She wanted to give historical context to what he was saying. Some comments made by an African American, who was involved in the black power movement, at her college helped her form the basis for a best selling novel (called “Kindred”), even though he did so inadvertently. She pushed herself anyway, and would win a short story contest that she entered in her first year in college. Butler felt that she could write a better movie, and drafted what would later become her “Patternist” series of novels.Īn aunt discouraged her from writing and upset some of her confidence by telling her that black people could not be writers. She saw a movie, in a televised form, called “Devil Girl From Mars”, which she did not like at the age of twelve years old. Her mother, after Octavia begged her to, got her a typewriter when she was only ten. She was first hooked on horse stories and fairy tales, but would also become interested in science fiction magazines. This led her to spend a lot of time at the library and reading books, and she would also write in a big notebook that she had. She had a strong shyness that made it hard for her to socialize with other people and her slight dyslexia that made it difficult for her to do schoolwork, made her think much less of herself and became an easy target for the bullies in her school. This was even though the integrated town of Pasadena allowed her to see diversity firsthand. While growing up during segregation, she got to see that her mother was not treated very well by her white employers she would have to enter through the back doors of the homes that she would clean.

She was raised by her mother and her mother’s mother (in what she would call a strict Baptist environment) due to the fact that her father died when she was only seven years old. Author Octavia Estelle Butler was born in the town of Pasadena, California on the date Jshe was the only child of a housemaid (Octavia Margaret Guy) and shoeshine man (Laurice James Butler).

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