"Kindred" by Octavia E. Butler: Analysis about Race, Time and History
This book was extremely interesting to read, partly because it moved from relatively modern times (the 1970s) to the nineteenth century and back so seamlessly. The entire book read like a fantasy, rather than pure fiction, and it held my interest throughout the story. The Epilogue, however, almost seemed to be a let down after the rest of the excitement and situations of the rest of the book. Kevin gets back safely, Dana kills Rufus and loses her arm, and they fly to Maryland to try to find answers to what happened to the people they met while they were in the past. It is all kind of disappointing after the rest of the book, and the way the final chapter before the Epilogue ended. In the end, the Epilogue ties up all the loose ends, just like an Epilogue is supposed to, but it is a real letdown from the rest of the book, and it almost seems as if the author did not know how to end the book, so she "wrapped it up" with the Epilogue and left it at that. I would rather h
ave seen a more meaningful ending, such as Dana did find some records of her lost family, and she even found a living relative that she could talk to and discover. It made me realize that some things have really not changed that much and I think that is what she was trying to say with this work. They treated human beings like animals, and were cruel and vicious, like Rufus, and having the characters go back in time really made the situation more real and crueler at the same time. It is still not acceptable, and that shows that society may not have come as far along as it thinks it has. Her family does not take the news well either, which shows there is still animosity on both sides, and that is sad, too. Dana was free, but even in modern society, blacks and whites are not "supposed" to marry and love each other, and the families' reactions show this. Part of the book that had an effect on me was when Dana had to react to the realities of slavery, and Kevin, knowing what he knew from the future, tried to help the slaves help themselves. Maybe that could have spun off into another book, or something, and I think it would have made the ending more enjoyable and even more realistic. The book made me think about what it would really like to be a slave, and how horrible an experience it really was, and it made me wonder how people could possibly do that to one another, and how they could justify it. The Old South was truly a very different world, and this book shows how different it was, not by relating history, but by putting the characters right in the middle of it. Dana is a bright, caring, and intelligent woman, and the only reason the families' object is because she is marrying a white man. I am glad Dana and Kevin were safe, but I would have preferred more meat to the ending. I also liked that the author did not gloss over the racial differences even in our modern world. I think the author does an excellent job of combining the present with the past, and if I have any criticism, it is of the Epilogue, which is really a letdown after the rest of the book.
Common topics in this essay:
Epilogue Epilogue,
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Dana Kevin,
rest book,
letdown rest book,
letdown rest,
racial differences,
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