Kindred, By Octavia Butler - 1527 Words

Edmund Wilson once stated that â€Å"No two persons ever read the same book.† When Wilson stated his quote, he was not just speaking about reading books, he was talking about perspective and how it changes the way people perceive the world. Wilson meant that no two people will ever see the same thing with the same frame of reference because perspective varies from person to person. All human beings have experienced their own experiences and have backgrounds that, at times, play a great role in molding who that individual is. In the book Kindred by Octavia Butler, this notion of varying perspectives is tackled very head onwards. Kindred is primarily about a a young black women named Dana living in the 1970’s with her husband Kevin, an older†¦show more content†¦Throughout the book it becomes clearer to discern their different ways of taking in the environment around them in spite of living in the same time period. Despite the fact that Kevin and Dana are both f acing the same issues, their interpretation of such issues vastly differs due to their differences in race, gender and social class that ties into race. Race plays a major role in the way Kevin and Dana view as well as experience individual situations. Human Beings are molded by their environment, their background and those they encounter. These things shape them into the people they will later on be. Whether it be a generous and kind person or one who is shallow and cold-hearted, is heavily relied on one s environment, which is a concept that Octavia Butler likes to bring up constantly within her book whilst speaking on Rufus or any other character for that matter. A place in where this plays a great role is when it comes down to the racial differences between Dana and Kevin. An excellent example that exemplifies the massive difference that race has on perception in general is when Kevin and Rufus are having a conversation, and Kevin reveals,†Ã¢â‚¬ËœShe’s my wife’ [...] ‘Niggers can’t marry white people!’† (Butler 60). This statement is remarkably significant because it exemplifies peo ple’s perceptions of Dana and Kevin due to their