Nelson Glendinning
English 130
17 April 2014
Blog #5
In class we have been reading the
book “Kindred” by Octavia E. Butler. A story of a black woman (Dana) married to
a white man (Kevin) who both live in the 1970’s. This novel has caught my
attention in particular because it deals with the controversial topic of time
travel. To my knowledge people have been arguing for years on whether it is
possible or not to travel to and from different periods in time. It is depicted
in movies countless times like in the series “Back to The Future” a Steven
Spielberg film that depicts a young teen and a wacky scientist traveling back
in time and are forced to ensure everything stays the same so he can exist in
the future. Much like these movies in Kindred she is forced to travel back in
time to the era of slavery to save one of her white ancestors. One question that
I always seem to ask throughout the book is how she is able to travel to and
from the past? What gift does she have that allows her to achieve this? Unlike
“Back to the Future” where the two protagonists have a time jumping car
equipped with a “flux compositor” that allows them to travel through time.
There is a complete absence of any scientific explanation as to how Dana is
able to travel through time. The only theme to her time travel is that she gets
dizzy right before she is about to jump between times. This is difficult to
wrap my head around for many reasons.
I have grown up watching all kinds
of movies and read all kinds of books dealing with science fiction. However, a
common theme in all of those books and movies is science. There was always some
sort of “scientifically” explanation for the characters ability to time travel
(whether they are true or not we may never know). So reading this book is a lot
different because there is not explanation for her time travels other that she
needs to save an ancestor of hers so she can exist.
Although I am not quite sure as to
why Butler uses time travel I do have one idea as to what her though process
might have been behind it. Butlers story tries to display the difficulties of
comprehending slavery by bringing someone who was raised in a somewhat less
oppressive time, and throwing her into some of the worst human conditions
possible. But an author can’t just say that one-day Dana woke up in the past
and had to stay there, where is the story in that? No, Butler chose to give the
protagonist a gift that linked here and her husband to the past. With each consecutive
jump to and from the past there seems to be a social shift in her interracial
relationship with Kevin. It becomes more and more evident to Dana and before
she knows it she is taking orders from Kevin. Here is an example of this
submission, “ ‘turn it off’ said Kevin. I obeyed” (Butler 191). That instance
shows the past clinging on to Kevin and that it still exist even with Slavery
abolished. So the only conclusion I can come to about the time travel is that
it is a symbol that oppression has the ability to time travel and Butler is
trying to tell us that it is still all around us.
While Nelson introduced us to the idea that Butler is using time travel as a symbol of oppression that still exists in the present. I find that Butler may have wanted to show us the idea that we are defined by the culture we are in. Butler took the horrific history of slavery and flipped it into to a science fiction novel and added accurate human elements within each character. We saw that Dana became traumatized with the events of slavery, coming from the aftermath of slavery; Dana is still traumatized when she see a man being whipped. Butler really wanted to provide a realistic story when she brought so much emotion in her characters. We see that Butler may have wanted to use time travel as a symbol of oppression in Nelson’s blog, but I believe that Butler wanted to convey the devastation of Slavery. She used time travel as a tool to provide the opportunity to introduce an individual whom has not experienced oppression like Slavery. By putting a character like Dana into Slavery and having her so traumatized that her perception of life is compromised and her self-esteem diminish with each act of abuse reiterates the devastation of Slavery to people.
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