The Grande Dame of Science Fiction
Posted on March 6, 2021
Octavia E. Butler, the award winning grande dame of science fiction was an extremely shy child. This gives me a small shred of hope, at least I share one similarity with her…I also started out too shy to speak.
Most critics praise Butler for her unflinching exposition of human flaws, which she depicts with striking realism.
Locus regarded her as “one of those authors who pay serious attention to the way human beings actually work together and against each other, and she does so with extraordinary plausibility”. We could not agree more with this statement, it explains how she would be considered a prophet today by some, an author capable of conceiving complicated futuristic situations that shed considerable light on our current affairs.
If we were so lucky to receive advice from one of the best sci-fi writers of our time we hope that she would appreciate our attempt to follow in her footsteps. That our characters, damaged and flawed depict our current crisis, in the midst of a real pandemic, through the fictitious insomnia pandemic in our novel.
It would be our hope that she would applaud our efforts to reach for scientific plausibility, without sacrificing the story and more importantly without writing for a specific genre.
Lastly we would like to think that she would commend our efforts to portray all characters (human or otherwise) as they actually are. To put the story first, above all else.
What we would give to have a conversation with her, but instead we are left with her stories, her legacy and her amazing quotes as advice.
“Good stories are good stories, no matter how they ‘re categorized.” – Octavia Butler
2 thoughts on “The Grande Dame of Science Fiction”
Brenda
–Thank you for featuring such a groundbreaking and inspiring woman author. I think being shy can be your super power – allowing you to be creative and overcome shyness through your storytelling.
Great post and inspiring read!
Tasha
–How she describes “the way human beings work together and against each other” could not be more relevant in these current times we find ourselves. The once revered notion that “We are all in this together” which purportedly described how we can help each other is now something to be ridiculed as it obviously is being used by our government against us “we the people”. Weaponizing our rights to our Freedoms as being selfish and uncaring. Oh, how I would have loved to sit down and have tea with this wise woman and discuss the “good stories” that will come from our current nightmare.