Parable of the Sower and My Monticello

 The Urban Life Experience Book Discussion Series continued on Saturday May 14th with a discussion of both Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler and My Monticello (the novella in the collection of the same name) by Jocelyn Nicole Johnson. 

                       

Octavia Butler wrote Parable of the Sower in 1993. The main character, teen-aged Lauren Olamina becomes a leader of refugees, walking from Robledo (a fictional town in southern California) to northern California, seeking a safe place to build a community. She's guided by a belief system that she herself penned called Earthseed. She's been prepared collecting food, money, seeds to plant, clothing, and supplies for the day she had to flee. Her neighborhood is burned down by a group of drugged pyromaniacs. Lauren grabs her bag and takes off, attracting fellow travelers along the way. 

Jocelyn Nicole Johnson wrote My Monticello is 2021. The main character is Da'Naisha Love who lives in Charlottesville, VA, and also becomes a leader of a group of refugees. Her group is made up of her neighbors, her grandmother MaViolet, and her boyfriend Knox. Whereas the group who burned out Lauren Olamina in Parable chose to burn their neighborhood because they perceived the neighborhood as "rich," the goup who burned out Da'Naisha's street in My Monticello based their actions specifically on race. Da'Naisha leads her group to the famous Thomas Jefferson home: Monticello, an estate that Da'Naisia and MaViolet share a special connection with.

Here are the elements both stories had in common:

1. Before leaving their respective homes, both groups had established a dynamic community of sharing and bartering. It seemed that all govenrnment systems had basically shut down. 

2. Both groups are led by young African American women.

3. Both groups' homes were destroyed by fire. 

4. Both stories describe extreme climate disasters.

5. Both stories are first-person narratives. 

6. Both groups are multicultural. 

Barb started our discussion off by pointing out that although there was racism described in Parable, the social classes were stratified economically, in other words, victims were chosen if they were perceived to have more, whereas in My Monticello, the victims are burned out of their homes by violent white supremacists.

Bonnie called our attention to p. 187 in Parable, where Lauren Olamina is saying, 

I thought something would happen someday. I didn't know how bad it would be or when it would come. But everything was getting worse: the climate, the economy, crime, drugs, you know. I didn't believe we would be allowed to sit behind our walls, looking clean and fat and rich to the hungry, thirst, homeless, jobless, filthy people outside...I thought we were so strong."

Shelara offered that people always say that Octavia Butler must have been "prophetic" or "prescient" to have written Parable back in 1993, but Butler always explained in recorded interviews that "you didn't need to be a prophet to see where we were headed." She said any logical person could look around and see the way the world was going. Shelara continued, "Are we going to do something about it? Right now we're going to have little kingdoms instead of a nation."

Jezrie mentioned that in Parable, things had devolved to the point where it wasn't safe to leave home, not even to go to work. Jezrie also expressed that she disliked the story line in My Monticello about Da'Naisha being pregnant and not knowing whether Knox or Devin was the father. She said this sounds like a trope and that the first story in the collection: "Control Negro" would have been a better comparison with Parable. Shelara liked the story "Virginia is Not Your Home" more. 

Here in New Haven, Parable of the Sower is the selection for this year's One City One Read. This is why we're discussing it again. The children's companion book is Star Child by Ibi Zoboi, which is a biography of Octavia Butler written in verse. 

Jezrie expressed the idea that Lauren Olamina in Parable is just like Octavia Butler the author. Perhaps she meant Lauren Olamina is "strong," like she perceived Octavia to be. She actually went as far to say that if the author wanted to make My Monticello better, the focus should have been on MaViolet, Da'Naisha's grandmother or Miss Edith, who, like Lauren in Parable knew what wild foods were edible and all about seeds and planting. 

Octavia Butler had written five novels and a multitude of short stories before she wrote Parable. She had been writing and submitting stories to magazines from the time she was a child. Jocelyn Nicole Johnson had been a public school art teacher for twenty years and My Monticello is her debut collection.