"AU that ou touc6 ou c6anye" :Utopian Desire ana t~e Co~.ceptoC~jan ye in Octavia ~ut~PgYgd~eof tde Sommer ana Parable o the Talents

Patricia Me[zer

This analysis examines two literary narratives by Octavia Butler, Parable ofthe Sower and Parable of the Talents, that elucidate the intersection of threefields in Western thought : the notion of utopia, feminist politics and theory ,and feminist science fiction. This intersection is crucial for feminists in that i tprovides tools for negotiating difference within feminist politics . I lay out thedynamics within Octavia Butler's feminist utopian/dystopian writing that de-fine her concept of "utopia" as both a utopian desire and a longing to trans -form. These allow her to theorize about future social relations and inform thestrategies for feminist politics that she develops .

Feminist debates on difference address the complex ways in which womenare positioned in relation to power based on race, class, and sexual difference .Within these debates, many postmodern feminist theories reject the essentialistnotion of "woman" as an identity and instead emphasize the interrelated con-struction of gender and other social categories, such as race and class) Butler' sutopian writing contributes to the deconstruction of difference as the "other" toa stable identity . Here difference is not the opposite component of identity, bu tbecomes a part of the self. While others have discussed Butler's treatment o fdifference mainly in terms of her "miscegenation" between species (an ap-proach Donna Haraway introduced in Primate Visions), I explore how differ-ence in her narratives relates to notions of utopia. At the center of Butler' sutopian desire lies the concept of change that adds an element of process to thefeminist discourse on difference . It not only places categories of differenceinto a historical context, but also connects them with time . This temporal as-pect that complicates absolute concepts of identity/subjectivity based on race ,class, and gender, I believe, is a valuable contribution to the feminist debate o nhow to negotiate difference politically and theoretically .

UTOPIA, FEMINIST POLITICS, AND SCIENCE FICTIONThe concept of the ideal community—nation, city, and/or village—is centra l

to Western thought, and fords its most direct expression in fiction. Defined b yErnst Bloch as the principle of hope,' the human urge to transform and re-creat eliving environments is the foundation of most politics, including feminist . It con-stitutes also the most challenging component in feminist theories, in which thediscourse on difference has proven U .S . feminist politics to be at times exclu-sionary in their formulation of women's interests, goals, and visions .

The construction of utopian societies is primarily an articulation of powerrelations, with the interests of various groups in the foreground . When ap-proached from this perspective, utopian formulations convey theoretical de-velopments outside the norms of what we define as "theory," and create a win -

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dow into the realm of the utopian imagination's relationship to politics . Theyremind us of the importance in feminist theories to develop utopian impulses .bell hooks' concept of yearning is one example of utopian desires articulated i nfeminist theory :

"[D]epths of longing, [ . . .] a displacement for the longed-forliberation—the freedom to control one's destiny "found in"folks across race, class, gender, and sexual practice . [ . . .] Theshared space and feeling of `yearning' opens up the possibilit yof common ground where all these differences might meet an dengage one another ." (12-3 )

Similarly, so is Andre Lorde's feminist re-definition of difference in Sister Out-sider: "The future of our earth may depend upon the ability of all women toidentify and develop new definitions of power and new patterns of relating acros sdifference" (123) . Iris Young's "unoppressive city" of difference, a model thatshe develops in "The Ideal Community and the Politics of Difference" and thatrefutes the humanist ideal of sameness that characterizes traditional utopias, serve sas an example of a utopian construction within theoretical discourse, and as astrategy for a feminist politics of difference . Its basic element is diversity, withnew cultures, potential interests, and social experiences constantly transformin gthe environment in which people live . The ultimate goal is not to create unitythrough assimilation, but "openness to unassimilated otherness" (Young 319) .

Young criticizes the Western, male "ideal of community " as inherently non-progressive, even if formulated within a "left" political claim expressed in uto-pian novels and social theory alike . These communities emphasize the notionof a unitary group of transparent selves, with a common identity. Young identi-fies the structures of the ideal community as based on metaphysics of presence,a desire to "formulate a representation of a whole, a totality" (302), that i sunable to tolerate fragmentation and uncertainty . She also pinpoints an inher-ent opposition of individualism and community that denies difference by de-fining the individual as a self-sufficient and solid unity . This "ideal of commu-nity" is also non-progressive because it denies difference within and betweensubjects by demanding recognition of, and identification with, all members ,"making it difficult for people to respect those with whom they don't identify "(311) . These "ideal communities," says Young, are politically problematic, racis tand class chauvinistic, rendering them contrary to inclusive feminist politics .Butler's fiction mirrors these theories' concern with feminist politics in thather utopian communities problematize the possibility of an "ideal community"and its vulnerabilities and problems .

As a literary genre, utopian writings reflect and participate in the criticaldiscourse on ideal communities, often reproducing the inherently dystopianconcept of a homogenous enclosed community . The theoretical object of theseutopian writings is what Bulent Somay terms the "utopian locus" in "Toward san Open-Ended Utopia" (25) . Here the utopian desire (i .e. the principle of hope),is projected into, and is conserved within the boundaries of the imagined ideal :

What the utographer did was to verbalize and enclose the uto-pian horizon of an age, which was in itself non-discursive ,infinite, and open-ended. [. . .] The utopian horizon was "sta-bilized" or finalized, and the final product was presented tothe audience. [ . . .] The main characteristic of this structure i sthe imprisonment of the utopian horizon within a closed and

ordered utopian locus, whose description is the central narra-tive element of traditional utopian fiction . (25, 26 )

Contemporary utopian fiction expands the utopian horizon and explodes theclosed and limited space in which the narrative takes place. The implicit, notexplicit, elements constitute the utopian moment of an open-ended utopia, th epotential of the expressed utopian desire . It points to the opportunities, withou tthe claim of authority inherent in the one-dimensional utopian ideal that strivesfor a closed and controlled way of being—similar to the ideal communitie sYoung criticizes. Butler's narratives reflect the notion of utopia as a potentialthat needs to be negotiated in its complexity, the people affected by it discus sand sometimes reject it . Butler develops the utopian term dialectically, not ab-solutely, and always in relation to the dystopian term, or its possibility . Theexisting tension between the actual narrative and its utopian spaces, and th epotential of the utopian horizon (Somay 33) is what is in the center of thenarrative, not the perfected ideal itself .

Generally, past feminist utopian writings in the U.S . have been inspira-tional to, and interactive with, feminist politics in their conceptualization o fpossible feminist futures . They defy the notion that "Utopia—the vision of theradically better world that our world could potentially be—was declared deadalong with the movements for change [of the New Left] that had inscribed it o ntheir banners" (Bammer 1) . Instead, they redefine the term, and make the de -sire for a more just world part of feminist conceptualizations, understandin g"`the utopian' as an approach toward, a movement beyond set limits into th erealm of the not-yet-set" (Bammer 7) . Similar to traditional utopian narrativesthat conceptualize the "ideal of community," in feminist utopias, the discus-sion of alternative social models is in the foreground of the texts . At the sam etime, however, they undermine the artistic and theoretical limitations of tradi-tional utopian novels, thereby problematizing issues like the "ideal nation" an d"social equality " (Bartkowski 12) .

