Octavia Butler Post

Octavia Butler wrote science fiction stories.  Her story "Sensory Sounds" was especially interesting in that it was based mostly about communication and how our society is slowly growing away from human interactions and lacking in the communication department.  She came up with an interesting scenario in which the reader had to ponder what would be worse: not being able to read and write, or not being able to speak.  This is an interesting dilemma, in that losing either would be a major handicap when trying to converse with others.  On the one hand, not being able to speak would mean that one would not be able to express tone and differences in pitch to express meaning.  If one could not write or read, then sending messages over long distances or passing a message widespread would be impossible.  This phenomenon brought up interesting class discussions with how people in their situation could adapt to the sudden change in how the world had to work, in order to keep communication similar between people. Sign language, for example, could be a possibility, as well as pictographs or glyphs that could be used to portray meaning.
Her stories are very thought provoking and she writes in such a way that the lesson she is trying to discuss is very subtle and well woven into her fiction.

Allison Weening, Post 7

Octavia Butler Post

Octavia Butler's sci fi writing style is very unique. She challanges the readers to decipher her commentary of society in her works. The two stories we read were Speech Sounds and The Evening and The Morning and The Night. In Speech Sounds she poses the question of what is the more efficient form of communication; speaking or the ability to read and write. In the story The Evening and the Morning and The Night Octavia Butler creates a new disease that raises a big moral dilemma. The disease is called Duryea-Gode, its a side effect from a cancer cure all drug where the victim begins to "drift" and mutilates themselves and those around them.

In the case of Speech Sounds I feel that the ability to speak is a more valuable form of communcation in today's society. The writen word can have many interpertations and if one is unable to clarify the statement through speech than this skill becomes very frustating. In the second story the moral dilemma is: can peoples' rights to reproduce be taken away because they inherited a genetic and dangerous disease? I believe that while you can't take away a persons rights, the decision to reproduce needs to be taken seriously and if I had the disease I would chose not to have kids.

Octavia Butler Blog Post

Between the two stories by Octavia Butler we read this week in class, my favourite is Speech Sounds. I really like how she almost forced the reader to think about which form of communication would be of better use to have - the ability to read and write or the ability to communicate through speaking. Speaking, in my opinion, would be of better use to communicate quickly, especially in an emergency like event. Although being able to write eloquently and read books, notes, etc. would be beneficial, I believe talking would allow people to communicate better without any questions about sarcasm and create less confusion. Sometimes I'll text someone and then have to re-explain a text message because it was confusing, but once I see them, what I meant is understood.

I found it really interesting that Rye trusted Obsidian because he is left handed. I don't know if it's just me, but I have a difficult time trusting people even after I've talked to them or have known them for a while so having trust based on the fact that someone is left handed blows my mind. Another interesting thing I found what that due to the illness and handicap of people, ordinary people are prone to feelings of jealousy, resentment, rage, and anger over their own impairments and the abilities other possess that they don't. This causes people to have a strong desire to kill the person or people they resent. I get jealous or angry at people, but it doesn't drive to feel like I need to kill someone; that's just crazy. I find it strange that an illness and handicap could drive someone to do such an insane thing like killing someone. Butler describes Rye feeling that urge when she cannot read a map, but Obsidian can. With Obsidian's death and the children being orphans, I felt depressed at the end but hopeful for Rye because she found people that also have the ability to speak.

Pam Kawalerski
Blog Post #8

Octivia Butler stories

Reading Octivia Butler's stories were about made-up science fiction problems with real world prognosis's as the root for their problems. The situations that Octivia Butler presents are not far from what we could experience. She presents issues that appear real and tell a story on how her characters deal with those issues. By doing this it makes us think about how we would deal with the same situations if it presented itself.
In Butler's story "The Evening, the Morning, and the Night" we learned about a concept of suicidal tendency with self mutilation implicated with it. Although this would be a horrible way to die or to live knowing you would die this way. I believe Butler uses this to show how we deal with abnormal people on a daily basis and how tunneling their imperfections can prove to help them with their disease.
In "Speech Sounds" We saw how real world scenarios would deal with the loss of Speech or literacy characteristics. Although it would be hard to imagine life without either one it would cause us to utilize other senses more. Life would definitely be more difficult because of the loss of one of these things. But i think it would be easier to have never had than to loss something we have been accustomed to having. It easier to learn how not to use something that you once had rather than to lose something you have been dependent on for your entire life.

Scott Swan
Post #8

Octavia Butler

I like Octavia Butler's stories in the sense that they make you think about how the world would be if certain epidemics broke out. For example "Speech Sounds" got me thinking about what would be worse, to lose your ability to read and write or to not be able to talk. Reading the story it was a little hard for me to fully believe what she was talking about could actually happen. I agree that the world would be in alot of chaos if this actually happened but i think that with our technology and knowledge we could find a practical solution to this problem. I also wasn't buying into it partially because of the fact that i dont think it would ever happen, although that could be me being not open minded. If it did happen though, i would pick to still be able to speak. I feel that through verbal communication there is alot more said than just they words you are saying as opposed to reading words on paper where you arent quite sure how to interpret them.

