That's a very insightful point about agenda-driven fiction being a particularly obnoxious type of plot-driven story.
I agree, the works of Le Guin (or Granny Le Guin as I call her, as a term of endearment and respect) are excellent examples of fiction with a point. I haven't read Jack Vance but I've always thought of Ayn Rand as Le Guin's evil counterpart, an ideological writer who let her agenda overrun her art. The Dispossessed and Atlas Shrugged are like textbook examples of how and how not to handle political philosophy in science fiction, or any fiction for that matter. I don't say that with reference to their placement on the left-right spectrum; In fact I've met leftists who are narrow-minded ideologues like Rand and conservatives who are as morally courageous and compassionate as Le Guin, and I consider the latter and not the former my people even though I'm a lifelong progressive myself.
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I agree, the works of Le Guin (or Granny Le Guin as I call her, as a term of endearment and respect) are excellent examples of fiction with a point. I haven't read Jack Vance but I've always thought of Ayn Rand as Le Guin's evil counterpart, an ideological writer who let her agenda overrun her art. The Dispossessed and Atlas Shrugged are like textbook examples of how and how not to handle political philosophy in science fiction, or any fiction for that matter. I don't say that with reference to their placement on the left-right spectrum; In fact I've met leftists who are narrow-minded ideologues like Rand and conservatives who are as morally courageous and compassionate as Le Guin, and I consider the latter and not the former my people even though I'm a lifelong progressive myself.