Kindred, so far, is proving to be a very intriguing book. I am already completely invested in all of the characters, and find myself flying through the book because I want to find out what happens. While I was reading the assignment for today, some ideas were running around in my mind, and here they are!
One observation I had came in The Fire section after Dana has knocked her attacker unconscious and feels dizzy. At this point in the story, we are so absolutely caught up in Dana's struggles and in her life in 1815 that we forget that she actually has a way to get home. We are so worried, as she is too, that her attacker will regain consciousness and kill her for what she has done to him. We're so invested in the scene that it's not until we connect her feeling of fear and dizziness to her time travels that we realize she's going home, and that she is no longer in any immediate danger.
I thought this was brilliant on Butler's part. Not only is she setting the historical scene so well and accurately that we feel like we're there with Dana, but we are so far there that even in the context of the book, we forget that she has the ability to return to where she really belongs. Once she does, we are jolted out of 1815 and back into the book's present, and we feel the same relief she does at being safe and at home.
Something else that I liked was Butler's characterization of Kevin. He seems to be very quiet and un-emotive, but Butler made it clear that he cares about Dana. My favorite line was "[h]e gave me a look that I knew wasn't as malevolent as it seemed" (13). I know people fairly well whose actions resemble this look, and it takes a while to realize that they aren't just mad all the time, it's either that they don't express emotions easily, or something about their face makes them seem upset when they're really just zoning out into space.
I thought that instead of portraying Kevin and Dana as a lovey-dovey couple and showing that they care about each other that way, Butler shows it in Dana's understanding that he's really not upset even though he looks it. This tells us that they know each other well enough to read each other's emotions even if they're not immediately evident. Butler shows us their feelings in other ways, for example, Kevin doesn't express melodramatic concern for Dana when she returns home, which some people might see as him not caring about her. However, when Dana wakes up, she has been cleaned up and has a stocked up kit bag tied to her waist in case she were to disappear in the middle of the night. I can imagine Kevin sneaking around the room trying not to wake her, and preparing all of the things for the bag so that she would be safe on her travels. That, to me, shows the great deal of affection and a deep level of caring that Kevin has for Dana, even though it's not showy.
Anyway, I cannot wait to get to tonight's reading assignment and find out what happens next!
1 comment:
There is indeed relief at her sudden "escape" back home, and you describe the effect of this on a "real time" reader nicely. But the relative safety of this development is compromised a bit when we realize she's been fighting Kevin off of her, scratching at his face, much like a dreamer waking slowly from a dream. The past and present merge in a discomfiting way here, suggesting that what happens in 1815 Maryland doesn't necessarily stay there--these narrative planes will increasingly overlap as the story unfolds. When, at the close of this chapter, Kevin asks whether he really resembles the patrolman she thought she was fighting off, she reaffirms exactly the secure kind of love that their scenes together demonstrate (he looks like someone "she can come home to"). But her anxiety about having him come along with her brings these questions back up in a troubling way. What if she DOES start to see him differently, in light of their experiences together in the past? What if SHE changes, as well?
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