In the 1970s, feminist utopias were extremely popular and their audienceextended beyond the science fiction community . They created a space for whatJean Pfaelzer defined as a feminist "political epistemology, " serving as a "meta-phor for potential histories" (283) . Their relation to feminist social and politi-cal theories is evident: as Frances Bartkowski observes, the peak of feminis tliterary production and political activity coincided in the mid-1970s (5) . 3 Infeminist utopias from the 1970s, authors such as Marge Piercy, Sally Mille rGearheart, and Ursula Le Guin created imaginative societies where feminis tpolitics were set to work. Their stories reveal that the concept of a utopia ncommunity continued to be the most prevalent narrative drive within feministwriting and that the utopian desire remained a vital component of feminis tpolitics: "[T]he act of fantasizing a feminist future—i .e., the genre itself—relocates the source of women's identity within a women's community" (Pfaelzer292). In doing so, these stories depict the problematic elements of alternativ e(supposedly ideal) social institutions, the development of which is one mainaspect in traditional utopian novels .

At the same time, as feminist utopian writing increased in the 1970s, theseauthors' visions projected more and more into a science fiction narrative frame -work. Because science fiction is a particular fantastic narrative mode that isrooted in contemporary phenomena, it lends itself to social criticism as do fewother genres and is therefore interesting to feminists . As Scott Bukatman pointsout, "Given a thematics profoundly engaged with social structures and sexua ldifference, and potentially heterotopic discursive practices, the relevance o f

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tence that utopian desire grows dialectically from despair and chaos : based onchange, on constant transformation, the relationship between utopian and dystopia nelements is of mutual interdependency . Dystopia precedes transformation ; it doe snot exclude utopia, but challenges it into existence.

There are two major differences between Sower and Talents that point toButler's inherent ambivalence toward a utopian community . One is a stylisti cdevice: the voice that narrates the story . Both texts use journal entries as thei rnarrative form . Yet, in Sower, Lauren's journal is the only reference for thereader, while in Talents the voices are multiple . Lauren's reflections are th emost frequent, but her daughter's entries comment upon them decades later;and her brother's and husband's voices challenge her presentation of events inthe course of the novel . Even though in Sower Lauren develops her vision inconstant exchange with people around her and Earthseed is a discursive (i .e.open) belief system, Lauren's perspective is the only narrative voice . By multi -plying the perspectives on events in Talents, Butler problematizes the concep tof a utopian vision that a single individual formulates . Her notion of differenc eand its inherent changing nature that is part of Butler ' s utopian desire become sapparent in her narrative technique when the estranged daughter ' s doubts o fthe validity of her mother's vision critique the utopian dream . The second dif-ference is the changing political strategies that Butler discusses in the novels :in Sower, the utopian idea spreads through the words of one person ; the con-cept is to gather and protect a following within a chaotic environment withoutthe tools of political campaigning . In Talents, her failings to enlarge andstrengthen her community during the time of a fascist regime haunt Laurenafter Christian fundamentalists capture Earthseed followers and destroy theirhomes . Once freed, she changes her political tactics . Instead of only trying towin the disempowered for Earthseed, Lauren begins to utilize the power an dinfluence of richer people in spreading her message and gathering people . Thi snarrative exploration of what form of activism has the most potential to achiev esocial change is crucial when looking at Butler in terms of feminist politics .

The basis for the utopian community that Butler constructs in Sower andfurther develops in Talents is Earthseed . The young Lauren in Sower, who laterin Talents becomes the mature and powerful leader of her influential sect, de-velops this religion and life-philosophy. Earthseed transcends the definition ofreligion as well as philosophy by combining elements of spirituality with po-litical and social issues, echoing religious principles in "Buddhism, existential-ism, Sufism" (Sower 239), where it is not the divine presence (God) himsel fthat is the aim of actions . Butler conceptualizes the utopian impulse in her futur-istic vision as a religious spirituality that rejects both the patriarchal concept o f"God" and the essentialist notion of an "earth mother goddess " (Pearson 58 )based in cultural feminism that is often an element within feminist utopias of th e1970s . 10 The centrality of religion in Butler's writings is crucial in the context o ffeminist utopias: feminist concepts of the future reject most organized religion . "Earthseed, with its rituals and "shapers" especially in Talents, seems at timescontradictory to feminist notions of an anti-hierarchical spirituality situated inthe individual, not in the representative of a religion . Unlike other organizedreligions, though, Earthseed's long-term goal is not Paradise, but the migratio nof humankind into outer space : "The Destiny of Earthseed /Is to take root amon gthe stars" (Sower 78) . The main message of Earthseed is that God is Change, andthat change is constant. Humans, through their actions, shape God .

All that you touchYou Change .

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All that you ChangeChanges you .

The only lasting truthIs Change .

GodIs Change .

(Sower 3 )

In Sower, Lauren writes of Earthseed from 2024 to 2027, and relates it tothe apocalyptic world around her. She travels from Southern California up North ,where whole states have been spared the destructive effects of pollution andviolence . Destruction, violence, and chaos induced by capitalism dominate thefuturistic world that Lauren travels ; a state she later refers to in Talents as the"Pox," which lasts from 2015 through 2030 (Talents 13-4) . The chaotic make-up of the Pox develops into a power vacuum that the fascist fundamentalis tChristian Right seize under the name "Christian Americans" with Andrew Steel eJanet as their leader. In Talents, results of the fascist regime are concentrationcamps, and war with Canada and Alaska . Out of this nightmare—chaos in Soweron the one hand, and organized terror in Talents on the other—Butler create sthe vision of a better and just world, based on the belief that each individual ha sthe power to manipulate and change existing conditions . Change is inherent tothe world and needs to be seized as a tool of empowerment.

God exists to be shaped, and will be shaped, with or withoutour forethought, with or without our intent . [. . .] There's hop ein understanding the nature of God - not punishing or jealous ,but infinitely malleable . [ . . .] there's power in knowing thatGod can be focused, diverted, shaped by anyone at all . (Sower24, 202 )

UTOPIAN COMMUNITIES AND NARRATIVE DISRUPTION

Butler ' s depiction of Earthseed ' s political organization is reminiscent o fwhat Russ calls "communal even quasi-tribal" (Russ 73), typical for feminis tutopias' attempts to conceptualize communities where "Order is kept [ . . .] notby use of force, but by persuasion" (Pearson 54) . In order to be active in shap-ing inevitable change, the community members meet on a regular basis to ex -change ideas, worries and strategies, and to discuss Earthseed verses collecte din The Book of the Living . These weekly Gatherings, "discussions, " create asense of belonging and solidarity and at the same time function as democratic,political decision-making processes .' Z

Butler emphasizes that the embracing of difference does not only enhanc ethe quality of human interactions, but that it is an act of survival and of neces-sity if humankind wants to end conditions of hate and violence. This concept ispresent in Audre Lorde's writing as well as in other feminist theories on differ-ence . As Butler writes :

Embrace diversity.UniteOr be divide drobbed ,ruled,killed

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By those who see you as prey .Embrace diversityOr be destroyed .

