Bloodchild Response

1. Bloodchild reminded me a lot of the situation Octavia Butler gave us in Dawn -- humans and aliens living together as a family unit. However, in Bloodchild she seems to push more the feeling that the aliens are in the wrong. In Dawn, I never decided firmly who was more wrong, the aliens or the humans, and I think that’s the way she intended the novel. In Bloodchild, I get the feeling that Gan is more of a deceived host than part of an extended family. Instead of sharing genetics and children between the species, coming up with a blended mix of both for progeny, there is a separation between the human children and the alien children. The human children occur naturally with no help from the alien. The alien children are very dependent on the human host, living as parasites in their bodies and potentially killing their hosts if left alone. It’s incredibly disturbing to think about, just as Butler meant it to be. The deal which allows the humans to sort of accept this treatment is the sterile eggs, which when eaten, help them live beyond their natural age. To put it simply, in exchange for long life, the humans sell their bodies. I think it’s tough to say whether this exchange is inherently bad or perfectly acceptable. Part of what makes it feel so much worse is the fact that a human can’t really opt out of this exchange without dooming a family member to the same fate. The relationship between humans and aliens is symbiotic, not simply parasitic, but it's still a relationship that is maintained by an unspoken threat.

2. To start with, I’d like to connect two smaller points of Dawn and Bloodchild together – the role of gender in each, since we’ve been talking about that a lot this semester anyways. It’s interesting that Butler seems to sometimes narrow her focus in at males struggling with the idea of creating alien children. In Dawn, it was often the men who would perceive injustice from the aliens most strongly and act out because of it. She seems to say that men are not used to being “taken,” to not being the dominant one in a relationship, and that’s what they rebel most strongly against. In Bloodchild, the men are the ones usually used for carrying alien children. She’s taken the concept of males doing something “feminine” and pushed it even further, into the maternal realm. Butler seems to see something both valuable and negative in the masculine tendency to rebel against being subservient, against being maternal. On the one hand, it could be seen that men are being tough against the oppressive hand of the aliens. They’re the only ones taking the initiative to start an uprising against a perceived tyranny. On the other hand, you can say that the men’s perceived tyranny doesn’t have to exist, and they’re causing needless conflict and violence just to maintain their own fragile pride. There’s something to be said in favor of both sides. Masculinity’s pride is not inherently wrong, and neither is femininity’s flexibility. And neither are they really limited to men and women. I don’t think it’s pertinent any longer to write so many of the men tough and masculine, and so many of the women flexible and feminine – I don’t think it rings true as a real reflection of how our society’s gender roles work. My father and I would probably prefer the peaceful, subservient way that is seen as feminine, but I think my sister and mother would probably agree with the men.

3. The first thing I would do in Bloodchild would be to deepen the cast and strengthen their personalities. Since this story is about the different ways you could take such an alien presence in your life, with Gan, Hao, Qui, and their mother as the four main viewpoints, I would define each of the newly deepened characters by their view on this first. Who is Gan’s other sister? What does she think? What about Gan’s father? I would bring both sisters and father further into the spotlight in Bloodchild, allowing them roles as supporting cast rather than just vaguely mentioned background characters. Give the cast more room to breathe before Lomas stumbles in and starts making things terrifying. We should get to know the family members at their most comfortable, only then to be thrown into conflict. Since I do so much work in school in the language of film, and this is already a successful short story, I would use the medium of short film to retell Bloodchild. The natural tendency of most directors would be to focus on the gore and the horror of T’Gatoi chopping up Lomas for the grubs, but I’d want to avoid sensationalizing that portion of the film. Show it only briefly or solemnly, and otherwise focus on Gan’s reactions to what is happening. Have a strong contrast between his initial comfort with T’Gatoi, and how later he becomes disturbed by the aliens. Maintain a careful tone to the film and its musical score so that it tips neither into saccharinely ignoring the problem nor making a horror show of them.