Announced on January 15th:
The 33rd stamp in the Literary Arts series honors Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018), who expanded the scope of literature through novels and short stories that increased critical and popular appreciation of science fiction and fantasy. The stamp features a portrait of Le Guin based on a 2006 photograph. The background shows a scene from her landmark 1969 novel “The Left Hand of Darkness,” in which an envoy from Earth named Genly Ai escapes from a prison camp across the wintry planet of Gethen with Estraven, a disgraced Gethenian politician. The artist for this stamp was Donato Giancola. The art director was Antonio Alcalá. The words “three ounce” on this stamp indicate its usage value. Like a Forever stamp, this stamp will always be valid for the value printed on it.
This stamp will be issued July 27th with a ceremony in Portland, Oregon. The Scott catalogue number is 5619.
Additional information will appear below the line, with the latest at the top
Updated June 28th: Ceremony Details
[press release]
New Stamp Highlights Acclaimed Author Ursula K. Le Guin
U.S. Postal Service’s Literary Arts Series Celebrates Author for Writings ‘Ahead of Their Time’
WHAT: The U.S. Postal Service honors the cross-genre writings of Ursula K. Le Guin, the acclaimed science fiction and fantasy author, with the 33rd stamp in its literary series.
News of the stamps is being shared with the hashtag #UrsulaKLeGuinstamp.
WHO: Joseph Corbett, chief financial officer and executive vice president, U.S. Postal Service
India Downes-Le Guin, granddaughter of Ursula K. Le Guin
WHEN: Tuesday, July 27, 2021, at 11 a.m. PT
WHERE:
Evan H. Roberts Sculpture Mall
Portland Art Museum
1119 SW Park Avenue
Portland, OR 97205
[Interestingly, no mention of the first day ceremony is on the Museum’s website yet. —VSC]
RSVP: Dedication ceremony attendees are encouraged to RSVP at usps.com/ursulakleguinstamp
BACKGROUND: Born on Oct. 21, 1929, in Berkeley, CA, Ursula Kroeber Le Guin began exploring the potential of science fiction and fantasy through writing in the early 1960s. In 1966, she published her first novel, “Rocannon’s World,” which intertwined elements of fantasy and science fiction. It inspired two sequels that established a setting for many later novels and stories.
Educated at Radcliffe College, and after receiving a master’s degree from Columbia University, Le Guin also explored gender identity through “The Left Hand of Darkness.” This ground-breaking novel follows a human ambassador to an icebound planet — where the inhabitants had no fixed gender. The book, which won the Hugo and Nebula awards in science fiction and fantasy, is often praised as the novel that permanently raised the literary expectations for science fiction.
Updated June 17th from the Postal Bulletin:
Here are the postmarks for this issue:
The Digital Color Postmark measures 2.54″ x 1.45″
The “special” postmark for other post offices to use after the first-day measures 2.74″ x 1.15″
Updated June 17th from the Postal Bulletin:
On July 27, 2021, in Portland, OR, the United States Postal Service® will issue the Ursula K. Le Guin stamp (Non-denominated priced at the 3-ounce rate) in one design, in a pressure-sensitive adhesive (PSA) pane of 20 stamps (Item 121400). This stamp will go on sale nationwide July 27, 2021, and must not be sold or canceled before the first-day-of-issue.
The 33rd stamp in the Literary Arts series honors Ursula K. Le Guin (1929–2018), who expanded the scope of literature through novels and short stories that increased critical and popular appreciation of science fiction and fantasy. The stamp features a portrait of Le Guin based on a 2006 photograph. The background shows a scene from her landmark 1969 novel The Left Hand of Darkness, in which an envoy from Earth named Genly Ai escapes from a prison camp across the wintry planet of Gethen with Estraven, a disgraced Gethenian politician. The artist for this stamp was Donato Giancola. The art director was Antonio Alcalá. The words “THREE OUNCE” on this stamp indicate its usage value. Like a Forever® stamp, this stamp will always be valid for the rate printed on it.
No automatic distribution.
Special postmark
How to Order the First-Day-of-Issue Postmark:
Customers have 120 days to obtain the first-day-of-issue postmark by mail. They may purchase new stamps at their local Post Office™ or at The Postal Store® website at usps.com/shop. They must affix the stamps to envelopes of their choice, address the envelopes (to themselves or others), and place them in a larger envelope addressed to:
FDOI – Ursula K. Le Guin Stamp
USPS Stamp Fulfillment Services
8300 NE Underground Drive, Suite 300
Kansas City, MO 64144-9900
After applying the first-day-of-issue postmark, the Postal Service will return the envelopes through the mail. There is no charge for the postmark up to a quantity of 50. There is a 5-cent charge for each additional postmark over 50. All orders must be postmarked by November 27, 2021.