(Sower 181 )

Earthseed, its religion as well as its community, is a moment of resistance an dan opportunity for its followers to gain control over their lives . The communitywith its growing number of members with diverse personal narratives and back -grounds develops a complexity on various levels . It is, from the beginning, anassembly of refugees who are fleeing destruction and oppression, and later ,with Acorn as its first settlement, represents shelter for disoriented and abuse dpeople that are on the receiving end of patriarchal capitalism ' s oppressions .These include girls forced into prostitution by their fathers, a young womanwhose homeless mother sold her to a man with several wives, a couple tha tworked as domestics and had to leave after the woman had been sexually ap-proached by their employer, a physician whose wife had been killed by a grou pof looting madmen, and corporate slaves that ran away—families and indi-viduals uprooted by the violence erupting from an out-of-control capitalist sys-tem. Earthseed defines itself concretely as an active element of political resis-tance when Lauren relates it to a crucial aspect in U .S . history : "`So we becomethe crew of a modem underground railroad,' I said. Slavery again—even worsethan my father thought, or at least sooner" (Sower 268) . Butler's critique of powerbased in contemporary economic relations in Sowerbecomes more complex whe nshe portrays slavery in Talents in the context of concentration work camps wherepolitical dissidents and other "anti-social" people are kept prisoners . 1 3

Earthseed 's emphasis on economic self-sufficiency through subsistenc efarming and bartering apparently represents a yearning for a pastoral, pre-tech-nological past. Yet Butler complicates utopian vision: the rejection of exploit-ative capitalist values and the promotion of ecologically safe production is no ta return to an "ideal community, " but a strategy of survival that in Talents goe shorribly wrong when fascists destroy the isolated settlement . As Madhu Dubeydiscusses in "Folk and Urban Communities in African-American Women's Fic-tion: Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower," Earthseed is not an arcadian uto-pia . Butler understands human nature's needs to be complex and changing ,opposing the predetermined simplicity of "natural" human needs in arcadianutopias .

One main difference between the actual and imagined utopian communi-ties of 190 century America and the 1960s Hippie communes that Acorn re-sembles and Earthseed is their relationship to technology . In this, Earthseedresembles postindustrial literary ecotopias in that they do not reject technolog yor yearn for a mythical past, but imagine an ecologically sustainable economi csystem (Dubey 6) . Instead of rejecting any high technology, Lauren activel yseeks access to itit is the key to Earthseed's Destiny .

Butler weaves controversial notions on technology into her narratives tha taddress crucial elements within feminist utopian writing, such as reproductiv etechnology. Lauren in Talents reflects on the possible effects on society's per-ception of reproductive issues when a child is incubated in an artificial womb .Her initial repulsion gives way to a contemplation of existing structures base don economic classes where poor women function as surrogate mothers for af-fluent couples . Instead of viewing the process as an inevitable threat to women ,Butler points to the potential technology holds . She rejects any sentimentalnotion of a pre-technological world as more desirable : "And, of course, womenwill be free to do without men completely, since women can provide their ow nova. I wonder what this will mean for humanity in the future . Radical change or

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just one more option among the many? " (Talents 83) . Earthseed promotes th eradical notion of artificial incubation and transcends biological differences bymaking them irrelevant : the shuttles heading for the starship carry "frozen hu-man and animal embryos, plant seeds, tools, equipment, memories, dreams,and hopes" (Talents, 363) . With this, Butler takes a radical stance in the femi-nist debate over reproductive technology. 14 Above all, though, Earthseed is "notan organic community unified by collective memory, ethnicity, shared cultura lheritage, or attachment to place" (Dubey 6) . Its principle is change and it smembers are from diverse backgrounds . The separate racial and ethnic origin sthat translate into different cultural and historical memories demand constan tnegotiation and mediation. As Dubey points out : "The process of finding unityin diversity is necessarily risky and difficult" (6) and is incompatible with th enotion of an "ideal community" that rests on homogenous patterns of identity . 1 5

The importance of literacy for individual agency runs through both novels .Education, i .e . research in the sciences, is essential for Earthseed's long-ter mgoal . The apocalyptic setting in Sower and Talents does not only lend Earthseeda distinct character of a New Beginning . It also points to the disintegratingpower system within the "technoscience" ' 6 apparatus that is (mis)guided b ypolitical interests . The failure of the U .S . Space Program mirrors the powerapparatus ' incompetence. Lauren comments on the relationship of technologi-cal development and politics : "Secretaries of Astronautics don't have to kno wmuch about science . They have to know about politics " (Sower 19-20) . Laurenrecognizes that a return to a mythic past is paralyzing, not liberating . She in-sists on technology as a part of any new social order . The re-definition o ftechnology 's role from capitalist investment to a tool of resistance become sconcrete in Talents when in the last part of the book the movement has devel-oped into a powerful sect with the economic and political resources to prepar espace flight . Earthseed uses science and knowledge solely for the purpose ofDestiny; there is no research in the name of science itself. Here science andtechnology, both elements of science fiction, become the basis for survival .Butler re-appropriates the empowering potential of knowledge from the capi-talist agenda, and turns technoscience into a symbol of resistance .

In terms of sexual politics, Butler's fiction redefines gender roles and rela-tions in interactions between men and women . There are no inherent duties orrights based on gender, nor are sexist notions carried over from traditional un-derstandings . In Sower, the most prominent form of gender specific experi-ences is violence against women, especially rape. In a disconcerting fashion ,Butler depicts violence against women to be a form of violence that unleashe sitself whenever social control fails . Rape is a common encounter for the peopletraveling North . Only as a group can the women prevent attacks . Lauren cross -dresses as a man on her journey, and resorts to that tactic when she takes up he rtravels later in Talents . This narrative device critically points out the socialconstructions of gender roles in U .S. society, where being recognized as a womancan be life threatening . Lauren is spared the experience in Sower, whereas inTalents fundamentalists who run the concentration camp rape her as part o forganized control. Here Butler depicts the sexual violence against women as aweapon of social control by terror regimes . She echoes recent manifestation sof the institutionalization and broad application of violence against women a spart of political control, such as the systematic rapes in Bosnia during the warand in Argentina during the military regime . Earthseed, in stark contrast toboth forms of sexual violence (as a result of social disorder or as a form o fsocial control) does not tolerate any form of oppression of children or an yadult . Therefore, the community would not tolerate gendered violence . "

rm 1 .'1 - '1AA'~

Heterosexuality is normative in both Sower and Talents, but Butler doesnot treat this particular form of sexuality as prescriptive . For example, she i scritical of Lauren's brother Marcus in Talents, who betrays his sister by keep-ing her daughter Larkin/Asha without telling her about her origin . He struggle swith his homosexuality that his Christian faith forbids him, and Larkin/Ash abecomes the only child he can ever have . Butler's emphasis on the restrictin geffects of Christianity on its members that seems to construct homosexuality a san acceptable form of sexuality is supported by the betrayal of two lesbianlovers by non-Earthseed people in the concentration camp . The moment inwhich Lauren feels sexual desire for a woman at the end of Talents similarlydisrupts the rather conservative element of normative heterosexuality that run sthrough most of Butler's narratives,'' introducing what Russ calls sexual "per-missiveness" (Russ 77) .

