The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler - Essay Example

? The Parable of the Sower Number] Outline 2- Introduction 3 -Ideas and Major themes 4- Thesis statement 5- Protagonist and Faith 6- Parents as Role Models 7-Actions verses beliefs 8- Conclusion Abstract: This research paper has explored the effects of religious beliefs on children of Robeldo community in The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. Thus, it assesses Lauren’s contradictory views about religion due to lack of role model and the unrealistic approach of followers of different faith. It also emphasizes on the factors like lack of empathy and moral degradation, which made her change her faith and preach her new religion Earthseed to others. Introduction of the author: Octavia E. Butler was an African American born in Pasadena, California, 1947 in a strict Christian Baptist family. At an early age she suffered from the death of her father and consequently, her mother had to work as a maid to support the family. Octavia was a dyslexic and shy child, but she never deterred her love for reading and writing due to her deficiency. She was a keen reader since childhood and started writing stories at an early age of 10, thus, won many writing contest till her college. Ever since the beginning of her writing career in 1970s, her work majorly revolved around African American spiritualism with the strong essence of science fiction. Her first work was published in 1976, Patternmaster and it was written in a 5 volume series (Lennard, 7). Octavia Butler has acknowledged herself as a mature science fiction writer through her work. She also has introduced the exceptional and innovative examples of telepathy, dystopia and travelling through time in her novels. She has thrived as a female writer and signified the feelings of fears, pain and apprehensions in African Americans due to racial discrimination. Her writing showed perfection from every aspect and she spent many years; struggling and making a name in writer’s community. She died at the age of 58 in Seattle ("Octavia E. Butler "). Ideas and Major themes: Octavia E. Butler’s renowned novel “The Parable of Sower” is categorized as dystopian in science fiction category. The post-apocalyptic novel presents the characters in multi-racial manner. Thus, it revolves around many themes like poverty, scarcity of food and water, unlawful state of America, social injustice, degradation of humanity, violence, lack of morality and above of all origination of new religion “Earthseed”. Butler said the idea behind the novel The Parable of Sower was to accumulate the neglected problems prevailing in the world and to give them thirty years from now, to become full-fledged disasters (“Brave New Worlds” 164). Thesis: The aim of this research paper is to assess the parental influence in terms of religion in “The Parable of the Sower” and to observe how parents participate in keeping the religious belief of their children intact. Protagonist and Faith: Lauren Olamina, the protagonist belongs to African American Christian family. Though, her father is a minister, but after the church being burnt and the collapsing situation of the society, she doesn’t belief in the God his father preaches. “Today is our birthday- my fifteenth and my father's fifty-fifth. Tomorrow, I'll try to please him- him and the community and God.” (Butler, 1) Through the following lines one can ascertain that Lauren wanted to please his father only for the sake of his favour and out of parental love, therefore, she pretended through her obedience and subordination in his believed religion. Although, she wanted to believe in Christianity, but the prevailing situation of her community, inside and outside of Robeldo, and the mere role religion barred it. “It comes to me when I try to be my father's daughter [.....]At least three years ago, my father's God stopped being my God. His church stopped being my church (Butler, 1). Lauren has depicted her situation throughout the novel and has explained the reasons behind her regressed concept of God. She has explained that her community Robeldo, is a walled community; segregated from people outside who are homeless, drug addicts, thieves, scavengers and most of them victim of fate. The scarcity of food, inflating rate of water, lack of jobs, public services like police and fire department being pricy, massive drought due to lack of rains and disastrous effects due to designer drugs like pyro, made Lauren revive her view of God, thus, enabling her to discover God in the form of change. Parents as Role models: Parents highly influence their child’s personality as they are the first role models, whom the child imitates. However, in adolescence children tend to repel to the expectations and beliefs of their parents. They tend to resist to the decisions, choices, faith and traditions their parents hold (Lerner & Laurence, 5). Octavia was brought up in a strict Baptist community; therefore, one can observe that Octavia through Lauren’s Character renamed her faith as Change. Octavia believed in will power to change that’s why throughout her novel she represents Lauren with firm determination of her faith (Earthseed). Consequently, through Lauren’s character, Octavia has conveyed that if one revives his/ her faith, it’s his responsibility to convey it to the others, like preaching or teaching