Kindred - Octavia Butler

Doubleday, 1979.

 

Four Stars

 

First of all, I loved the premise of this novel. A black woman, Dana, living in the 1970s, is suddenly and repeatedly thrown back in time to the 1820s Antebellum south where she must try to survive in a world of slavery and oppression. Not only that, but she soon realizes that the white slave owner who is calling her back in time happens to be her ancestor – as such, she is forced to save his life over and over again (he is especially accident-prone) in order to preserve her own existence. It is a thought-provoking construct in which the reader is forced to look at how much the world has changed, and how much the issues of racism are still with us today – not only in the 1970s but here in 2015.

 

The constant shifts between past and present destabilize our concepts of history and our separation with the evils of the past. It is also a reflection on human nature: both Dana and her white husband, Kevin, are frightened by how easily they adapt to their roles as slave and slave-owner. It is easy to look back at history and say we would never condone slavery, but Dana concludes that the acceptance of evil is easier than we think, and thus slavery was maintained with minimal force.

 

Although I loved the novel as a thought-experiment, I found it somewhat lacking in plot and character development. The aspects of time travel could have been much more thoroughly explained, although that didn’t bother me since I am not a sci-fi fan to begin with, so I accepted it as simply a clever device to contrast slavery with our modern world. However, I couldn’t get past the oversimplification of the characters and their relationships.  There were so many opportunities for complex psychological exploration that were simply skimmed over. I found it hard to believe that Dana and Kevin’s relationship could survive what they went through, because I felt like I didn’t know anything about them, or whether they really had a strong bond to begin with. Also disconcerting is the fact that neither of them seems all that concerned about their inevitable time travel – Butler tells us that they are upset, but it felt too detached. Similarly, the characters that populated the past could have been fleshed out much more.

 

The ending of Kindred was very abrupt, but it was also the only possible scenario, in my opinion. One thing I loved was the ultimate uncertainty about which world is real for Dana and Kevin, especially after life goes back to normal. It made me feel like there could be all sorts of people who accidentally travel through time, then go on living normal lives. Ultimately, despite its weaknesses of character development, this novel is a beautiful philosophical experiment in ways of looking at the past, and why the study of history will always be relevant so as not to repeat it.