Most feminist utopias, as Green points out, "deal with contemporary prob-lems by defusing the differences that cause conflicts to develop among people"(167) . Yet, Butler insists on the acknowledgment of socially constructed differ-ence, such as gender and race difference, on which she bases the strength of he rutopian community . Rather than envisioning an "overcoming" of difference(as it is present in liberal discourse of "multiculturalism"), she creates a less-than-perfect world where the potential of negotiating difference in non-oppres-sive ways constitutes the utopian desire .

Indeed, Butler perceives difference as a primary element of survival . Yet,as progressively as Butler treats the acceptance of difference as a crucial strat-egy for feminist political movements, and as directly as she problematizes sex -ism, she does not explicitly address problems of violence based on race i nAmerican society. Butler extensively problematizes oppressions based on classand gender differences, as well as on religious/ideological beliefs, such as i nthe form of rape and forced prostitution and economic slavery . Indirectly, itbecomes clear that the winners in this chaos are wealthy white people . In con-trast, the inhabitants of Earthseed communities have multiracial backgrounds .Also, Lauren's personal identity and family history is affirmatively AfricanAmerican . She openly discusses Janet's past career in the Ku Klux Klan, an dcompares the behavior of his Crusaders with Hitler's SS and the Christian re -education camps with Nazi concentration camps . Yet, neither the fact that herdaughter is placed in a black upper middle-class Christian family, nor that herbrother becomes an influential man in the Church, are put critically into the con -text of the racist background of the Christian Americans . While women and thepoor become victims of mob violence, the lynching of people of color is no tmentioned even though the history in American race relations and current racia lviolence would project such incidents in an chaotic uncontrolled state of soci-ety. 19 Butler discusses race relations mainly in the diversity-affirming structure o fEarthseed that opposes both a white racist, as well as an exclusive African Ameri -can folk community, and in Lauren's strong African American identity . 20

The imagery of plants and seeds that dominates Earthseed echoes Lauren ' sidentity. This imagery emphasizes Earthseed's anti-capitalist and agricultura lidentity, and suggests the affirmative recognition of black women's experi-ences in Alice Walker's "In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens" that celebratesAfrican American woman's unwritten history and creativity. In accordance withthis, the central metaphor of Earthseed and its relation to feminist politicalactivism is the seed. It grows from destruction, represents the life-affirmingcomponent, and evokes ideas of multiplying . At the core of the metaphor stands ,of course, change . The seed symbolizes the success of the vision, the concep tof sowing ideas and growing communities not modeled after a remote, ideal-

ized past, but focus on the future . Its main device is writing, the gathering an dpreserving of knowledge . The gender politics developed within an Earthsee dcontext echo Walker's concept of "womanist," "committed to survival and whole -ness of entire people, male and female" (xi), which evokes gender relations dis-tinct from radical or cultural feminist notions of separatism . With Lauren's statu sas a spiritual leader with an essentially political vision, Butler speaks to a histori -cal pattern of strong spiritual leaders in the African American community—mos tof whom were/are men, and offers an alternative to contemporary U .S . society. '- '

Butler's approach to race issues that at first appear to be in the backgroun dof her social critique can be understood as a (narrative) strategy that under -mines the binary of white/black that dominates U .S . discourse on race rela-tions . She explicitly rejects what Tucker Farley names the "white fantasy abou tearning unity" (243) often present in feminist science fiction, at the same tim eas Butler resists representation of the black folk community, exclusively de -fined as African American, as the only empowering form of community .22 In-stead, Butler places racial oppression into the complexity of social power rela-tions, such as in terms of economic and ideological oppression . She does no tforeground racial oppression in her analysis of social injustice, but undermine sthe juxtapositions and binaries of racial discourse of self/other by portrayin gracial diversity as a main component of her utopian vision. The "other" (peopleof color) is not included within the story of the "self," but constitutes the per-spective of narration . As Robert Crossley explains : "All her fiction stands inquiet resistance to the notion that a black character in a science fiction novel i sthere for a reason" (xviii). Butler firmly roots her protagonist within an Afri-can-American context, yet at the same time she refuses to ideologically ghettoiz eher characters . Her fiction is too complex to be reduced to a single, exclusivepolitical position . "How a feminist science-fiction character responds to a male -dominated world is one thing ; how Butler's black heroines respond to racistand sexist worlds is quite another" (Salvaggio, 1984, 78) . 23 By insisting on thepresence of people of color in her narratives as normal, not exceptional, Butle ralso implicitly rejects the tokenism that categorizes her work primarily in term sof her identity as African American . 2 4

In both novels, children represent the survival of the community . In Sower,the group welcomes and protects them on their travels North . They embody thefuture that the adults are trying to create . The interactions of adults and chil-dren transcend the definition of the nuclear family, typical of feminist, utopias :"The dissolution of the nuclear family and the de-emphasis on the biologica llink between mother and child leads to a redefinition of the parent-child rela-tionship (Pearson, 1997, 56) . In Sower, parenting is not related to shared blood(several individual members in the group "adopt" children and every adult i sresponsible for every child's well being) . Lauren, herself a rather "un-moth-erly" figure in the conventional sense in that she rejects the passivity regardin gpublic/political life associated with that role throughout both novels, early o nrecognizes the growing solidarity between adults that the children's depen-dency triggers . She realizes how responsibility for others, children or adults ,can give meaning to life and can heal internal wounds : "taking care of otherpeople can be a good cure for nightmares" (Sower 235) . Butler's use of meta-phors and structures that are reminiscent of tribal organization comments onthe increasing tendency of contemporary society to alienate its members fro meach other. In the Earthseed community, the ordering principles are not hierar-chies and a division of labor, but mutual respect, responsibility, and, formed bytheir current surrounding, the security of others . Thus, the sense of belonging ,of being taken care of, extends from the children to every member of the corn -

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ventions on the one hand, and that which seeks diversity and justice on th eother. With Lauren, Butler introduces the concept of a strong, spiritual leaderto her feminist future vision. This strongly contrasts with the political leader o fthe Christian fundamentalists, Janet, who later disappears from the politica lscene—a broken and insane man . Lauren ' s function as spiritual leader reflect sthe discursive and changing nature of Earthseed communities . At the end ofTalents, her position has developed into almost mythical status, that of a HighPriestess or a Mother to All . Yet evaluating Lauren ' s role and decisions, a criti-cal disruption takes place that complicates the binary construction of "good "and "bad" leader as well as the authority of utopian imagination. Her daughter,watching from afar, challengingly questions Lauren's position as leader . Larkin/Asha defines her mother's strength as controlling and manipulative, and re-flects after her mother's death on her "damned Earthseed" (Talents 9), accus-ing Lauren of a hidden hunger for personal power. Larkin/Asha not only doubt sthe vision of Earthseed itself, but also her mother 's motives for pursuing it .