the learnt value or skill. In addition to it, Lauren holds her mother responsible for her hyper-empathy syndrome, as she took an abusive drug, Paracetco during her pregnancy with her (Butler, 255). This signify that parents who neglect their children at an early age face rebellious and accusing behaviour from their children later in life, crippling either their faith or prominent personality aspects ( Palmer, 225). “We would be baptized out of duty or as a kind of insurance, but most of us aren't that much concerned with religion. I am, but then I have a different religion” (Butler, 2). Silivia, Keith, Hector, Curtis, Drew and Marcus did not take much notice of either being baptized or not. However, they did want to believe if it changes the current situation to any extent. Yet, Lauren throughout, the story believes in her own developed faith i.e. Earthseed, the will and the power to change. Lauren has also been observed to criticize the potential believers of Christianity, who tend to adapt to the selected norms of their faith for personal safeguarded of rights and do not do anything on communal grounds. She detested the scarcity of resources like water and the ritual of baptism, which wasted precious and pricy water. Along, with it she also liked the notion of Catholics who baptize at an early age. Hence, here the element of respect for other races and religion is signified by Octavia. She spent her childhood in poverty and faced discrimination. Therefore, she wanted to change/ modify the judicious proclivities, which are deeply rooted in people. Lauren also explores the tendency of life on other planets like Mars, but to her disappointment instead of providing a platform for humans to survive, it killed an astronaut. Hence, the environment of Mars is best suited for death, the cold-rock planet cannot produce warmth and eventually Earth needs change in the form of will by all to work towards preserving what is left. Action verses belief: Suicide of a sanctimonious figure Mrs. Sims left a perplexing and sceptical view of Christianity. When a persistent believer attempts suicide, it shows his insecurity about God and shallowness of faith. Thus, for the youth it represents a conflict of beliefs and steadfastness in actions. Robeldo has been presented as a community full of diverse believers and all people belonged to different ethnic groups. Hence, the children are exposed to all types of religious beliefs, like Buddhism, Christianity and Judaism. Consequently, none of the believers ever participated in communal change. They tried to save some rituals from their religion, but did not act on any notion which involved sacrifice or empathetic act towards others. Chinese, Hispanic, Mexican, African American and Native American people from different ethnicity lived together in Robeldo, but lacked morality and practicality in their faiths. Hence, it led Lauren to produce a new faith which taught survival. “My God doesn't love me or hate me or watch over me or know me at all, and I feel no love for or loyalty to my God. My God just is.” (Butler, 5) Conclusion: Therefore, the children in Robeldo community didn’t see an exemplary role model from any religion, what they observed was disparity, hunger, death and selfishness all around thus, shaking the foundation of their existing beliefs. Hence, this enabled them to opt for a new belief which promoted empathy and was based on bringing overall change in society. Bibliography: "Octavia E. Butler." 2012. The Biography Channel website. Dec 05 2012, 01:35 Lennard, John. Octavia E. Butler: Xenogenesis/Lilith’s Brood. Penrith: Humanities-Ebooks, 2007. Web. “Brave New Worlds.” Essence 31.1 (May, 2000): 164-168. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Albertsons Library, Boise, ID. 10 Sept. 2008 . Butler, Octavia E. Parable of the Sower. New York [u.a.]: Warner Books, 2000. Print. Lerner, Richard M, and Laurence D. Steinberg. Handbook of Adolescent Psychology. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2009. Print. Palmer, James O. The Psychological Assessment of Children. New York: Wiley, 1970. Print. Bottom of Form Plot Summary The story begins in the year 2024; a distressing picture of future of America is shown. The country relapsed over the last few decades and has increased unbridled crime, increase in poverty, inadequacy of food and water, high inflation rate, and thus people need to pay in order to live. The protagonist Lauren Olamina; a young black women who has lost her Minister father and her faith in Christianity, lives in a community where outsiders cannot infiltrate and it is protected by the armed Suburbans. Lauren on her way to be baptised, explores her faith in God. Prices of water inflate and democracy in America becomes a long lost dream. With Mrs Sims suicide, Lauren tends to explore her view of traditional God and discovers God in power to change. California’s society due to civil disorder is divided into three groups, the rich, the middle class and the homeless. They all try numerous ways to survive, but only on individuals bases. Police, fire department charge handsome amount to resolve the immediate attention seeking matter or crime. Lauren suffered from hyper- empathy syndrome could feel even the pain of dying animals which were shot for self-defence practice. Robeldo is close to mass destruction from the outsiders; therefore, Lauren