To point out the painfully obvious, my life did change. And billions of others’ did, too. That moment, and the obstacle course of months that followed, taught me that sometimes the world’s fragility will wallop you upside the head.
This reminder simmers on every page of Octavia E. Butler’s seminal dystopian novel Parable of the Sower and its sequel Parable of the Talents. It follows Lauren, a young woman from Southern California who lives in a community walled off from the worst effects of climate change, street violence, and political crises. She has a burning sense that her world is unsustainable and tries to warn her community that it’s about to collapse. When catastrophe does occur and her town is destroyed, Lauren must flee, joining waves of refugees from Southern California headed north for good jobs and access to water. Eventually, she creates a religion based on the inevitability of change.
When full-on quarantine began, some friends and I decided to read the Parable books for a Zoom book club. Written in the 90s, they’re frighteningly on the nose with their visions of life in the 2020s, to the point that some parts would feel corny if written today. For example, a far-right president literally vows to “make America great again” and inspires hate crimes across the country. Today, that’s the news.
Going into the first book, I wanted Butler’s prophetic voice to help me make sense of 2020. I wanted to point to lines in the book and say, “See! We are living in a dystopia!” But the Parable duology resonates far deeper than spooky connections. It’s a story about drastic change that no one can prepare for, how people handle it or choose not to, how a country becomes a disaster, and how individuals caught in the tide remake their world.
At the beginning of each chapter, there is a verse from Lauren’s religion-in-the-making, Earthseed. They’re simple on their own. Taken with the rhythm of the story, they’re a turning gemstone, reflecting different sides of one solid message: God is Change.
I read Lauren’s story while the United States teetered on the edge of transformation. The country bubbled all year, heat from the pandemic pushing issues like health care and wealth inequality to the bursting surface. The Black Lives Matter movement poured into the streets in response to ongoing cruelty against Black people at the hands of police. Political candidates promised a return to normal, but, in my opinion, their visions of the status quo fell flat when our historical moment demanded anything but.
All along, Lauren’s voice buzzed in my brain. God/is both creative and destructive/demanding and yielding/sculptor and clay. As we’ve learned from COVID, the stability we cherish is not as permanent as it seems. Yet neither is the current order of things in which police violence is frequent and policing is our response to too many societal ills. If change can destroy what we take for granted, we can use it to create something better, too.
I think we can expect more transformation in the near future. We might be cooped up at home, settling into that “new normal,” until a smattering of news articles sends us into nervous sweats. Or we might see goals realized that were once regarded as impossible. Whatever happens, I’m glad I had the Parable novels to keep me company this year. Butler tells a good old-fashioned story with a resonance that’s chilling and hopeful at the same time. It didn’t give me answers, but it lended me clarity, something I know I’ll be looking for next time we get walloped upside the head.
Ezra Craker
Staff Member