munity . In Sower, after a woman dies of a gun-wound during an attack, th egroup embraces her sister in a feeling of protection and solidarity : "In spite ofyour loss and pain, you aren't alone . You still have people who care about yo uand want you to be all right . You still have family" (Sower 277) . "Mothering"(i .e. behavior based on qualities associated in the y West with women), becomesa fundamental characteristic of an Earthseed community . Butler's concept ofmothering rejects the white stereotypical ideal of the nurturing, self-sacrificingmother within patriarchal society. Instead, it embodies involvement and com-mitment to the community at large that in principle is independent of gender .Unlike creators of separatist utopias, and more similar to writers like MargePiercy, Butler extends the principle of mothering to men and draws them intothe responsibility of parenting .

In Talents, Butler further explores the question of origin—regarding physi-cal birth as well as ideological belonging—when Lauren loses her daughter t othe fascist government who gives away children of dissidents to regime-friendl ycouples . Larkin/Asha ends up living with her uncle Marcus, who keeps Lauren' sidentity as her mother from her. The girl's removal from her mother and her

They'll make a god of her . I think that would please her, if sheorigin problematizes issues of identity and biological origin . Larkin/Asha's alien-

could know about it. In spite of all her protests and denials ,ation from everything her mother stands for, including her rejection of the name

she's always needed devoted, obedient followers—disciples-she gave her, becomes a symbol for Lauren's lost chance to pass on her belief

who would listen to her and believe everything she told them .to her descendants, and conveys a sense of loneliness that her status as "Mother

And she needed large events to manipulate . All gods seem toof All" entails .

need these things . (Talents 7 )The kidnapping of Acorn's children and the loss this poses for the whole

community, not just for their immediate families, is critical in understanding

Larkin/Asha's critical perspective that opens the narrative in Talents interrupt sthe subversive function of Earthseed communities and the threat their prim-

the representation of Lauren as impartial leader of a movement at the end o fciples pose to the system. Here Butler touches on contemporary feminist con-

Sower, and negates the utopian vision within the narrative by declaring it emptycems with families separated through totalitarian regimes in order to under-

and artificial . She depicts her mother as a person driven by personal desire smine the identity and self confidence of groups that disrupt dominant ideolo-

who works "hard to seduce people" (Talents 62), adding a ring of falsehood togies, such as in Argentina under the fascist regime .25 The undermining of com-

Lauren's visionary ambitions . Her daughter accuses Lauren of taking advan -munities by removing their children also takes place under the "protection" of

tage of people ' s vulnerability, physically and emotionally, when she "collects "a "democratic" system, such as the placing of Native American children with

them on her travels or when they come to seek refuge at Acorn by giving the mwhite families that took place in the U .S . until the 1970s and that still affects

an illusion, born by her mistaking her "fantasy for reality" (Talents 44) . Thetribes today ; and the removal of children from their "unfit" mothers by the state

daughter's voice reflects Butler's critical discussion of the limits of her ow ntoday that especially affects women of color who face racism and poverty. 26

concept of leadership as well as the conflicting loyalties tied to it .In Butler's narratives, children represent the treasure of the community ,

the foundation of any future and shared identity as a group passed down from

I have wanted to love her and to believe that what happene dgeneration to generation . They are symbolic for the resistance against assimila-

between her and me wasn't her fault . I've wanted that . Buttion by a dominant group and secure the survival of values and beliefs . Their

instead, I've hated her, feared her, needed her . I've never trustedsystematic removal from the community by the system undermines the basis of

her though, never understood how she could be the way sheresistance, and is a tool for raising a regime-friendly generation.

was—focused, and yet so misguided, there for all the world,but never there for me . I still don't understand . (Talents 7-8)

Now we are told that our children have been saved from ourwickedness . They've been given "good Christian homes." [ . . .]

The narrative significance of Larkin/Asha's estrangement from her motherThe Crusaders deliberately divided siblings because if they

surfaces in its contrast to the central role children inhabit in Butler ' s writing .were together, they might support one another in secret hea-

As the lost daughter, the ideal foundation of her mother's vision, Larkin/Asha' sthen practices or beliefs. But if each child was isolated and

voice disrupts the narrative voice that is intact in Sower . There Lauren's jour-dropped into a family of good Christian Americans, then each

nal entries become the movement's history, and constitute a powerful, authen-would be changed. Parent pressure, peer pressure, and time

tic narration. Lauren's ability to read and write enables her to formulate herwould remake them as good Christian Americans . (Talents,

goals and to make them available to her "followers, " most of whom are Miter-189, 237)27

ate at the time they join the community. Her skills place her in a position ofmastery, as she metaphorically and actually "shapes" the voices of Earthseed ' s

Butler builds the narrative structure in Talents around two conflicting con-

people . Yet, as Dubey points out, this does not result in social hierarchies sincecepts of leadership : one that encourages hate and homogenous cultural con-

"the Earthseed community will erase all social distinctions deriving from lit -

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FEMSPEC 3:2 . 2002

43

generates it) that constitutes the utopian moment and that allows for differ-ence within a community.

In addition to the concept of change, Butler creates metaphors of boundar ytransgression that implicate new ways of conceptualizing difference as part o fa feminist subjectivity . Lauren suffers from "hyperempathy syndrome " (Sower10) that Butler's characters refer to as "sharing ." This new psycho-physiologi-cal disease is caused by the abuse of either parent of the drug Paracetco, a"smart pill," before the birth of a child, and runs through both novels . A sharerexperiences the physical sensations (pain as well as pleasure) of other people .Their visual and acoustic expressions, such as the sight of a person shot, an dcries of pain, transmit the other 's sensations onto the sharer . On their travels ,Butler depicts sharing as a vulnerability, and in Talents, within the confines ofthe concentration camp, sharing is another instrument for torture since it trans-fers pain from other prisoners as well as pleasure from torturers onto thei rvictims, such as during rape . Since it is next to impossible for a sharer to inflic tpain on others without suffering, violence becomes only viable in self-defense .Though Butler introduces the affliction to the reader via the intimate channe lof Lauren ' s journal entries, the phenomenon develops from a single case into asocial disease that increasingly informs personal as well as social interactions .As a physical mechanism that prohibits the disconnection and alienation fro mothers, sharing represents the painful and pleasurable process of crossing dif-ferences and of actually experiencing the other's world beyond a mere willing-ness to understand it . Sharing blurs and shifts boundaries and discloses a stable ,autonomous identity to be a myth – sharing becomes a symbol against the bi-nary construction of self and other and thus constitutes a crucial metaphor fo rre-defining social relations in Butler ' s narratives, as Lauren's thoughts convey :

eracy by ensuring all its members equal access to education" (10) . Accord-ingly, the title of spiritual educators in Earthseed is not priest or preacher, bu tshaper. In Sower, the context of an individual's spiritual journey and enduranc ethat resists chaos and destruction frames the concepts of Earthseed . In Talents, afragmented and split narration process critically reevaluates these concepts . Thisdisruption takes place not just in regard to the persons speaking . The positionsand beliefs they hold point to the complexity of utopian imagination when Larkin/Asha criticizes her mother's authoritarian position as shaper and charges he rwith manipulating her role to her advantage in the service of Earthseed .

