From then on the library was my second home.”įrom that young age, Butler persisted on being a writer in spite of many roadblocks. She had been taking me home, but now she immediately took me to the library and got me a card. I remember the surprised look on her face. When I was six and was finally given books to read in school, I found them incredibly dull they were Dick and Jane books. Someone would also talk to us about how to use the library. There we would sit, and someone would tell us-or read us-a story. The teachers would have us join hands and walk down to the library together. We didn't have a library at the school, but we were not that far from the main city library in Pasadena. In an interview, Butler stated, “I discovered the library back in kindergarten, I guess. Libraries gave Butler that first access to stories and books that would later inspire her to write. Butler recounts her mother’s reaction to her writing as a child, “Oh,” she said, “Maybe you’ll be a writer.” She started writing stories down by the age of 10. Butler started telling stories about a magical horse at the age of 4. In her notes for a speech given around 2001, Butler writes about the joy having someone read to you, “Being read to by my mother and the women at the library-being introduced to reading as fun, not as nasty, but necessary medicine that will make you better someday.” Her favorite books as a child were about horses, then fairy tales and later at the age of 12, science fiction. Now you read.’ She didn’t know what she was setting us both up for.” -Butler, Bloodchild As soon as I really got to like the stories, she said, ‘Here’s the book. “My mother read me bedtime stories until I was six years old. In Positive Obsession, the younger Butler writes: Butler, a maid who planted the seeds that inspired her daughter to read. Butler, īutler grew up in Pasadena, cared for by her single working class mother, Octavia M.
Photo courtesy of the Estate of Octavia E. According to Butler, “Public libraries … are the open universities of America.” Libraries helped to shape Butler into a writer and her relationship with the Central Library, in particular, served as an environment that allowed her to flourish. Butler’s ability to be creative and to be continually inspired to create is deeply tied to her library habit. How did Butler become this masterful creator of universes? Libraries, of course. While her literary output is not voluminous (in her 30-year career as a published author she wrote only 12 books and one collection of short stories), each one of her works is monumental in its depth, thought, and execution. Butler (1947-2006) is a writer, creator, world-builder and genius who made room in the white male-dominated science fiction world for works with African American female leads.
“Habit is persistence in practice.” -Octavia E.
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