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Octavia E. ButlerA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Octavia Butler (1947-2006) was a pioneering figure in American science fiction. Her blend of speculative fiction elements, social critique, and her unique point of view as a Black woman in a field dominated by white male authors made her formidable both within her genre and outside it—in 1995, she was the first science fiction author to be awarded a MacArthur Genius Grant.
Coming of age during the Civil Rights and Black Power movements, Butler wrote novels that used science fiction conventions to explore both existing power dynamics and social hierarchies and to imagine new futures. As a result, she is considered an important figure in the Afrofuturist movement. After getting her start by writing short stories, Butler published her first novel, Patternmaker, which was the first book in the five-part Patternist series. The sprawling saga traces an alternative history from Ancient Egypt to the far future, in which humanity is split into three genetically different groups. The powerful Patternists—humans who have been bred to have telepathic powers—fight against the Clayarks, who are mutated superhumans, and dominate over the Mutes, who are ordinary humans. The series examines “racial and gender-based animosity, the ethical implications of biological engineering, the question of what it means to be human, ethical and unethical uses of power, and how the assumption of power changes people,” themes that appear throughout Butler’s oeuvre (Hine, Darlene Clark, et al.
By Octavia E. Butler
Adulthood Rites
Adulthood Rites
Octavia E. Butler
Bloodchild and Other Stories
Bloodchild and Other Stories
Octavia E. Butler
Dawn
Dawn
Octavia E. Butler
Fledgling
Fledgling
Octavia E. Butler
Kindred
Kindred
Octavia E. Butler
Parable of the Talents
Parable of the Talents
Octavia E. Butler
Speech Sounds
Speech Sounds
Octavia E. Butler
The Evening and the Morning and the Night
The Evening and the Morning and the Night
Octavia E. Butler
Wild Seed
Wild Seed
Octavia E. Butler