At the end of Talents, Earthseed, now a powerful and influential sect ,launches the first shuttles to assemble a starship partly on the Moon and partl yin orbit . Unable to go, Lauren is dead at 81 before the shuttle is ready to take o nits journey to the stars . Lauren's final prophetic entries into her journal stand instark contrast to Larkin/Asha's dismissal of her "long, narrow story" (Talents362) as fantastic and irrelevant: "I know what I've done . I have not given the mheaven, but I've helped them to give themselves the heavens . I can't give the mindividual immortality, but I 've helped them to give our species its only chanc eat immortality" (Talents 362-3) .

UTOPIAN DESIRE AND POLITICAL STRATEGIES: CONCEPTS OF AGENCYEarthseed becomes a metaphor for a political conviction that grows into a move -ment. Its Destiny (space flight) is the future goal that focuses the desire, whilethe Earthseed principles create utopian communities in the here and now. With -out creating exclusive structures that define normative behavior, morality, an dself-perception that theorists like Young criticize in the concept of the tradi-tional "ideal community," Earthseed provides a shared identity and life experi-ence that are not based in a particular unified racial or cultural background .Above all, it provides for the survival of the human species—a crucial element

But if everyone could feel everyone else's pain, who woul dthroughout the two novels where Earthseed develops amidst a dystopian envi-

torture? Who would cause anyone unnecessary pain? I've neverronment. The most powerful aspect from a feminist analysis is the concept of

thought of my problem as something that might do some goo dagency that Butler develops : the agent of change—of the utopian desire—is

before, but the way things are, I think it would help . I wish Ihuman, the individual in mutual relationship with a nurturing community, a

could give it to people. Failing that, I wish I could find otherpartnership that allows resistance to oppressive structures . The possibility to

people who have it, and live among them . (Sower 105-6)redefine fate is not determined by a prayer to an outside power, "God" (i .e . theappeal to a higher authority, may it be the state or other social institutions or a

Earthseed's emphasis on change, the boundary crossings of sharing, an dhistorical determinism), but by the community themselves .

the value of diversity throughout the novels that reject the nostalgic notion o fChange is the liberating element in Butler 's concept of utopian desire .

an original perfect past that the Christian fundamentalists are trying to reviveChange defines Earthseed and becomes its major component, as encapsu-

(see Talents 23) is reminiscent of a Harawayan cyborg politics . Here the con-lated in the phrase "God is Change ." Change elevated in this manner declares

cept of change intersects with that of difference : as an inevitable principle ,"utopia" itself as a process, as something never completed. This is what makes

change can be shaped, thereby releasing difference from static identity/socialthis concept so valuable to the feminist discourse on utopian writing . The

politics . The metaphor of change as the center of feminist politics and theoriesutopian locus, the world it conceptualizes, is automatically open and discur-

adds a temporal aspect to what Trinh Minh-ha in Woman, Native, Other callssive; there is no one perfect community . The changing visions of people with

the "politics of differentiation" (82) . Thus, difference is not understood as andiverse backgrounds and different experiences that need constant adapting

absolute, a given, that needs to be re-positioned in relation to identity ; nor is itand negotiating that constitute Butler's utopia, echo Young's unoppressive

understood to be simply an historical moment that economic and social rela -city. The binding element within this inconsistent utopian space that Butler

lions create . Instead, Butler acknowledges that just as identity is not stable, socreates is the shared notion that there is a better world—in what shape and in

difference is a shifting constituent. The metaphor of change re-conceptualize swhat form depends on the action of the people involved, and as a concept

identity so that it "refers no more to a consistent `pattern of sameness' than to anremains undefined. Butler constructs change not as a frightening, but as a

inconsequential patterns of otherness" (Trinh 95) . Otherness, difference, become slife-affirming principle, as a hope for a self-destructive, materialistic society

not an element to define oneself against, but an integral aspect of any concept o fimmobilized by static social categories . This active force of transformation

self, such as with Butler's metaphor of sharing . This position allows a debate onin Butler 's narratives defines them as open-ended utopias . Here it is the po-

difference that moves beyond the immobilizing "multiculturalism" that locks dif-tential and its implications (and its relation to the dystopian environment that

ference into an exotic and safely contained other, as well as beyond the static

44 FEMSPEC 3:2 . 2002

FEMSPEC 3 :2 . 2002 45

categories of identity politics that do not allow for difference to be articulate doutside a defined political agenda . Butler contributes to feminist debates on howto negotiate difference by insisting on its transforming ability and on the inabilit yto define categories of difference and their respective roles in social relations .

The power of Butler's narratives lies, without question, in the utopian de -sire and the resulting visions she describes . Yet, at the same time she is criticalof the implicit politics of these visions, and the element of faith involved .Through the different political strategies Lauren employs in her attempts t ocreate Earthseed communities, Butler addresses problems feminist grassroot smovements encounter. They give complex insight into the dynamics of the issue sinvolved : In Sower, there is at first no system behind Lauren's mission . She speaksabout Earthseed to the people she meets, and wins over believers in the course oftheir journey. "She meant to make Earthseed a nationwide movement, but sh ehad no idea how to do thi s" (Talents 141) . Resistance in Sower manifests as puresurvival, and oppression emanates from capitalism gone mad . There is no systemfrom which the group needs to protect itself. Instead, random violence and de-struction of individuals terrorize through lack of social structure .

