Chico Norwood, "Science Fiction Writer Comes of Age", Los Angeles Sentinel, April 16, 1981. A5, Al5. Kenan Randall (1991). "An Interview with Octavia E. Butler". Callaloo. 14 (2): 495–504. doi: 10.2307/2931654. JSTOR 2931654. Nancy Jesser argues that Lilith's behavioral changes are part of a larger Oankali project of "improving" the human race. She writes, "[i]n Butler's plot, it is the Oankali's modification of the human genome that will accomplish what centuries of civilization, getting burnt in the hot fire of human stupidity, failed to do." In other words, Oankali modification of human genetics will change human behavior, and humanity will be less likely to destroy the earth with nuclear war. However, in the end, humans will no longer be human. Joseph understands this when he declares, at the end of "Nursery," that at least Peter "'died human'" (196). He wonders what they will be like once they finally make it to Earth: "'Will we want to by then? What will we be, I wonder? Not human. Not anymore'" (196). Slavery In "Nursery," the theme of knowledge and power gains new dimensions. In "Womb," the Oankali had total power over Lilith partly because of their vast knowledge about her person and the human race in general. As Lilith's time aboard the Oankali ship has progressed, she, too, gains knowledge. Now we see Lilith in a new situation: she is coming face-to-face with other humans who have not yet learned what she knows about the Oankali. Lilith has access to knowledge that the others do not. First, she is given "eighty dossiers" filled with information about these other humans, including "short biographies made up of transcribed conversations, brief histories, Oankali observations and conclusions, and pictures" (116). Lilith's knowledge of these people and of their situation among the Oankali will give her more power than the others in "Nursery." This, in turn, will cause tension between Lilith and the others, as she tries to help them as much as she can but they see her as part of the Oankali and therefore one of their oppressors.

Haraway, Donna. "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century" and "The Biopolitics of Postmodern Bodies: Constitutions of Self in Immune System Discourse". Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge, 1991: 149–181, 203–230. In 1983, Butler published "Speech Sounds", a story set in a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles where a pandemic has caused most humans to lose their ability to read, speak, or write. For many, this impairment is accompanied by uncontrollable feelings of jealousy, resentment, and rage. "Speech Sounds" received the 1984 Hugo Award for Best Short Story. [23] Steven Piziks, "An Interview with Octavia E. Butler", Marion Zimmer Bradley Fantasy Magazine, Fall 1997. Octavia E. Butler. (2017, April 28). Biography; A&E Television Networks. https://www.biography.com/writer/octavia-e-butlerOctavia E. Butler: Telling My Stories." Program and Exhibit (April 8 – August 7, 2017), The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.

Melzer, Patricia, Alien Constructions: Science Fiction and Feminist Thought. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0-292-71307-9. Butler's first work published was "Crossover" in the 1971 Clarion Workshop anthology. She also sold the short story "Childfinder" to Harlan Ellison for the anthology The Last Dangerous Visions. "I thought I was on my way as a writer", Butler recalled in her short fiction collection Bloodchild and Other Stories, which contains "Crossover". "In fact, I had five more years of rejection slips and horrible little jobs ahead of me before I sold another word." [27] Tempest Bradford, K. "An 'Unexpected' Treat for Octavia E. Butler Fans". NPR . Retrieved August 26, 2018. Zaki, Hoda M. "Utopia, Dystopia, and Ideology in the Science Fiction of Octavia Butler". Science-Fiction Studies 17.2 (1990): 239–251. JSTOR 4239994.Robyn McGee, "Octavia Butler: Soul Sister of Science Fiction", Fireweed 73. Fall 2001, pp.60 and following. Jdhaya tells Lilith that she has been sleeping on this ship for almost two hundred and fifty years. They have several other humans in isolated confinement. Lilith has been awakened because she has work to do—it will be her job to wake the other humans and prepare them to return to Earth. In the two hundred fifty years since humans have left Earth, Earth has rejuvenated. The vegetation has grown and those animals which did not go extinct in the war have repopulated. Once Lilith is able to get used to Jdhaya, he brings her out of her cell. Lilith asks Jdhaya what the Oankali want from the human race. He tells her that the Oankali are traders and they expect to trade genetic material with the humans. Lilith realizes that the Oankali have now truly continued the human extinction that the war began. The future humans will be human-Oankali hybrids and it will be her job to bring them into existence. Lilith is disgusted at this thought and tells Jdhaya that she wishes they just left her to die on Earth. He tells her that if she wants to she can touch him and he will sting her with his tentacles so that she dies. However, she cannot take this opportunity—she still has an instinct to live. Despite this, however, the Oankali imagine themselves as benevolent captors that offer the humans in their care a choice. When Lilith is finally able to leave her cell, she is apprehensive at the thought of entering Jdhaya's home. He soothes her by saying, '"No one will touch you without your consent'" (38). Lilith is comforted by his words but this comes with the awful knowledge that she has become dependent on Jdhaya: "How had she become so dependent on him? She shook her head. The answer was obvious. He wanted her dependent" (38). Hayward, Philip, ed. (2004). Off the Planet. John Libbey Publishing. doi: 10.2307/j.ctt2005s0z. ISBN 978-0-86196-938-8.

