Elements Of Science Fiction In Kindred

The novel under the title Kindred is a magnificent literary piece created by renowned African-American fantasy writer and novelist of contemporary times Octavia Butler. This superb piece encompasses the most burning issues and problems faced by the African-American community. The novel throws light on the pathetic condition of the black slaves and vehemently condemns domestic violence and slavery inflicted and imposed upon the black stratum of the American society. The novel also discusses atrocities and hatred exercised upon the African Americans on the basis of racial and ethnic discrimination prevailing in the society. Butler points out the communication gap between spouses and family members, which adds to the misery of the black

Neer the very beginning of the novel Dana is experiencing her second return to the past and is greeting her relatives when the father of Alice, her great great… grandmother, is being dragged away because he is presumed to be a runaway slave of the slave master, Tom Weylin. After that mess with Alice’s father clears, the patroller questions Dana as to who she is. When she can’t answer, the patroller drags her out of the home, and she tries to escape with no success. “The man tackled me and brought me down hard. At first, I lay stunned, unable to move or defend myself even when he began hitting me, punching me with his fists. I had never been beaten that way before - would never have thought that I could absorb so much punishment without losing consciousness.” After she is brutally beaten for a while, she scrambles and musters up the strength to bring a limb down onto the man’s head and runs fast and far away from the unconscious man who almost killed her. Although Dana’s tenacity might have come as a surprise to the readers, Butler also does a fabulous job of revealing how Dana is even surprised by her capability and how she can survive through her power as well as her

William Faulkner’s “Barn Burning” and Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” are two famous short stories written in the early 1900’s. These stories are commonly studied together because of how much they embody southern gothic writing and other striking similarities. “Barn Burning” and “A Good Man is Hard to find” are largely similar in their themes about morals, their southern gothic aesthetics, and their widespread violence with only minor differences.

On Dana’s expedition she discovers the true significance of freedom when she compares her own life to whos she’s surrounded by in the plantation of Tom Weylin. All the characters had a role that had an impact on Dana, one in specific was a girl named Alice who became Dana’s great-grandmother. Alice did not love Rufus because she was in love with Isaac, but she was owned by Rufus, which was a dimension for the 1976 mind frame of Dana. The author Butler incorporated a personal relationship between Dana and Alice that signalizes the reader on understanding the experiences black women had in the twentieth century, not just that, but a what black women went through in slavery. Alice presents a correspondence between the past and the present, informatory how they empower each other in areas such as sexuality, the importance of motherhood, and definition of oneself

In Kindred by Octavia Butler, the main character, Dana, travels back in time from nineteen seventy-six in California to Maryland in the eighteen-hundreds. She travels to the Weylin plantation where she realizes that they were her ancestors. Dana experienced first hand the brutality and suffrage that they faced. She too must learn how to survive in a time where blacks are believed to be below white men and considered sub-human. This novel goes into detail and the brutality of what it is like to be a black woman in the antebellum south and have all of her rights taken away.

Dana, the narrator of Kindred the idea of what it means to be a monster comes up upon the violent treatment on the part slave owners. Dana believes there is a reasonable explanation of why Mr. Weylin acted the way he

William Faulkner some would say was one of the great writers of American literature during the twentieth century. His stories many times had a gothic plot and contained odd or supernatural ideas and characters. He had many notable works, two of which were “A Rose for Emily” and “Barn Burning”. “A Rose for Emily” and “Barn Burning” are similar in the way that William Faulkner portrays the characters and the tone he uses in both.

Have you ever been told that you and a friend are practically the same person? Something similar to this happens to Dana and Alice in Octavia Butler’s novel, Kindred. In Butler’s novel, Dana is a young black woman living in 1976. Next thing she knows, she time travels back to the antebellum South. Dana is given the task of saving her several times great grandfather, Rufus Weylin, from multiple life threatening situations. Along the way she meets her several times great grandmother, Alice, who is a young free black woman. In her novel, Kindred, Octavia Butler compares and contrasts Dana and Alice to show the theme that people will do anything in order to survive. Both Dana and Alice have to become slaves on a plantation, run away for a life of freedom, and tolerate the treatment of Rufus.

Octavia Butler’s novel Kindred is categorized as science fiction because of the existence of time travel. However, the novel does not center on the schematics of this type of journey. Instead, the novel deals with the relationships forged between a Los Angeles woman from the 20th century, and slaves from the 19th century. Therefore, the mechanism of time travel allows the author a sort of freedom when writing this "slavery narrative" apart from her counterparts. Butler is able to judge the slavery from the point of view of a truly "free" black woman, as opposed to an enslaved one describing memories.

First published in 1979, Octavia E. Butler’s Kindred is a unique novel, which can be categorized both as a modern-day slave narrative, and as a science fiction time-travel tale. In the novel, Butler uses time-travel as a way to convey W.E.B. Du Bois’ theory of double-consciousness. Dubois’ theory is based on the idea that people of color have two identities, both struggling to reconcile in one being. His theory about the complex nature of the African-American experience directly relates to Butler’s use of Kindred’s protagonist, Dana, and her experience time travelling as a modern-day African-American woman, and her experience of a pre-abolition, nineteenth-century slave.

Southern gothic is a type of literature that focuses on the harsh conflicts of violence and racism, which is observed in the perspective of black and white individuals. Some of the most familiar southern authors are William Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor, and Cormac McCarthy. One author in particular, Flannery O’Connor, is a remarkable author, who directly reflects upon southern grotesque within her two short stories, “A Good Man is Hard to Find” and “Revelation.” These two short stories are very similar to each other, which is why I believe that O’Connor often writes with violent characters to expose real violence in the world while tying them in with a particular spiritual insight.

In Octavia Butler’s novel, Kindred, she challenges humanity, moralities, and racism. By sending Dana through time, it highlighted the similarities and differences between characters and symbolic meanings. The theme of this novel is answering the question to “what if” a black woman, raised with rights, had to endure slavery? What tactics would she use in order to survive? Many people cannot imagine the agonies slavery has caused, not only to blacks, but everyone including loss of freedom, family, loved ones and self. The interracial couples in the novel, Dana and Kevin; Alice and Rufus, symbolize a larger issue of segregation that divides of our nation. The antagonist, Rufus, changed throughout his life as Dana tried to teach him

Southern Gothic literature has rooted itself in American culture and created several classic short stories that have pushed literary boundaries and minds. Among the most influential of these Southern Gothic stories is “A Rose for Emily”, by William Faulkner; “A Good Man is Hard to Find”, and “Good Country People”, both by Flannery O’Connor. After first discussing what characteristics make up the genre of Southern Gothic, each of these stories will be evaluated and discussed in terms of what makes each of them a prime example of Southern Gothic literature.

Race and gender roles were an ever present issue in the Southern culture and dynamic. After the Civil War, dramatic changes began to take place in the South. Political leaders began to enact Civil Rights amendments, industrialization became more popular, and gender roles were beginning to be indistinct. In Southern literature, the portrayal of female characters evolved along side with the Southern culture. Female characters became more independent, strong-willed, and hardworking. Even African Americans became the main characters in Southern literature. In “Caroline Gordon’s Ghosts: The Women on the Porch as Southern Gothic Literature”, Tanfer Tunc discusses the evolution of the female character in Southern literature.

As I ripped by arm from its plaster prison, I began to feel that strangely familiar sensation, the dizziness. No, it must have been from the pain. I must be delusional. I couldn’t be going back. It wasn’t possible. Rufus was dead. He was dead! I had seen him die with my own two eyes. I had killed him with my own two hands. I couldn’t be going back! He was dead!