Butler constructs Earthseed as a political metaphor in contrast to the vio-lent rhetoric and actions of the Christian Americans in Talents that echo thecontemporary Religious Right's ideological warfare on unassimilated others .Once the fascist regime takes over in Talents, the form of resistance must change .Oppression becomes systematic, and collaborators with the regime are politi-cal/ideological as well as capitalist . Reactionary fundamentalists, "Crusaders, "whose excesses of violence the fascist Right government tolerates, 28 destroyand transform Acorn into a Christian re-education camp in Talents and turnLauren and her people into slaves and prisoners . After the destruction of Acornand the systematic oppression of Earthseed as a dissident sect, Lauren change sher political strategies. The vision of many small individual communities asthe decentralized, flexible parts of her organization that convert their surround-ings in the course of the years, "[she imagined] a Hazelnut, a Pine, a Manzanita ,a Sunflower, an Almond. . ." (Talents 156), makes room for an organized politi-cal movement. Earthseed utilizes traditional liberal forms of political strategie sincluding outreach projects, door to door campaigning, city hall events, andspeeches at schools and universities, and the publication of Earthseed—the Boo kof the Living . Lauren initially resists the notion of winning people for her caus eby impressing them through rhetoric and tactical reasoning. Later she realizes thestrategic necessity to give up her insistence that religious faith precedes member -ship within the Earthseed community. Her contemplation echoes the concerns o fpolitical activists in how to turn their cause into a mass movement :

I must create not a dedicated little group of followers, not onlya collection of communities as I had once imagined, but amovement. I must create a new fashion in faith—a fashionthat can evolve into a new religion, a new guiding force, thatcan help humanity to put its great energy, competitiveness, andcreativity to work doing the truly vast job of fulfilling the Des -tiny . (Talents 267)

With this comes the realization that a movement needs financial resourcesand influence in political matters in order to achieve social change . By emphasiz-mg issues they might find interesting, Lauren involves wealthy people who haveenough political influence to protect the sect from further harassment from th eChristian Americans before the Church eventually loses its power . Through these

"supporters" (Talents 348), the movement gains in power and financial strengthand eventually is in the position to actively pursue the Destiny .

Butler describes the shift from individual grassroots activism to an orga-nized and strategic movement that includes forming alliances based on certainissues addressed in Earthseed, an important feminist tactic, also as problem-atic . In Sower, and in the beginning of Talents, Earthseed is a refuge for thos ethe system oppresses . It constitutes a major site of resistance . In the final partof Talents, affluent new members of the movement "rescue" the disempowered ,such as when Lauren is able to relocate some members of Acorn and gets the msettled in safe environments provided by the supporters . On the one hand, thi srepresents a concept of agency that empowers the disenfranchised through theirnegotiations with representatives of power, such as the anthropologist Ann aLowenhaupt Tsing argues in In the Realm of the Diamond Queen . A study o nIndonesian forest tribes and their means of negotiating with colonial an dpostcolonial powers, this text similarly examines "the ways in which peopl eactively engage their marginality by protesting, reinterpreting, and embellish-ing their exclusion" (Tsing 5) . Lauren 's utilization of resources of people inpower, and her persuasion of them to believe in Earthseed in order to empowe rthose at the margin, echoes this concept of a displaced agency .

On the other hand, the reader can understand the shift from small to larg eas a critique of feminist alliances with groups in power that compromise femi-nist political integrity . What began as a seemingly limitless potential to shap ethe world surrounding them becomes useless unless utilized within the context o falready established power. This introduces the danger of defining and "namin g "difference from privileged positions. The Earth seed community builds itself aroundnotions of equality and fairness, yet the true element of the utopian desire, change ,seems limited to those already in power. This raises the question of the "utopianform [that] is already a miscegenation of sorts, a blending of pragmatic loca lconcerns with transcendent idealism" (Green 169) . Butler in the end opts for thepragmatic solution within her utopian vision, and with that speaks to concern swithin feminist grassroots movements : With whom to ally? What compromise sare acceptable, what is not open for negotiation? And above all, she addresse sissues of agency and the potential to seize the moment and change the worl daround us, the promise of "All that you touch, you change . "

NOTES

1. Examples of works that conceptualize the interrelation of gender identit ywith race and class, as well as nationality, include Higgenbotham, Nicholson ,Butler and Scott, Spivak, and Trinh .2. See Bloch.3. The activity of both feminist activists and theorists as writers of feminis tutopias, one example being the cultural feminist Sally Miller Gearheart, als oreflects the close connection of feminist politics and literary imagination.4. For further discussion see Bammer (160) .5. Dawn (1987), Adulthood Rites (1988), and Imago (1989) . See, for example,Green and Haraway (1989) . Articles that examine utopian aspects in Parableof the Sower include Dubey, Gant-Britton, and Miller .6. For a discussion of social and political issues as they are conceptualize dwithin feminist utopias, see : Bartkowski, Gearheart (1984), Pearson (1984 ,1988), and Russ .7. For more information see Bartkowski (6) .8. Both novels are part of a series of which the third book, Parable of th eTrickster, is in progress .

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47

9. The metaphor of the journey inhabits a special role in the discourse on uto-

sexual pleasure define sexuality, never those between the same-sexed parents ,pia . Bartkowski claims that the realization of the utopian desire in a literary

despite the "mediating" role of the neutral gender, and reproduction . In Survi -utopia is an inner journey (Bartkowski 4, 10) . Butler works with this by send-

vor (1978), Butler 's depiction of an alien species and cross-species reproduc -ing her protagonist, the "carrier" of the utopian desire, on a journey, where she

tion do not incorporate any sexual relations outside the heterosexual matrix ,develops and pursues this desire .

either.10.One example is Gearheart (1979) .

19 . See Davis (1981) for an historical analysis of violence against African Ameri -11.The most prominent and oppressive account of a patriarchal totalitarian

cans in times of economic/political unrest in the U .S .regime in feminist science fiction is Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, where

20 . Lauren 's name already reflects her affirmative identity as African Ameri -Christian fundamentalists also restructure society . Atwood's narrative is one

can : Lauren Oya Olamina Bankole, the last two surnames being African name sexample for feminists' rejection of any society based on organized religion .

adopted by her father and her husband, respectively, in the 1970s during the12."They're problem-solving sessions, they're times of planning, healing, learn-

Black Power movement . Her African middle name is that of a Nigerian Cod-ing, creating, times of focusing, and reshaping ourselves " (Talents 65) . The

dess, and her status of matriarch, as well as Earthseed 's concept of growth an dgoal is to celebrate people's own agency (Sower 197) . This organizing element

change, defies the notion of a white male God .of Earthseed as religion becomes, unlike in the Christian tradition that is con-

21 . In Chapter 6 of Black Atlantic, Paul Gilroy speaks of African-Americantrasted with Earthseed especially in Talents, not a legitimizing tool for power

leaders drawing on the first testament for inspiration in their attempt to gai nstructures and exclusion, but a means to discursively construct a shared future .

freedom for their people, from Marcus Garvey to Martin Luther King . Biblical13. As a symbol of complete and absolute oppression Butler introduces elec-

images of the enslaved and chosen people who will be led to a promised landtropic collars used on the prisoners by their tormentors, "also known as slave

construct analogies between African-American leaders and Moses leading hi scollars, dog collars, and choke chains " (Talents 80) . With her devastating ac-

people out of Egypt. Butler 's two novels refer to this tradition with their title scount of the effects of the collar on people, Butler directly comments on con-

(both are taken from the bible), with the importance spirituality has in Lauren' stemporary tendencies of using electronically controlled devices in prisons on

future vision, and with the Destiny in Earthseed that pronounces distant plan -inmates, such as the electronic belt . It is the escape from the collars that be-

ets as the promised land.comes Butler's most powerful metaphor in Talents .

