The complexities of Kindred: Dana and the reader’s relationship to Rufus
The complexities of Kindred: Dana and the reader’s relationship to Rufus
Kindred by Octavia Butler attempts to add nuance to a commonly understood topic in U.S. history: slavery. Now taught in most if not all U.S. History classes, everyone has their own understanding of slavery, and how brutal its conditions were. However, most of these histories are focussed on a broader view, understanding the “system” more so than the individuals and their emotions. Kindred provides a unique perspective, forcing a woman with modern values to interact with and react to the world of antebellum slavery.
Many of the nuances in Kindred come from Dana’s relationship with Rufus. She has seen him as an innocent child before he has a chance to be influenced by his father and the system of slavery. Dana’s understanding of Rufus is vague as she watches him grow up through only a few glimpses of moments in history before she has to save him from being killed for his attempt to rape Alice. How truly shocking this is to Dana is seen when she realizes what happened: “Rufe, did you manage to rape that girl… Why would you do such a thing? She used to be your friend,” (Butler, 122-123).
The juxtaposition of Rufus, going from an innocent boy who Dana is meant to protect, to a ruthless rapist and slave owner, undoubtedly messes with Dana’s head. It gives her a more complex perspective of a slave owner than any modern-day person would have of the past. It’s easy to get frustrated with Dana as you watch her sympathize with Rufus, knowing what he’s done. She even feels guilty herself, stating “I didn’t think much of myself,” (Butler, 164). However, it’s a complex psychological situation that is both emblematic of the way slaves might feel, and not.
Dana’s relationship with Rufus is similar to slaves of the time because, in any case, it’s in an enslaved person’s best interest to be on the good side of the plantation owner. Dana certainly gets resentment for it, but it seems to mostly come from jealousy. Although Dana doesn’t agree with Rufus’s actions, she treats him with respect and attempts to sympathize with him. However, what makes their relationship different is Dana’s knowing that he is her relative, and possibly only way back to the present. That aspect of the novel is obviously unrealistic to a real slave’s experience, but Dana’s feelings don’t seem to be.
Dana’s choices are particularly interesting in the last scene on the Weylin Plantation. She has tried time after time to sympathize with Rufus, give him the benefit of the doubt, and get him to change his ways. Her efforts to explain love and encourage him to free his children do have some effect, but she is confronted by his undeniably poor character when he tries to get control of Dana. In that moment, she makes a split second decision to kill him. It’s difficult to interpret this decision as she has had countless opportunities to kill him before, but decides that this is what pushes her over the line.
Ultimately, I interpret it as her being human. In the past, he has hit her, raped Alice, sold slaves, and tried to shoot her. These were all betrayals she found herself forgiving him for, reflecting, Dana states “I never realized how easily people could be trained to accept slavery,” not just talking about natives of this antebellum world, but also herself, (Butler, 101). Ultimately, at this point in the novel, she is exhausted, she knows Hagar has been born, and she feels caught off guard by how much Rufus is attempting to violate her and her rights. This is enough to push her to kill him. Even if she isn’t able to make it back to 1976, she decides she isn’t willing to forgive Rufus any further.
She does return to 1976, though, and finds out that her decisions resulted in most enslaved people on the Weylin Plantation getting sold to worse places. Despite her efforts to make life better for the slaves, she realizes she must confront the past for what it is, in its every complexity.
Hi violet! I completely agree with you on your interpretation on Dana's choices with Rufus! I think much of Dana's lowering of her boundaries roots in her denial that her attempts to instill modern values into Rufus has utterly failed, and maybe made the situation even more worse for Alice (given Rufus' delusion of he's in love with Alice). Additionally, I think her ultimate killing of Rufus is also driven by Alice's death. With Hagar born and Alice dead, her purpose of remaining in the past has faded. So when a chance arises to punish the perpetrator of these harms, it's natural for Dana to take it.
ReplyDeleteI think you're completely right; this book really shows the human side of slavery. We often see a very fact-based, cold interpretation of slavery which removes the stories, feelings, and pain that add perspective to it. I love that this book adds that all back in. It adds dimension when we are reminded that watching a whipping has a terrible smell and makes Dana almost vomit, when we are shown how two-sided Dana's feelings about Rufus are, and when we see this innocent child turn into a monster. The complexity of this book truly adds to the terrible baseline facts we've learned about slavery. Great post!
ReplyDeleteHi Violet, I like how you walked us through Dana's relationship with Rufus and tried to explain why Dana was forgiving of Rufus, as hard as it is to justify. I agree that Dana has only seen a little of Rufus, which has caused his adult personality to surprise her, and I find it important to reiterate that she is forgiving of Rufus because of her blood relation to him and, in my opinion more importantly, her brief moments with him as a young and innocent child. I also agree that Dana has to act like a slave of Rufus in the sense that she has to be on Rufus's good side, though it is important to remember that she has privileges that the other slaves do not. Overall, great post!
ReplyDeleteHi Violet! I really liked how clearly you laid out Dana’s emotional conflict with Rufus. You explained the shift from seeing him as a scared, somewhat sympathetic kid to watching him grow into someone who abuses power in horrendous ways very well. I think you’re right that Dana’s reactions feel messy because they are human, apart of what any person would do. She doesn’t just see “a slave owner,” she sees someone she’s known across different stages of his life, which makes everything harder for her to process. This book is complex in the ways emotions are handled and I think you did a great job at uncovering what Dana was most likely experiencing emotionally. Great post!
ReplyDeleteHi Violet! I agree with how you point out that Dana is human, and even though her influence on Rufus may have ultimately made things worse, and there's times where she's motivated by her own interest (making sure Hagar is born) she was genuinely trying to help. She also went through a lot because of this, but was still the one to stop Rufus at the end. Great post!
ReplyDeleteHey Violet! You did a great job with this topic. It is the pivotal moral dilemma of Kindred but you managed to analyze it complexly. I agree that Rufus' development has a very interesting effect on Dana's psyche; however I feel that she and the reader get a much more nuanced view of Rufus and by extension, potential slave owners, through the development of his actions. We see the motivations behind his crimes not just the act. Great post!
ReplyDeleteI agree that Dana's line about "how quickly people can be trained to accept slavery" refers to herself and her own disturbing tendency to adapt to the role she has been forced to play in this historical setting, and the final scene with Rufus is indeed a distressing illustration of this tendency. She pauses to consider the actual possibility of accepting his sexual aggression--even though this has been her "red line" from the start of the novel--because in an all-too-"human" way she finds herself flattered that he "cleaned up" for her, and she continues to WANT to consider him not as bad as he COULD be. Even at this final crisis moment, she has to work hard to access her 1976 self. When she plunges the knife into Rufus, it's like she's trying to kill off that part of her. Among the many distressing aspects of this scene is the way she finds herself starting to think in precisely the way she had disingenuously encouraged *Alice* to think about Rufus earlier, when she had more or less tried to persuade her to "accept slavery."
ReplyDeleteHello Violet, many times it feels to me that Dana is a mother to Rufus attempting to push her progressive ideas onto her son. It's not the perfect analogy as Rufus is the one with more power in the relationship, but it is how Dana seems to be acting. She hopes that although she sees all of these messed up things in Rufus, the small, simmering lights of hope are what push her forward.
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