PARABLE OF THE SOWER by Octavia E Butler
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
“There is no end
To what a living world
Will demand of you.”
“I showed him four verses in all—gentle, brief verses that might take hold of him without his realizing it and live in his memory without his intending that they should. Bits of the Bible had done that to me, staying with me even after I stopped believing. I gave to Harry, and through him to Zahra, thoughts I wanted them to keep.”
TITLE—Parable of the Sower
SERIES—the EARTHSEED duology
AUTHOR—Octavia E Butler
AUDIOBOOK NARRATOR—Lynne Thigpen
PUBLISHED—1993 (ed. read: 2016, with an introduction by Gloria Steinem
PUBLISHER—Four Walls Eight Windows (ed. read: Seven Stories Press)
GENRE—literary speculative dystopian science fiction
SETTING—western united states from LA to northern california in 2024-2027 (which at the time was 32+ years into the future from when the book was originally published)
MAIN THEMES/SUBJECTS—social (/economic/political) collapse, innovative & rejuvenating religious philosophy, trying to survive in isolation vs in community, children are our future, post-apocalyptic survival techniques & strategies, migration on foot, guns, cannibalism, violent patriarchal gangs & fire-addicted drug addicts, corporate slavery, the courage to trust, fear vs faith, balancing risk with what is right, constant negotiation & navigation of values, morals, feelings, fears, desires, & identity, scavenging & looting, hope
“If there is one thing scarier than a dystopian novel about the future, it's one written in the past that has already begun to come true.” — from the Introduction by Gloria Steinem
PREMISE—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—As an intellectual exercise, the idea to sort of gauge a worldview against its success or fit in a community placed in a world such as the one in which this book is set is *mwah.* 😚👌🏻
EXECUTION—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—The title & the epigraph at the very end of the book resonated so much & made such excellent bookends to the story that the premise of the book felt underlined incredibly well & demonstrated the success of its execution.
WRITING STYLE—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—What I also found particularly successful was how well the narrating POV’s personality & worldview was conveyed through the tone in which the story, via her journal entires, was told.
CHARACTERS—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—Diverse, complex, interesting, sympathetic, relatable, heart-breaking, frustrating, & just deeply, deeply human.
STORY/PLOT—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—Less plot, more story, for sure & the character arcs, as well as the community arcs were really well-done. The pacing was also excellent.
"These things frighten people. It's best not to talk about them."
"But, Dad, that's like. . . like ignoring a fire in the living room because we're all in the kitchen, and, besides, house fires are too scary to talk about."
WORLDBUILDING—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—This is where the book far exceeded the expectations of its genre. Butler managed to create a world that felt perfectly (indeed, devastatingly) interwoven with our own that even though it was written in 1993, with the beginning of the story’s action set in 2024, & I was reading it in 2024 (I actually started it on the exact *date* the book starts—July 24th), it still felt prescient both in the sense of the things that have come true since Butler wrote the book & the things that seem as though they might still come true in the too-near future. Indeed, for many places around the world, the conditions in the novel are already, tragically modern-day reality—something I never lost sight of while reading. The inclusion of new developments in industries such as technology & pharmaceuticals, the deterioration of the both the late-capitalist stage of the economy & the political & infrastructural situation in the country, & social constructs such as religion & race all made the book feel eerily timeless in spite of the dates surrounding its publication & action.
BONUS ELEMENT/S—Since the book was focused mainly on the MC’s discovery of a new worldview (or, religion), & her analysis of the world around her according to her thoughts about Earthseed, I found that it read a lot more like an intellectual exercise or thought experiment than it did just straight up science-fiction apocalyptic horror, though there was plenty of brutality & intense & troubling content, it didn’t feel gratuitous but in service to the deeper project. I was very happy to find that this was the case because the dystopian or post-apocalyptic trope/sub-genre is my absolute least favorite in all of literature. 😅
PHILOSOPHY—★ ★ ★ ★ ★—Absolutely excellent. The best part of the book, imo. I thought it was interesting & curious, humble yet firm, & I especially loved that it was tested in many situations throughout the story & adjusted or realized or understood in a new light each time.
"Bread and circuses," my father says when there's space news on the radio. "Politicians and big corporations get the bread, and we get the circuses."
My thoughts:
I put off reading this book for a very long time. But on Parable Day (July 24, 2024) I decided I was ready to be brave. 😅 As an intense intellectual exercise, or a troubling thought experiment, this book is incredibly excellent & enormously erudite. However, a work of strictly enjoyable or mere-entertainment literature, it is not.
The fact that the MC, Lauren’s “sharing” made her process the pain of others directly on the page I think helped me sit with a lot of the super heavy content. I also parallel read this book on audiobook & printcopy, & the audiobook narrator’s voice was very calm & soothing so that helped as well.
I think what disturbed me the most, by far, while reading this, however, was my very vivid, consciousness of the fact that for some places in the world today, like Sudan, this isn’t some future dystopian imagining at all—this is their reality right now.
“…This business sounds half antebellum revival and half science fiction. I don't trust it. Freedom is dangerous, Cory, but its precious, too. You can't just throw it away or let it slip away. You can't sell it for bread and pottage."
The one thing that I was curious about that I couldn’t quite parse was Butler’s choice to include the fire drug & the painted faces… I can’t quite figure out that metaphor? or analogy? or allegory? or whatever it is…? Especially since they also had some kind of reputation as heroes of the proletariat? It was the one thing that tripped me up that I would like to hear someone else’s interpretation of I think…
This book definitely made me think about what kind of a person I would be in such a situation… I genuinely can’t imagine it.
I would recommend this book to readers who are interested in how to philosophically or religiously navigate a hypothetical, but highly convincing, dystopian society set in “our world.” This book is best read slowly. I never read more than two chapters a day so I had time to think about and digest the material & not be too overwhelmed by the graphic & upsetting subject matter to the point where it would put me off picking up the book again. As it was I actually looked forward to reading it every day.
Final note: Apparently this was supposed to be a trilogy (& the third book was going to be called PARABLE OF THE TRICKSTER!!) but the last book was never written, or at least, never published. Smh. This is the second time Octavia Butler has done this to me. *shakes fist*
"The Destiny of Earthseed is to take root among the stars… Other star systems. Living worlds… After all, my heaven really exists, and you don't have to die to reach it. 'The Destiny of Earthseed is to take root among the stars,’ or,” I nodded toward the burned area, “among the ashes."
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
CW // all of them. just, literally all of them—& though graphic, I would not say they were gratuitous
Season: late summer into fall
Music pairing: I found nature soundscapes (the ocean, rain, birdsong, crickets, etc.) to be a good pairing for this read.
Further Reading—
PARABLE OF THE TALENTS by Octavia E Butler—TBR
THE VASTER WILDS by Lauren Groff
THE FIFTH SEASON by NK Jemisin (which I am absolutely not reading this year after all lmao—one dystopian apocalypse book per year MAX for me k thx)
NO GODS NO MONSTERS by Cadwell Turnbull
Ursula K Leguin… but which one?? THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS? A WIZARD OF EARTHSEA? you tell me! (also is it just a coincidence that “Earthseed” & “Earthsea” sound almost the same?)
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015 film) & probably its sequel but idk I only saw the 2015 one
Terry Brooks’s Shannara Chronicles (book one is THE SWORD OF SHANNARA) also takes place in like a future post-apocalyptic western united states but with Elves & stuff so this book made me think of that even though it’s very very different…
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