Technical Specifications:
Issue: Ursula K. Le Guin Stamp
Item Number: 121400
Denomination & Type of Issue: 3-ounce rate, Non-denominated, Mail use
Format: Pane of 20 (1 design)
Series: Literary Arts (33rd in a series)
Issue Date & City: July 27, 2021, Portland, OR 97208
Art Director: Antonio Alcalá, Alexandria, VA
Designer: Antonio Alcalá, Alexandria, VA
Artist: Donato Giancola, Brooklyn, NY
Modeler: Joseph Sheeran
Manufacturing Process: Offset, Microprint “USPS”
Printer: Ashton Potter (USA) Ltd (APU)
Press Type: Muller A76
Stamps per Pane: 20
Print Quantity: 10,000,000 stamps
Paper Type: Nonphosphored Type III, Block Tag
Adhesive Type: Pressure-sensitive
Colors: Black, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow
Stamp Orientation: Horizontal
Image Area (w x h): 1.42 x 0.84 in. / 36.068 x 21.336 mm
Overall Size (w x h): 1.56 x 0.98 in. / 39.624 x 24.892 mm
Full Pane Size (w x h): 7.24 x 5.92 in. / 183.896 x 150.368 mm
Plate Size: 240 stamps per revolution
Plate Number: “P” followed by four (4) single digits in two corners
Marginal Markings:
Front: Header: Literary Arts – 33rd in a series • Plate number in bottom two corners
Back: ©2021 USPS • USPS logo • 2 barcodes (121400) • Plate position diagram (6) • Promotional text
Updated January 17th:
The official Ursula K. Le Guin Twitter account announced the stamp, garnering much reaction from her fans. You can follow the discussion here. The message was retweeted by DisCon III, the 79th World Science Fiction convention, which will be held in Washington, DC, August 25-29.
Kris McIntosh is the new chair of the Education Department of the 
Women (Sc. 959) issues.
More stamps in the Typically Dutch series will appear in the coming months about wooden houses (22 February), canal houses (22 March), houseboats (6 April) and terraced houses (14 June).
The 1742 farmhouse depicted on the stamp is called Broedersbouw and can be found in the North Holland village of Zuidoostbeemster. In the illustration on the stamps, the farm is flanked on the side by a tree, the front shows the green grassland. There is a black line at the bottom of the stamp that refers to the street level. To the left of the farm, the rising sun can be seen against a sky with blown strips of sky.
sheet Experience Nature – Dwingelderveld pays attention to the unique flora and fauna of this heather landscape in the middle of Drenthe.
The Dwingelderveld National Park is the largest wet heathland area in Western Europe. This protected nature area was also voted the quietest area in the Netherlands at the end of 2020. Wet ditches and dry sand ridges alternate on the extensive moist heathland of the Dwingelderveld. As a result, there is a lot of variation in plant growth and animal life.
separate graphic layer on the stamp sheet contains transparent images of a kestrel with spread wings, the needles of a Scots pine, a creeping dung beetle, the profile of the head of a Drenthe heather sheep and a bare pedunculate oak.
The stamp sheetlet opens with an intense winter image of the Drenthe heath sheep. According to Janse, this animal can still be considered as semi-wild because it can keep itself alive. “On the stamp next to it, there is the yellowhammer, a beautiful bird, on a twig. Typical for the east of our country, especially in Drenthe. And, very special, his vocals resemble the opening bars of Beethoven’s 5th symphony.”
Dartmoor is a world of high moorland, open space and huge skies. Here is a place to roam for miles across high and wild expanses punctuated with spectacular granite outcrops, called tors, which stand proud of the landscape like castles. But although the world of humans can feel far away indeed, this once-forested landscape is strewn with remains from 12,000 years of habitation, agriculture and industry. Visitors to the park are bound to encounter Neolithic stone circles, Bronze Age burial mounds and Iron Age hill forts. Dartmoor’s uplands are still farmed in the same ways they have been for centuries.
The New Forest is actually very old: it was created as a hunting forest almost a millennium ago by William the Conqueror, and centuries of use for grazing, timber and fuel have produced a landscape that is more of a mosaic of heathland, open pasture and ancient woodland dotted with mires and streams. Much of this area is not enclosed, meaning that ponies, donkeys and cattle owned by local people called Commoners roam freely. The National Park also has 42km of coastline, with spectacular views across to the Isle of Wight. The New Forest is a wonderful haven for wildlife and people alike.
William Wordsworth described the Lake District as “a sort of national property”. This could apply to all of the UK’s National Parks, but few can lay claim to as many hearts as this one. The ingredients of the landscape — a UNESCO World Heritage Site — include volcanic uproar 450 million years ago, the sculpting power of Ice Age glaciers and the much more recent handiwork of sheep farmers. For centuries now, the area has seduced visitors with the gentle pastoral ambience of its villages and valleys, the splendour of its lakes and the ruggedly sublime beauty of its fells. The obsession of the English Romantics with the Lake District helped crystallise the appeal of this iconic landscape.