The memorial scholarships sponsored by the Carl Brandon Society and Pasadena City College help fulfill three of the life goals Butler had handwritten in a notebook from 1988: [95] [96]Octavia E. Butler, reading her description of herself included in Parable of the Sower, during a 1994 interview with Jelani Cobb a b c Butler, Octavia E. "'Radio Imagination': Octavia Butler on the Politics of Narrative Embodiment." Interview with Marilyn Mehaffy and Ana Louise Keating. MELUS 26.1 (2001): 45–76. JSTOR 3185496. doi: 10.2307/3185496. Lilith's initial discomfort at realizing that her captors, who turn out to be an alien race called the Oankali, have performed surgery on her body without her consent speaks to an overarching theme of Dawn. Throughout Dawn, the humans aboard the Oankali ship are forced to submit to their captors' desires. The question of consent seems to be relatively straightforward: because the humans are captive, they have no choice but to submit to the Oankali's decisions. In other words, the humans have no consent, and therefore no bodily autonomy, in the Oankali world. In "Womb," Lilith realizes this truth when she learns the Oankali have changed her genetic code and begins to see the way the Oankali treat humans as similar to the way humans used to treat animals on Earth: "This was one more thing they had done to her body without her consent and supposedly for her own good. 'We used to treat animals that way,' she muttered bitterly" (31).

Lilith's encounter with Paul Titus speaks to an important truth: a lot of the human-on-human violence that we see in Dawn has gendered undertones. Despite the fact that Lilith "did deliberately Awaken a few more women than men in the hope of minimizing violence," there are several instances of gender-based violence within the second half of Dawn. As Lilith Awakens more people in "Nursery," the potential for violence increases. She tasks Leah with Awakening a man that almost immediately attempts to sexually assault her: "Leah's charge, a small blond man, grabbed her, hung on, and might have raped her if he had been bigger or she smaller" (171). Soon after, Peter and six other men pin down Lilith so that they can steal food from the pantry. Later, Peter and Gregory grab a newly Awakened woman and try to take advantage of her: "She screamed Lilith's name when Peter and the new man, Gregory Sebastes, stopped arguing with her and decided to drag her off to Gregory's room" (176). Lilith sees these moments of gender-based violence as a regression, calling the men "cavemen" and "fools" (177). While she declares that "there will be no rape here," it is unclear whether the violence would have ended if the Oankali did not soon after bring the humans to the training floor. Human Solidarity The acclaimed trilogy that comprises Lilith’s Broodis multiple Hugo and Nebula award-winner Octavia E. Butler at her best. Presented for the first time in one volume, with an introduction by Joan Slonczewski, Ph.D., Lilith’s Brood is a profoundly evocative, sensual — and disturbing — epic of human transformation. Crossley, Robert. "Critical Essay." In Kindred, by Octavia Butler. Boston: Beacon, 2004. ISBN 978-0-8070-8369-7 Women Writing Sci-Fi: From Brave New Worlds ". YouTube. Clip from 1993 TV documentary Brave New Worlds: The Science Fiction Phenomenon featuring Robert Silverberg, Karen Joy Fowler, and Octavia Butler discussing science fiction in the 1970s In the mid-1990s, Butler published two novels later designated as the Parable (or Earthseed) series. The books depict the struggle of the Earthseed community to survive the socioeconomic and political collapse of 21st-century America due to poor environmental stewardship, corporate greed, and the growing gap between the wealthy and the poor. [23] [29] The books propose alternate philosophical views and religious interventions as solutions to such dilemmas. [7]Pfeiffer, John R. "Butler, Octavia Estelle (b. 1947)", in Richard Bleiler (ed.), Science Fiction Writers: Critical Studies of the Major Authors from the Early Nineteenth Century to the Present Day. 2nd edn. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1999. 147–158. Calvin, Ritch. "An Octavia E. Butler Bibliography (1976–2008)", Utopian Studies 19.3 (2008): 485–516. JSTOR 20719922. Schwab, Gabriele. "Ethnographies of the Future: Personhood, Agency and Power in Octavia Butler's Xenogenesis", in William Maurer and Gabriele Schwab (eds), Accelerating Possession, New York: Columbia University Press, 2006: 204–228. Science Fiction Chronicle Award for Best Novelette – "The Evening and the Morning and the Night" [76]