plans to escape with her friend Joanne. Thieves rob Mr. Richard Moss from his livestock and Reverend Olamina (Lauren’s father) states a passage from Bible, which states to kill the intruders in defence of house or family. Lauren wakes up to find her neighbourhood burnt and her family missing she escapes with few belongings and thus, from there onwards she meets Zahra, Harry and the others to head north for survival. Thus, it was the origination of a new community Acorn and a new faith Earthseed up till the end. Her new religion or believe in god the Earthseed is destined for stars. Harry, Zahra, Bankola, Ally, Jill, Keith, Olamina and Cory are the main characters other than Lauren. Amy, Bianica and Joanne are Lauren’s friends and Keith her brother and lastly Olamina her father. The story is narrated from Lauren’s side. Lethal designer drug pyro made people to burn down anything at all and left them with the feeling of ecstasy. Set in a dystopia style “The Parable of Sower”, describes the state of dysfunctional country where, crime is wild and unmonitored, feral dogs attack people, corpses rot all around. Through the prevailing and neglected problems, Octavia has signified the worst possibilities in future. Earth Seed, is a philosophical understanding of God, it associates man power to change and unravels the true meaning of God/faith in will and change. Lauren has hyper-empathy syndrome, which is a result of an abusive drug taken by her mother at the time of pregnancy. Thus, Lauren can feel the pain of others to an extent that it becomes real for her. Through it, author wanted to emphasize the lack of empathy among people and its final outcome as a dysfunctional society. The major themes in the story are change, liberty, loss and refurbishment. The book presents two major literary conflicts the Christian justification of killings and the new belief Earthseed. Social issues highlighted in the book were religion, decline in moral values or lack of empathy and racism. I would like to analyze the different aspects of religious beliefs held by the survivors of Robeldo community and its impact on children and scarcity of food and water. In 2027, when thieves and pyro drug addicts’ burnt down Robeldo, Lauren, Zahra and Harry were the only survivors who met fortunately. They formed a team to take care of each other hence, plan to travel north to Canada together. Even to protect Harry, Lauren cuts the throat of a man fighting with him. At the ocean, when Zahra (Hispanic), Harry (white) and Lauren (Black) were bathing, a mixed couple like them came thus, liking the similarity Lauren invites them to join their group, in which husband was black, wife was Hispanic. After Lauren saves Gloria’s and her baby’s life from the dogs, Travis and his family join Lauren’s group. Thus, Travis gets intrigued by Earthseed. Bankola, Allie and Jill join Lauren’s group later during the voyage to North. From San Luis Reservoir to Clear Lake, Emery and Tori, a mother daughter and GraysonMora with his daughter Doe join Lauren’s group. They all shared a common feature of hyper-sympathy syndrome. They finally reach the coastal hills of Humboldt County, Bankole’s land where his sisters and family is burnt and killed; they all decide to stay and called their community Acorn. Octavia Butler’s work is a macro vision of global destruction, which would eliminate all the resources and moral values in the near future. Thus, dystopia would be the right term to describe it and philosophy of change is its major theme. “The Parable of Sower” can become a reality if, natural resources would not be valued and hence, preserving them cannot stop the mass destruction of humanity in future. The main idea of the focused pages is the faith in new God and intensity of growing turmoil in Robeldo, which in turn demanded change (Butler, 28-31). Octavia’s family and historical background enabled her to highlight the significance of empathy. The aspect of forming a foundation of a new faith Earthseed becomes a controversial issue for some, along with the fact that Octavia belonged to a black family and worked as a maid in the house of white, her notion of “change” and “new faith” stirred the debate (Pott & Butler, 331). In addition to it, the degradation of humanity that people restrained to respect their survival and address their needs only, due to Catastrophe all over America. Octavia’s new faith “Earthseed” commenced the elimination of differences either on religious or racial grounds and emphasized on individuals rather than religious perceptions. The essence of it was based on change and hence, one’s will towards attaining and adapting change. I predicted few things, like Lauren’s determination in establishing a pack of her, her inclination towards Bankola and the stubborn response of Harry after making love to Zahra (Butler, 37). I have personally enjoyed every bit of this novel, as it stated many issues which we need to understand and address too. It enabled me to ponder on my existing perceptions of faith, will, natural resources and empathy. Work Cited Butler, Octavia E. Parable of the Sower. New York [u.a.]: Warner Books, 2000. Print. Potts, Stephen W, and Octavia E. Butler. “We Keep Playing the Same Record: a Conversation with Octavia E. Butler.” Science Fiction Studies. 23.3 (1996): 331-338. Print. Top of Form Top of Form Top of Form Bottom of Form Read More