Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
"Kindred" by Octavia E. Butler is a science fiction novel that intricately weaves themes of race, identity, and history through the lens of time travel. The story follows Dana, a Black woman living in 1976 Los Angeles, who unexpectedly finds herself transported back to the antebellum South. Each time she travels, Dana must navigate the brutal realities of slavery and the complex relationships between her ancestors, Rufus and Alice, who are pivotal to her family's lineage. The narrative explores Dana's struggle for survival in a time marked by oppression and violence, while also examining her own identity as a modern African American woman.
As Dana attempts to protect Rufus during moments of danger, she grapples with moral dilemmas around her role in his life and the historical context of slavery. The novel not only highlights the horrors of slavery but also delves into the psychological impact of these experiences on contemporary understanding of race and power dynamics. Ultimately, "Kindred" serves as a powerful commentary on the lingering effects of slavery and the importance of acknowledging and confronting historical injustices. This thought-provoking tale invites readers to reflect on the complexities of ancestry, trauma, and the interwoven nature of personal and collective histories.
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Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
First published: 1979
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Science fiction
Time of plot: June 9-July 4, 1976, and the early nineteenth century
Locale: Los Angeles and Maryland
Principal characters
Edana (Dana) , an African American womanKevin Franklin , her white husbandRufus Weylin , Dana’s white ancestor in antebellum MarylandTom Weylin , Rufus’s father, a slave ownerAlice Greenwood , Dana’s black ancestor in antebellum Maryland
The Story:
Dana and Kevin are moving into their new home in suburban Los Angeles in 1976 when Dana suddenly disappears for a few seconds. She experiences a few hours in an unidentified time and place, where she saves a small boy from drowning, only to have the boy’s father aim a gun at her. She feels disoriented and then finds herself back in her apartment, wet and muddy. Kevin has seen her vanish and reappear across the room, and yet he finds it hard to believe that she has traveled elsewhere.
A second incident allows Dana to better understand what is happening to her. Once again, she vanishes from her California home and finds herself rescuing the same boy, now a few years older and this time in danger from a fire. She learns that she is in Maryland and it is 1815, so the color of her skin marks her as a slave, since she has no free papers. Dana also realizes that the boy, Rufus, and his free black neighbor, Alice, are her ancestors, as she has read their names in her family bible. As night falls, Dana seeks refuge at Alice’s house, only to witness the brutal beating of a black slave man visiting his free black wife, Alice’s mother, without permission. The man’s white assailants are Patrollers, forebears of the Ku Klux Klan, and one of them attacks Dana, ultimately sending her back to twentieth century Los Angeles.
Dana and Kevin make preparations after the first two voyages, having determined that Rufus somehow calls Dana to him whenever his life is in danger and that Dana returns home when she feels grave danger to herself. The next time Dana feels herself losing consciousness, Kevin holds onto her and is thus transported with her to Maryland. The year is 1819, and Rufus has become a difficult twelve-year-old who enjoys Dana’s company but shows streaks of his emotionally distant father. Dana must pretend to be Kevin’s slave, and she is astonished by how easily both manage their roles. They remain for about two months, until Rufus’s father, Tom Weylin, catches Dana teaching two slave children to read and attacks her. Her life in danger, Dana returns to Los Angeles.
Dana finds herself alone, her white husband trapped in the past in his role as slave owner. Eight days later in 1976, and five years later in antebellum Maryland, Dana returns to find Rufus being severely beaten in a fistfight with a black man. Rufus’s opponent is Isaac, Alice’s slave husband, and he is nearly killing Rufus for raping his wife and trying to sell him down the river. Dana saves Rufus’s life and nurses him back to health with the help of some modern over-the-counter medicines she has brought back with her. Dana’s fourth journey into the past lasts two months and is full of reflections on the nature of slavery.
Kevin has gone north, so, without his protection, Dana becomes a house slave on the Weylin plantation, although Rufus promises to mail a letter to Kevin informing him of her return. Dana learns how slaves are made when she finds her letter unmailed and runs away. Quickly caught, Dana receives a horrific beating, but she is unable to time travel because she knows her life is not in real danger. Beaten and subdued, Dana begins to lose touch with her identity as a twentieth century African American writer and to experience the subtleties of oppression built into the system of slavery.
Dana observes her ancestors, Rufus and Alice, and even becomes involved in their relationship when Rufus asks Dana to convince Alice not to resist his advances, since he will possess her sexually with or without her consent. Dana watches as Alice, who received a beating far worse than Dana’s when she was caught as a runaway, becomes her owner’s sexual slave. After two months, Kevin returns to the plantation, and he and Dana are leaving when they encounter Rufus. Rufus points a gun at them and when he means to use it, the two travel back to 1976.
Dana’s fifth trip to antebellum Maryland finds Rufus laying face down in a puddle, drunk and ill. Dana treats his illness with Excedrin but is unable to help his father, who dies of what appears to be a heart attack. In a rage because he believes Dana allowed Tom Weylin to die, Rufus sentences Dana to fieldwork, where she briefly experiences the physical brutality practiced on field slaves. Dana soon returns to the house, but, when Rufus sells a slave specifically because he has spoken to Dana, she takes matters into her own hands and cuts her wrists, returning herself to Los Angeles.
Dana’s final voyage occurs on July 4, 1976, America’s bicentennial. For the first time, Rufus does not appear to be in immediate danger when she finds him, although the fact that Dana has time-traveled suggests that he is considering suicide. He immediately takes Dana to see Alice, who has hanged herself because she believed that Rufus had sold her children, whom he actually secreted with family in order to further subdue Alice. When Rufus, desperately lonely, attempts to rape Dana, she briefly thinks how easy it would be to allow herself to become a victim before stabbing Rufus repeatedly. Rufus fights back, and this time, when Dana returns to twentieth century California, she is without her left arm, which has remained in the space between Rufus’s desperate grasp at her arm and the wall of her home.
Bibliography
Ampadu, Lena. “Racial, Gendered, and Geographical Spaces in Octavia Butler’s Kindred.” CEAMAGazine 17 (2004): 70-78. Analyzes the representation and thematic importance of literacy and sexuality in Kindred.
Butler, Octavia E. “An Interview with Octavia E. Butler.” Interview by Charles Rowell. Callaloo 20, no. 1 (1997): 47-66. Detailed interview that includes Butler’s advice for burgeoning writers and information about the genesis of Kindred.
Long, Lisa A. “A Relative Pain: The Rape of History in Octavia Butler’s Kindred and Phyllis Alesia Perry’s Stigmata.” College English 64, no. 4 (2002): 459-483. Discussion of how these two novels embody the experience of slavery in their characters and thus their readers, with attention to using these texts in teaching at the college level.
Rushdy, Ashraf H. A. “Families of Orphans: Relation and Disrelation in Octavia Butler’s Kindred.” College English 55, no. 2 (1993): 135-157. Reads Kindred as an exploration of the complexities of memory and kinship for twentieth century African American culture.
Steinburg, Marc. “Inverting History in Octavia Butler’s Postmodern Slave Narrative.” African American Review 38, no. 3 (2004): 467-476. Argues that Kindred shows marriage to be a form of slavery and that it complicates the relationship between literacy and the empowerment of slaves.
Yaszek, Lisa. “’A Grim Fantasy’: Remaking American History in Octavia Butler’s Kindred.” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 28, no. 4 (2003): 1053-1066. Shows that using science-fiction motifs, such as time travel and the alien other, allows Butler to create a nuanced vision of American history.