Frazier, M. Chelsea, “Troubling Ecology: Wangechi Mutu, Octavia Butler, and Black Feminist Interventions in Environmentalism”, 2016, pp. 40-72 https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5749/jcritethnstud.2.1.0040?casa_token=Z04lEBNWwmwAAAAA%3AW9OlW217AlS0zbSTtooyjlhdUOPajOPzJadn_5a1WgtT-6n_zglZmDPd7xMrV4IkS5JhJ6RMgqLH5GYCl4a8TVrQgkfvVoMRT8nA5zi69a6_orTdoo8&seq=18

• In this book, Frazier discusses how Lauren, Zahra, and Henry undergo significant changes in gender and racial identity. It goes into depth about how different they are from each other and their dynamic as a trio. It also discusses how Lauren does not fit into the usual gender norm, she makes a great leader as her focus is elsewhere than becoming someone’s mate and she is the most resourceful.

Monk, Patricia, “Frankenstein’s Daughters: The Problems of the Feminine Image in Science Fiction”, 1980, pp. 15-27

Frankenstein’s Daughters: The Problems of the Feminine Image in Science Fiction on JSTOR

PATRICIA MONK, Frankenstein’s Daughters: The Problems of the Feminine Image in Science Fiction, Mosaic: An Interdisciplinary Critical Journal, Vol. 13, No. 3/4, OTHER WORLDS: Fantasy and Science Fiction Since 1939 (SPRING/SUMMER 1980), pp. 15-27

• This article discusses how women in science fiction normally had zero roles in the genre. When women are included they are mainly the supporting character for the male protagonist. They don’t do much and are stereotypes. Most authors choose a male protagonist for the sci-fi stories.

Therí, A. Pickens, “Octavia Butler and the Aesthetics of the Novel”, 2015, pp. 167-180

Octavia Butler and the Aesthetics of the Novel on JSTOR

THERÍ A. PICKENS, Octavia Butler and the Aesthetics of the Novel, Hypatia, Vol. 30, No. 1, SPECIAL ISSUE: New Conversations in Feminist Disability Studies (WINTER 2015), pp. 167-180

•  Pickens discusses how Lauren goes beyond gender and her abilities. It is stated that the novel shows Lauren with either characteristics of male or female. She can’t just take on the role of a woman who will struggle to survive; She has to protect others and adapt in this dystopian world.

Drzata, Elijah, “Gender in Dystopia: The Persistence of Essentialist Ideologies in Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower”, May 2019 https://stars.library.ucf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1103&context=urj

Did you know that the narrator eats octopus again? If I had a nickel for every time the narrator eats octopus I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice.

The narrator uses his experiences and his friend’s experiences to create a fictional story. The narrator discusses the ideas he has for a novel. “A beautiful young half-Lebanese conceptual artist and sexual athlete committed to radical Arab politics is told by her mother, who is dying of breast cancer, that she’s been lied to about her paternity: her real father turns out to be a conservative professor of Jewish studies at Harvard. Or New Paltz. Wanting her own child, she selects a Lebanese sperm donor in an effort to project into the future the past she never had.” (157) The story feels too on the nose. The main character in the idea wants to have a child and choose someone to donate sperm or the mother is diagnosed with breast cancer. It all feels related to what has happened In the story.

It seems like the narrator can’t distinguish fiction from reality. His friend Alex is aware of this. He once believed his mother was dying when she wasn’t, he blamed the story that he was writing.”In my novel the protagonist tells people his mother is dead, when she’s alive and well. Halfway through writing the book, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and I felt, however insanely, that the novel was in part responsible, that having even a fictionalized version of myself producing bad karma around parental health was in some unspecifiable way to blame for the diagnosis. I stopped working on the novel and was resolved to trash it until my mom who was doing perfectly well after a mastectomy and who, thankfully, hadn’t had to do chemo convinced me over the course of a couple of months to finish the book.” (138) He lives in this fictional reality. He believes that whatever he writes about it, whatever he may picture, it could happen. Fiction has consumed the narrator’s life. It’s his reality. the same reality, but different. It seemed like if he continued to write the book, his mom would have suffered. Do you think there’s another me out there, and another you? Living the same lives but different? And they’re writing about us? This hurts my brain, I’m having an existential crisis.

“Because you believe, even though you’ll deny it, that writing has some kind of magical power. And you’re probably crazy enough to make your fiction come true somehow.” (138)

It’s fiction, it’s not real. If something never happened, it’s fiction. Even if it seems real? A hallucination? Is this fiction within fiction? Honestly, I’m not sure if I understand the book entirely. I have more questions/guesses than analyzing. But let’s think about the octopus again. An octopus represents creativity, intelligence, and awareness, it can adapt to different situations. It’s a multitasker. Kind of like the narrator. I guess we’re all like octopuses in some way.

In Parable of The Sower, how does the main female lead Lauren defy gender norms?

10:04 by Ben Lerner is unique from the previous books we have read. It feels more realistic, and self-aware. For me, it is hard to grasp what the book is about, and what it’s trying to tell us. But I have picked up on a occurring theme; time. The book’s title is self-explanatory on that but even in the book time is mentioned. 

Lerner mentions Back to the Future, how the character is affected by the presence of the future, and the absence of the future. “I was reminded of the photograph Marty carries in Back to the Future, crucial movie of my youth: as Marty’s time-traveling disrupts the prehistory of his family, he and his siblings begin to fade from the snapshot.” (9) Back to the Future has a theme of time; time travel to be more specific. It’s interesting how this is mentioned. Will the topic be brought back? Or is it just the main character reminiscing about a movie of his childhood? 

A unique thing that Lerner does is provide images of what is being discussed in the story. It gives visual emphasis on what we are supposed to picture. The other books we have previously read do not provide this. With this tactic does Lerner want us to know exactly what he is referring to rather than keep us guessing and have us picture something entirely different? When talking about Back to The Future, Lerner provides images of exactly what he is describing from the movie. (10) I find this to be a good tactic because as I was reading, I had a hard time figuring out what was being described in the movie. With the images, I was able to realize what it meant. 

The synopsis of this book talks about the narrator having a medical condition, his friend wanting to conceive a child with him, and the possibility that the city will be soon underwater. It almost feels as if that isn’t the central idea, at least not in the beginning. We haven’t reached the meat of the story. It focuses on the narrator’s relation with time, and his misrememberment of events. Does he want this child? Is he fading from existence? What happened the other day? What is he doing now? How is he affected by the people around him? What are the people of this world doing? Do they feel the same as him? Is there a sprinkle of Main character syndrome?

I felt time was an illusion upon starting this book. Time passed by as I tried to figure out what was happening. Then I realized time had passed significantly and I had other things to do.

“I won’t remember this. This is the most beautiful view of the city I have ever seen, the most perfect experience of touch and speed, I’ve never felt so close to Liza, and I won’t remember it; the drugs will erase it.” (80)