“The Storm,” “The Rope,” and “Epilogue”

Kevin and Dana

 Kindred. Published in 1979.



In “Kindred” Octavia Butler states that Kevin was longer than Dana because Kevin wanted to live more real situations than Dana’s ancestors lived. It prolonged stay affects Kevin in many ways like he could't see the situations lived at that time, same as Dana saw, Kevin saw more natural when whites treated black people as slavers. Kevin acted as Dana master, Kevin sometimes was forced to treat Dana in ways he would not normally treat her because Dana's and Kevin's races was that it was illegal for them to be married in the slavery times. They usually had to hide this from whites for keeping Dana in safe.

When Kevin came back together with Dana from their travel, Dana unfortunately discovered that his lovely husband Kevin had similarities between her cruelty ancestors, Rufus.  Both of them were whites, which it was a big advantage at that time.  White’s males had power in slavery times.  Also, Kevin and Rufus spoke with strong southern accents. Both Kevin and Rufus cared for Dana in different way, Rufus’s love for Dana was expressed more after Alice’s death, but his love was only for satisfy his desires by force. Rufus always considered Dana lower class than him.  In contrast, Kevin, Dana’s husband would never attempt to force Dana into anything. According to Butler, Dana said “He was so careful, so fearful of hurting me” (190).  Dana offered, but Kevin at the beginning refused because he was scared Dana will be hurt more than she already was. Also, Kevin always considered Dana an equal of him. This alteration isn't symbol of changes because today's human being always are trying to hurt between them.  So, only people who grown up with values know how to treat and have compassion for others.