duality-and-balance
The interplay between light (sun), darkness (shadow), and ice represents cosmic cycles and the balance between creation and destruction.
1 chapter across 1 book
The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)Ursula K. Le Guin
This chapter presents a primitive Orgota creation myth describing the emergence of the world from ice and the sun, where three ice-forms create the earth, seas, plants, animals, and men. The myth recounts the awakening of thirty-nine men, the violent actions of the first awakened Edondurath, and the eventual union between Edondurath and the youngest brother, which gives birth to human nations marked by an ever-present shadow symbolizing mortality and the passage of time. The story concludes with a cosmic vision of the sun's eventual self-destruction and the return of ice and darkness.