#Octavia butler mind of my mind series

The impact of the novel results from Butler’s ability to evoke the antebellum South from two points of view: the stubborn, desperate attempts of African Americans to lead meaningful lives in a society that disregards family ties and disposes of individuals as marketable animals and the uncomprehending, sometimes oppressively benevolent ruthlessness of a ruling class that defines slaves in terms of what trouble or pleasure they can give.īutler began her science-fiction novels with the Patternist series, and in this series the reader can observe the beginning of her development from a writer of well-crafted science/adventure fiction to a writer who recalls in her own way the reflectiveness of Ray Bradbury.įirst written but third published was Survivor, the tale of an orphaned Afro- Asian girl who becomes a “wild human” in order to survive in a harsh environment. When Edana and Kevin are separated by the South of 1824 into slave and master, they each begin unwillingly to imbibe the feelings and attitudes of the time from that perspective. Kindred uses a black woman of the 1970’s and her white husband to probe beneath the surface stereotypes of “happy slave” on the one hand and “Uncle Tom” on the other. By asking, she preempts the reader’s own curiosity, and when there is no answer, the story simply moves forward. At one point, the heroine, Edana, asks herself how it can be that she- the as-yet unborn black descendant of a nineteenth century slaveholder-can be the instrument of keeping that slaveholder alive until he fulfills his destiny and fathers her ancestor. While the protagonist is shuttled helplessly back and forth between 18 in a kind of time travel, this device is of no intrinsic importance to the message of the story. Characters unable to alter or escape the order of things are expected to show a sort of noblesse oblige.īutler’s most atypical work in terms of genre is Kindred, published in 1979. The maturity and independence achieved by the protagonists imply not the advent of universal equality and harmony but merely a pragmatic personal obligation to wield power responsibly. Therefore, each of her human, nonhuman, and quasihuman societies displays its own form of selfishness and, usually, a very clear power structure. Being human does not mean being faultless- merely familiar.

She frequently uses standard images of horror, such as snakelike or insectlike beings, to provoke an aversion that the reader is unable to sustain as the humanity of the alien becomes clear. Through an alien, alienated, or excluded person, a crucial compromise is struck, civilization is preserved in some form, and life goes on.īutler’s fiction reflects and refracts the attempts-and failures-of the twentieth century to deal with ethnic and sexual prejudice.

What begins as an act of courage usually ends as an act of love, or at least understanding. In order to fulfill her destiny, often the protagonist-most often a black woman-must do or experience something not only unprecedented but also alien and even grotesque. In contemplative but vividly descriptive prose, Butler tells her story from the first-or third-person perspective of someone who is passive or disfranchised and is forced by events or other characters to take significant action. There is, however, no happy ending but a conclusion in which the lead characters have done their best and the world (wherever it is) remains ethically and morally unchanged. As Butler herself said, she does not believe that imperfect human beings can create a perfect world.īutler’s diverse societies are controlled by Darwinian realities: competition to survive, struggle for power, domination of the weak by the strong, parasitism, and the like Within this framework, there is room for both pain and hope, for idealism, love, bravery, and compassion, for an outsider to challenge the system, defeat the tyrant, and win power. Clarke’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and similar science fiction in offering an optimistic, rational, and agreeable view of humanity.

In this sense, her work does not follow the lead of Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series (1951-1993), Arthur C. Butler presented a version of humanity as a congenitally flawed species, possibly doomed to destroy itself because it is both intelligent and hierarchical.

Octavia butler mind of my mind