, he talks with an Urrasti doctor named Kimoe, and the two cannot understand each other's ideas about class and property. On landing, Shevek is hailed as the first man from the Moon and taken to a lavish welcome at a university. This matters because the wall can look like protection or like a prison, and the book's central question starts here.

Chapter 2: A childhood on Anarres

The even chapters take place on Anarres, and this one goes back to Shevek's early years. Anarres was settled by followers of the thinker Odo, and children grow up in a shared, communal life where sharing is the rule. Reading it right after the Urras chapter lets us see where Shevek comes from. This matters because the warmth of life without ownership and the narrowness that can come with it are both planted here, and they are where Shevek's doubts about the wall begin.

Chapter 3: A guest at the university

On Urras, Shevek wakes in luxurious rooms and is puzzled by a servant, since Anarres has none and everyone does their own chores. The physicists Pae, Chifoilisk, Oiie and Atro welcome him, and he is thrilled to meet colleagues who know his General Temporal Theory. He is dismayed when they say women do not belong in science. On a city tour he asks to see Odo's grave, where the inscription says that to be whole is to be part and that true voyage is return. His escorts keep him away from ordinary people. This matters because the welcome already hides a wall of its own.

Chapter 4: Abbenay

Back on Anarres, Shevek arrives in the capital, Abbenay, and is given a room of his own at the institute. The senior physicist Sabul tells him to learn Iotic, the language of Urrasti physics, before he can read their work. About half a year in, Shevek writes a critique of the physicist Atro's work. Sabul has it sent to Urras under both their names, and Shevek decides to work with Sabul because Sabul controls how his ideas reach Urras. Later Shevek falls ill and is taken to a clinic. When he wakes, his mother Rulag, whom he barely knows, is at his bedside and offers to guide him. He refuses. This matters because the credit conflict shows how Sabul holds power over Shevek's work, and the scene with Rulag shows how stubbornly Shevek insists on making his own way.

Chapter 5: Warnings and parties

Now a teacher on Urras, Shevek finds that his own work will not move. Shopping with his new salary leaves him sick at what he has become. Chifoilisk, a scientist from the rival state of Thu, warns him that the rooms are bugged, that Pae reports on him and that the state of A-Io will steal his theory. Receptions bore him, but a weekend with Oiie's family gives him some hope. He dreams of walking across a desert with Takver toward a thin, shining barrier. This matters because he begins to see that kindness here comes with a price.

Chapter 6: Bedap, Takver and Tirin

After recovering from his illness, Shevek lives a lonely life at the institute, and his work stalls. He meets his old friend Bedap again, who argues that cooperation on Anarres has turned into obedience. Bedap also tells him that their childhood friend Tirin staged a play, was given one hard job after another and now lives in an asylum. On a hike with Bedap's friends, Shevek meets Takver, and the two agree to become partners. In his third year, his mentor Gvarab dies, and Shevek feels his years there have produced very little. This matters because the book shows that a society without a government can still produce small powers that people fear to challenge.

Chapter 7: Vea's party

On Urras, Shevek is drawn to Vea, Oiie's sister, who flirts with him and gets him to promise to visit her in Nio Esseia. He skips class and takes the train, and they spend a day of expensive meals together. At her party he talks about time and physics, then, having never drunk alcohol before, drinks until he is very drunk. He shouts about the wall and leaves the room feeling ill. In a bedroom he gropes Vea, and when she tells him to stop, he keeps going. She leaves angry and disgusted. Oiie and Pae collect him and put him to bed, and Pae worries that bringing Shevek to Urras has become a serious risk. This matters because it shows a man who despises ownership treating a person as something to take, and it drives his shame in the next chapter.

Chapter 8: Drought and famine

This Anarres chapter covers the hard years of drought and famine. Shevek and Takver are posted to different places, far from each other, and they have a daughter, Sadik. The chapter tests the idea that everyone will carry a shared burden fairly. This matters because the separation, which later chapters say lasts more than four years, shapes the rest of the story, and the work Shevek does in the famine area later weighs on him.

Chapter 9: The morning after and the strike

Shevek wakes after Vea's party sick and ashamed, and he sees that the Ioti state now owns his work. After days of intense work bring a breakthrough on his theory, he falls feverish, and his servant Efor, who nurses him, tells how his daughter died in a filthy hospital. When Atro speaks of the poor as made for war, Shevek sees his cruelty plainly. A note urging him to join his brothers leads Efor to help him slip out to Old Town, where he meets an underground movement planning a strike. At the large demonstration he speaks to the crowd, then police helicopters open fire. He drags a wounded man into a basement and stays with him. This matters because he finally meets the people his hosts hide.

