PARABLE OF THE SOWER by Octavia E. Butler (1993)
The Parable Of The Sower is set in the near future (2024 – 2027) . It is the story of a small group of people clinging frantically to hope even though the fabric holding society together is in tatters.
Its central character is an 18-year-old black woman named Lauren Olamina. She is the daughter of a preacher and part of a close-knit family in a community trying to preserve order and dignity aware that outside the wall of their protected world there are hordes of have-nots wanting a piece of what they have. Lauren’s family are not wealthy but she knows that “to the desperate we looked rich”.
In presenting this doomsday scenario Butler could be describing the background today’s occupy movement:
“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’d be allowed to sit behind our walls, looking clean and fat and rich to the hungry, thirsty, homeless, jobless, filthy people outside”.
Continue reading