Bejewelled with emerald islands, fringed with beautiful wooded shores and surrounded by grand hills and mountains, Loch Lomond is where the Scottish Highlands ‘begin’. This National Park encloses 21 Munros (Scottish mountains above 3,000ft, or 914.4m) and includes some of the most popular mountains in Scotland, such as Ben Lomond — ‘Glasgow’s mountain’ — and the Cobbler, with a magnificent crown of rock on its summit. The Trossachs have been described as ‘the Highlands in miniature’, a compact and picturesque cluster of hills, lochs and pine forests. A network of water buses links points across Loch Lomond and Loch Katrine, providing a convenient way to explore the park by joining up foot and bike trails.
The mountain that gives the Snowdonia National Park its name is its star attraction. Wales’s highest mountain — Yr Wyddfa in Welsh — is a complex massif of bristling ridges and pyramid-shaped summits, inhabited by agile mountain goats and the elusive Snowdon beetle. With almost half a million visitors a year, Snowdon ranks as one of the busiest mountains in the world, but hikers also flock to the Glyderau, with its pulse-racing scrambles, and the awesome Cader Idris. Legend holds that if you sleep on the slopes of the latter, you will die, go insane or turn into a poet. Numerous attractions such as surf parks, zip wires and underground adventures pull in thrill-seekers from far and wide.
Endless seas of bright-purple moorland, steam trains puffing through sinuous valleys, sun-dappled waterfalls in lush woodland, the smell of fish and chips wafting through fishing villages in coastal coves…the North York Moors National Park has a timeless and idyllic feel, particularly in summer, with its retro-seeming villages and heritage railways — famously used as filming locations for Heartbeat and Harry Potter — evoking the atmosphere of a bygone era. Walking, cycling and sightseeing are the order of the day here, either in the valleys and moorland of the National Park’s interior or on its spectacular coastline — a sweep of high cliffs, hidden coves and rocky beaches, some of which are studded with Jurassic fossils and dinosaur footprints.
The South Downs National Park is the UK’s youngest, created in 2010. As well as incorporating the rolling chalk hills and white coastal cliffs of the South Downs themselves, it includes the wooded patchwork of the western Weald. Lying between London and the south coast, this is no remote wilderness, but walking through the landscape of gentle hills, ancient woods, sunken lanes and vineyards (vine-growing in this part of England dates back to at least Norman times) is a much-needed antidote to city stresses. This is also the easiest National Park to explore by public transport; the whole South Downs Way can be split into sections and accessed by bus and train.
The Peak District is really two landscapes in one: the high moorland and Millstone Grit escarpments of the Dark Peak and the sleepy villages and lush limestone gorges of the White Peak. Its location at the heart of industrial England ensured that it was the crucible of the ‘right to roam’ movement. For workers from Manchester, the Potteries or the steel cities and wool towns of Yorkshire, the big boggy moors, peaceful valleys and climbing crags were the closest source of natural beauty and adventure. It is fitting that, in 1951, it became the first region in the UK to be granted National Park status. Today, around 20 million people live within an hour’s drive.
Pastel-coloured fishing villages hunkered in turquoise bays; long lines of surf rolling up to broad, white beaches; rugged cliffs, sea stacks, rock arches, bird colonies… This is the only UK National Park created primarily for the beauty of its coast — a spectacular Atlantic-battered shoreline. It is an exhilarating place to hike, surf, climb, go coasteering or ride out on a boat trip to the offshore islands and spot puffins, dolphins and seals. The hills and headlands are also dotted with stunning Neolithic burial chambers such as Pentre Ifan, Carreg Samson and Carreg Coetan Arthur, with huge slabs of rock balanced on top of each other at extraordinary angles.
All of the UK’s National Parks are shaped by the hand of humanity in some way, but few as fundamentally as this one: the collection of lakes known as the Broads was formed by medieval peat diggings, later flooded as sea levels rose. Today, it is a labyrinth of over 200km of navigable waterways, criss-crossing a sleepy landscape dotted with picturesque pubs and villages — an idyllic water world to explore by boat. A vibrant wetland habitat, the park is home to a quarter of the UK’s rarest wildlife species. Otters dive around the riverbanks, the surreal boom of bitterns reverberates for miles and vast flocks of birds soar over the marshes.
Stamp set AS6700 £8.50
OTTAWA – As spectacular as the celebration itself, a special set of Lunar New Year stamps was issued today, ushering in the Year of the Ox with a retrospective collection of all 24 colourful stamp designs from the past 12 years.
[en Francais]
Each of the souvenir sheets will represent the current international rate of $2.71.
And a pane of 12 domestic-rate stamps will use the domestic-rate designs from 2009-2020.
These stamps will be water-activated (“lick ‘n stick”).
and to seek out wanted items.
at a nominal cost by the collector or dealer (