Chapter 10: Famine and the return to Takver

The famine years are over, and Shevek crosses the desert of the Southwest in a truck to find Takver. The driver asks where he worked, and Shevek says that his job had been making lists of who should go without food, and that he quit. In Chakar he finds Takver and their daughter Sadik. They talk about Tirin, who has left the asylum and is rewriting his play, and about how Anarresti believe themselves free while following orders. Shevek decides to return to Abbenay and start a printing syndicate, and to spend his life unbuilding walls. This matters because he stops obeying and starts acting.

Chapter 11: The Terran embassy

Fleeing the crackdown, Shevek reaches the Terran embassy, where staff tell him that he is on Terran soil and safe, and he sleeps for two days. He then meets the ambassador, Keng, and tells her that the Ioti meant to keep him isolated and use his research as a weapon. He asks her to send his equations to all worlds so that no state can own them, and asks for help to go home. This matters because it turns his discovery from a possession into a gift.

Chapter 12: The Syndicate and the decision

Back on Anarres, Bedap presents a project of the Syndicate of Initiative, a group in contact with Urras, at a council meeting. Rulag, Shevek's mother, opposes the group on almost every point. Shevek then decides to go to Urras to open communication, backed only by the Syndicate, and boards an ore freighter past a hostile crowd. This is the last Anarres chapter, and it catches up with the scene that opens chapter 1. It matters because Shevek's journey is a choice made with others.

Chapter 13: The voyage home

Aboard the Hainish ship Davenant, Shevek speaks by radio with the Syndicate, and the news is encouraging. A crew member, Ketho, asks to land on Anarres with him. Shevek warns him that things on Anarres are a little broken loose and that freedom is never very safe, and he calls him brother. At sunrise, he looks at Anarres and imagines being home with his family. He has no gift from Urras, and his hands are empty, as always. This matters because the ending is open, with nothing promised.

Characters

Shevek

A physicist from Anarres who is working on a theory of time. He is quiet, stubborn and more curious than ambitious. He is willing to be unpopular for an idea and to learn from places he disagrees with.

Takver

Shevek's partner and the mother of his daughter. She is a biologist who studies fish, practical and fiercely loyal. She is the person who makes Anarres feel like a home, and not only an idea.

Bedap

Shevek's friend, a sharp critic of life on Anarres. He sees early that rules and habits can turn into new kinds of control, and he pushes Shevek to act on his doubts.

Sabul

A senior physicist in Abbenay who decides which work gets published. He is the main example of how petty power can grow even in a society with no government.

Atro

A famous physicist at the university on Urras. He is courteous and powerful, and he wants Shevek's theory for the benefit of his country.

Oiie

A younger Urrasti physicist who befriends Shevek and enjoys his company. His friendly attitude makes it harder for Shevek to see how closely he is being watched.

Chifoilisk

A scientist from the nation of Thu, A-Io's rival. He is frank and worn out, and he gives Shevek a warning about how the state might use his work.

Keng

The ambassador from Earth on Urras. She listens to Shevek without trying to claim him, and she gives him a safe place to decide what to do.

Ketho

A Hainish crew member who travels back to Anarres with Shevek. He is an outsider who sees both worlds and is curious about the one Shevek calls home.

Odo

A thinker from Urras who died before the settlers left. Her writings inspired the Anarresti, who call themselves Odonians. She appears through the habits and sayings of the people she inspired.

Writing about this book

This is a novel about big ideas, so a good report starts with one clear question and uses one or two scenes as evidence. Here are some starting points that do not give you an answer, only a way in.

• Anarres has no police and no money, yet Shevek feels pressure from other people. Which scene shows that most clearly, and what do you think it means?
• Compare how Shevek feels in his comfortable apartment on Urras with how he felt as a child on Anarres. What does each place give him, and what does it take away?
• Why does the author alternate the chapters between the two worlds? Try describing what you notice when you read a chapter about Anarres straight after a chapter about Urras.
• Shevek decides to share his theory with everyone. Is that an act of freedom, or a way of avoiding responsibility? Argue one side and use a scene to support it.

Remember that the subtitle is An Ambiguous Utopia. A strong report does not decide that Anarres is good and Urras is bad, but looks at what each society gets right and wrong.