Octavia E. Butler
June 22, 1947 - February 24, 2006
An American science fiction writer, one of the best-known among the few African-American women in the field.
Comment by Tricia Sullivan, on The Guardian:
Octavia E Butler (1947–2006)
I was teaching in New York when I came across Octavia E Butler's Kindred in a secondary-school catalogue of novels recommended to support diversity. It caught my attention because Butler was described as a science-fiction writer. I thought I was familiar with science fiction, but I'd never heard of her – nor have a great many other readers, I suspect. For many years, Butler was the sole African-American woman novelist in science fiction. Kindred tells the wrenching and unforgettable story of a young black woman who time-travels and saves the life of her slaveholder ancestor, but it is, in Butler's words, "a grim fantasy", not science fiction.
Beginning in the 1970s, Butler wrote three sequences of novels: the Patternist books, the Lilith's Brood series and the Parable novels (incomplete at her tragic death in 2006). Critically respected, she won the Hugo and Nebula awards, received a Clarke nomination, the PEN lifetime achievement award and a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant. A serious writer working in a field that is seldom taken seriously, Butler addressed biological control, gender, humanity's relationship with aliens, genetics and even the development of a fictional religion. Her narratives leave space for the reader's involvement while exploring the nature of change. They gaze unflinchingly on power dynamics. "Who will rule? Who will lead? Who will define, refine, confine, design? Who will dominate? All struggles are essentially power struggles," Butler stated, "and most are no more intellectual than two rams knocking their heads together." Butler's writing is courageous, stimulating and infused with a rare purity of intention. Crushingly, she died at the height of her powers. Bloodchild and Other Stories is a good place to begin discovering her work.
26 works Add another?
Most Editions | First Published | Most Recent
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Dawn: xenogenesis
10 editions - first published in 1987 Borrow -
Wild seed
9 editions - first published in 1980 DAISY -
Adulthood rites
7 editions - first published in 1988 Checked out -
Xenogenesis
7 editions - first published in 1987 Borrow -
Clay's ark
6 editions - first published in 1984 Borrow -
Mind of my mind
6 editions - first published in 1977 Borrow -
Kindred
6 editions - first published in 1979 Borrow -
Parable of the sower
6 editions - first published in 1993 Checked out -
Imago
5 editions - first published in 1989 -
Bloodchild and other stories
5 editions - first published in 1995 Checked out -
Patternmaster: a novel
4 editions - first published in 1976 -
Survivor: science fiction.
3 editions - first published in 1978 -
Parable of the talents: a novel
3 editions - first published in 1998 Borrow -
Conversations with Octavia Butler
1 edition - first published in 2010 -
Xenogenesis: 3 vols. in 1
1 edition - first published in 1989 -
La Parabole des talents
1 edition - first published in 2001 -
The evening and the morning and the night
1 edition - first published in 1991 -
L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future
1 edition - first published in 1993 -
Lilith's brood
1 edition - first published in 2000 DAISY -
Seed to Harvest
1 edition - first published in 2007 -
Bloodchild
1 edition - first published in 1996 -
La Parabole du semeur
1 edition - first published in 1999 -
Imago
1 edition - first published in 1997 -
Parable of the Talents
1 edition - first published in 2001 -
Wild Seed (Patternist)
1 edition - first published in 1988 Borrow -
Adulthood Rites (Xenogenesis)
1 edition - first published in 1997 Borrow
Subjects
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Links (outside Open Library)
History Created April 1, 2008 · 7 revisions
| September 20, 2011 | Edited by Frau Zack | Added new photo |
| May 17, 2011 | Edited by George | Edited without comment. |
| May 17, 2011 | Edited by George | Edited without comment. |
| May 17, 2011 | Edited by George | Edited without comment. |
| April 1, 2008 | Created by an anonymous user | initial import |