Her other story "The Evening and the Morning and the Night" also made me think, although i feel that she just took the idea from the book "I am Legend" and put a slight twist on it. If this really happened in our world today, i feel that there would be alot of treatment centers like the one in the book and research to what causes the disease, because after all it is in your genes because it is passed on genetically. I do not know if i would have a kid and risk giving him the disease. I guess i would have to know the chances that he got the disease and then i would have to ask myself if i would want to be born with that disease. I think my decesion to have a kid would be based on the current treatment and centers for people who have the disease.

Octavia Butler

I enjoyed both of Octavia Butler's stories "The Evening and the Morning and the Night," and "Speech Sounds" because they are so different from anything I have ever read. When I was first reading "The Evening and the Morning and the Night," I actually thought DGD was an actual disease because she described it so well. She brings up a lot of interesting topics that make you think about what if you actually had this disease. Like we discussed in class, when reading this story I was thinking about the movie "I am Legend" and how they people infected with the disease seemed like "zombies" and fed off themselves and each other.

The other story, "Speech Sounds" also made me think about if I was put in that situation which handicap I would rather have. The story leaves a couple of unanswered question such as can they learn the thing that they don't have, and like we discussed in class the ability to understand drawings. I like Butler's stories so much because she makes you think about what would would do in that situation and what your reaction would be.

Octavia Butler

Butler is a writer that likes to use speculative fiction in her stories. She normally jumps right into the story without giving the reader any background information. This can be seen in The Evening and the Morning and the Night. The protagonists in this story (Lynn and Alan) are affected by Duryea-Gode Disease (DGD) and their parents were also. Lynn's father killed her mother and then himself and Alan's mother is in a type of home called Dilg. Up until recently, Alan did not even know if his mother was alive.

When Lynn and Alan go to visit his mother, they learn that this is not a hospital. It is more of a place where they focus all of the patient's energy on creating and inventing new things. The walls are covered in art and many of the doors are locked with p.v. locks that one of the patients invented. People diagnosed with DGD mutilate themselves to some degree and they all at some point drift into a world of their own. Thus, the question comes up if people who are diagnosed should have children, for it is genetic. If someone who has this disease were to have children they would run a great risk of passing it on to their children. Alan completely disregarded the possibility of having children. Lynn never agreed nor disagreed with Alan. She knew her consequences if she were to have a child but she does not want anyone tell her she can't. She wants to keep her rights and choices and make her own decision.

The statement that Butler was trying to make in this story was that we have to be more understanding of those with disabilities/diseases. We should not have to judge them just because they may look or act differently. In a way, they are the exact same as us and they are capable of things we can only imagine.

-Bethany Davis (Post #8)

Ironhead and Motherfucker

Aimee Bender in my opinion, is such a phenomenal writer. She has unique skills in the way that she writes due to her ability to relate the 'stories' to a fictional, yet realistic setting.

In the short story Ironhead, Bender tells a story about a boy with an iron for a head is born into a family of pumpkinheads. The iron-head can be metaphoric for several things. However, in my opinion, I feel as if it symbolized 'having weight on ones shoulders' as well as the aspect of racism. This ideal can then be related to the author Wendy Rose as she had the same struggles growing up in her family where her father was Hopi and mother Irish/Scottish.

In Benders second story of the week, Motherfucker, bender takes on the role of expressing the true meaning of the word motherfucker in all literal sense. She tells the story of a man who likes to sleep with mothers and ultimately helps an actress find her true self. At the end, one can come to the conclusion that this man is truly lonely.

These to short works can be compared in the theme of loneliness. Each character was individually depressed or left alone because of different reasons. Overall, the moral is that different people cope differently and depression/racism/loneliness can have severe negative effects and we all must learn to recognize that and help one another.

Courtney Bisher
Blog Post 7.

Aimee Bender: Motherfucker

Aimee Bender usually writes in two different kind of styles in her novel Willful Creatures. One of them is where she takes a completely absurd scenario and adds realistic aspects to it. This can be seen in the short story End of the Line. The other style is the opposite which is a realistic scenario told in a twisted perspective. This can be seen in the short story Motherfucker.

Motherfucker usually is a word to insult someone, like another word for jerk. But Aimee Bender takes this word literally. She writes of a lonely but confident man who only has sexual relations with mothers. He is explained as a straight-forward, confident, living-life kind of man. Dating mothers starts to sound creepy the way he does it. He sits and watches the mothers, watching how they interact with their children, and makes it sound like it is just a game to him. It is easy for him to get single women because he won't have to worry about and husbands for an affair.

He finally finds a scarlet that he seems to be really interested in. But he never really takes any initiative to stay with her. He doesn't take her on dates and doesn't return her phone calls. Maybe he is not as simple and sick as we thought he is. He seems to be more complex than a guy that just wants to get with a lot of mothers. He knows how to play with people's emotions - he is an emotional ventriloquist - and therefore he plays with the scarlet's. He probably doesn't pursue a relationship with her because he only wanted to teach her to be herself. He could tell that she wasn't happy so he threw his emotions on her during the relationship to help her out in her career and make her happy. He constantly tests his emotions and in the long run her helped her out. More simply, maybe he just didn't want to be with her because he was not ready to be committed.

Through this story, I think Aimee Bender is trying to tell us that we should not "judge a book by its cover." People may be more complex than they seem.

Bethany Davis (Post #7)