22. See Dubey for an extensive discussion of this issue .14.Butler's perspective on reproductive technology of course echoes the theo-

23 . For further discussion on Butler 's black female characters, see Foster,ries Shulamith Firestone formulated over 30 years ago in The Dialectic of Sex

Salvaggio (1986), Shinn, and Govan .(1970). Her radical envisioning of a reproduction "not of woman born" and

24 . One aspect that does contradict Earthseed 's commitment to accepting andrejection of motherhood as a liberating institution, also reflected in the utopia

promoting diversity as its norm is the prohibition of expressing or followin gin Marge Piercy ' s Woman on the Edge of Time (1976), caused controversial

other religious systems within the community. What in Sower appears like areactions within feminist communities .

quest to persuade others of Earthseed, in Talents is supported by an institution-15.Dubey discusses Butler's novel in the context of African-American writing

alized exclusion of other beliefs, i .e . opinions (see Talents 145) . In her attemptand the urban crisis, and the resulting representation of the rural folk commu-

to protect her utopian vision, Lauren, as the founder of Earthseed, sanctions th epity as "a site where integral black communities can be imaginatively restored"

silencing of other believers within the community . Even though Earthseed doe s(1) . She points out how Butler's writing on community "complicates influen-

not aggressively and never with violence impress their belief system onto oth -tial current accounts of black women's literary tradition" (2) by employing

ers, its politics of protection to remain a united whole gives it an exclusiv escientific modes of knowing and textual forms of communication instead of

frame, which stand in ironic contrast to the core of its definition : Change .the magical epistemology of "conjuring" or oral tradition that occur in the writ-

25 . This issue that Butler addresses is the object of Rita Arditti's impressiv eing of influential authors like Toni Morrison and Gloria Naylor.

book (1999) that traces the attempts of women in Argentina to locate the chil -16. Haraway coined the term that indicates the commercially-used and socially

dren of their daughters and daughters-in-law that "disappeared ; " i .e . were mur-and ideologically structured practice of science culturally manifested in semiotic

dered, under the military regime in the 1980s .systems of representation . Haraway argues that we need to resist technoscience,

26. For a critical view on social and state sanctions that punish and control "bad"a complex net of economic, ideological, and political relationships defined by

mothers, especially in relation to poverty and racism in the U .S ., see the essayglobal capitalism, by appropriating its tools as well as its products, which both

compilation "Bad" Mother: The Politics of Blame in Twentieth-Century America .are embedded within cultural meaning .

Eds. Molly Ladd-Taylor and Lauri Umansky, and Angela Davis, Chapter 12 :17. In opposition to Earthseed's structures of gender equality and opposition to

"Racism, Birth Control, and Reproductive Rights" in Women, Race, and Class.sexual violence, the Christian Americans are propagating gender relations based

27 . Larkin/Asha 's alienation partly derives from the realization that her motherin traditional roles of strictly patriarchal Christian societies where women are

is a mother to all believers in Earthseed, that she would have to share her statusconsidered inferior in all respects to men, and are subject to violence and pun-

as Lauren's priority with the community . "I wonder what my life would haveishment. Above all, a woman is never allowed to hold a position of spiritual

been like if my mother had found me . [ . . .] How long would it have been beforeauthority, where she might influence and guide a man's fate . Lauren's role as

-

she put me aside for Earthseed, her other kid? [ . . .] I was her weakness, Earthseedthe spiritual leader of Earthseed directly challenges the Christian values pro-

was her strength. No wonder it was her favorite" (Talents 265) .moted by fundamentalists not only in her novels, but also in U .S. society today.

28 . These self-organized groups that act in the name of Jarret, who denies all18. For example, the reproductive units in the Xenogenesis-series consist of

connection with them, are reminiscent of Hitler's SS (storm troops) in fascis ttwo males, two females, and one androgynous gender—the terms of hetero-

Germany and of the Serbian terror troops in the Bosnian and Kosovo war.

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FEMSPEC 3:2 . 2002 49

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Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. A Critique of Postcolonial Reason : Toward aHistory of the Vanishing Present . Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1999 .

Trinh T. Minh-ha. Woman, Native, Other . Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1989.Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt . In the Realm of the Diamond Queen . New Jersey :

Princeton, 1993 .Walker, Alice . In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens: Womanist Prose . San

Diego: Harcourt, 1983 .Young, Iris Marion . "The Ideal of Community and the Politics of Differ-

ence ." Feminism/Postmodernism. Ed. Linda J . Nicholson. New York :Routledge, 1990. 300-23 .

journe t6rou~ Mile be Scu erN's Cartede Tendre A 17 -Ce tur,~ Salon Wovnan'sDream /Countrv~ o~Tenaevness

G(oria Fenian Orenstein

La Carte de Tendre, or the Map of the Country of Tenderness, made its debut i nthe first volume of Madeleine de Scuddry's novel Clelie (1654) . It is a map ofthe mythical Country of Tenderness, which is also a metaphor for Mlle d eScuddry 's heart and for her salon. As a salon game that soon became the rage inSeventeenth-century Parisian salon society, it can be viewed as a precursor ofmany board games, and one might also claim that it foreshadows certain con -temporary computer games . However, I see it more as a map of Mlle de Scudery' sdesire, and of the emotional geography of the territory of her political ambitionand her sexual imagination.

Mapping the domain of love had already been attempted several times be -fore she created her map of the domain of tender friendship . What differenti-ates her map from the others is that Tendre, the capital city of her country, wa salso her heart and her salon . However, since she had vowed to remain celibat eand unmarried all of her life, her map does not lead to the sexual consumma-tion of love . Indeed, love was banned from her country and her salon. Tendre isthe country of intimate friendship for Madeleine de Scudery.

James S. Munro, in his study Mademoiselle de Scudery and the Carte deTendre, places the creation of this salon map game in the tradition of allegorica lmaps of fantasy countries such as the Carte du Royaume d'Amour, which ap-peared in 1659 in the first volume of the Recueil de Sercy, attributed to Tristan1'Hermite . The destination of Tristan's pilgrim is Jouissance [Pleasure] .' Munrowrites :

The allegory transparently represents the development of aparticular kind of liaison which must have been commonplac eat the time; having met in the wood called Belle-Assemblee ,"qui est un bois fort agreable ou it y a presque toujours Con-certs de Luths & de Voix, ou du moms la grande Bande de sViolons & souuent la Comedie & le Bal" [which is a very agree -able forest where there are almost always vocal and lute con-certs or at least the great Band of violins and often theatre or aBall], the lovers pass through Reueue, Visite and Soupirs [Re-ceived, Visit and Sighs] to a town [and] [f]rom here, Jouissance[Pleasure] is reached by way of [Declared Passion, Protesta-tions, and Undertakings], where, we are told, "il y avait autre-fois . . .un chateau mediocrement fortifid, qu'on appelloit Resis-tance" [there had been, in the past . . .a mediocrely fortified castlethat was called Resistance] . [. . .] Beyond Jouissance [Pleasure]there lie [Satiety] and [Weak Friendship] . (Munro 41 )

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