“Poetry dwells in a perpetual utopia of it’s own”- William Hazlett

One of my favorite parts of the “Parable of  the Talents” is the poetry that Octavia Butler incorporates throughout the entire book. It got me wondering why poetry would be so involved in a utopian novel so I started to search around and see what other utopian thinkers and poets thought. Many believed that poetry and utopia are inseparable from each other; each is dependent on the other to be successful. This makes sense when considering the history of poetry because many poems were written to describe a utopia or to portray our world in a utopian perspective.

Consider this poem written by Kathy Pottle titled “Utopia”:

Nobody will ask
whether the speaker is the author

or a persona.

Some people will like

to muss the hair of children

Buck teeth will be a sign

of character.

No one will wear

white cotton underwear.

The sun will rise
the moon will rise

the sun will retire

the moon will fade.

Interest in bloody meats,

green grapes, and peas

will increase

This poem actually is Pottle’s version of utopia and how it should be presented which perfectly intertwines the idea of utopia and poetry, which Butler also uses in “Parable of the Talents”. Butler uses the poetry as a way to make the story breathe, to make it more alive and all encompassing. It’s no wonder that so many authors have the idea that poetry and utopia are so  connected and why several poets and authors use them to play off each other.

Do you agree that poetry is an integral part of  utopia or vice versa?

          In issue I believe to be important, when contemplating Octavia Butler’s, Parable of The Talents, is the gender norms that are defined in, not only this, but all post-apocalyptic world. As Olamina writes:    

“I’ve heard that in some of the more religious towns, repression of women has become more and more extreme. A women who expresses her opinions, ‘nags,’ disobeys her husband, or otherwise ‘tramples her womanhood’ and ‘acts like a man,’ might have her head shaved, her forehead branded, her tongue cut out, or, worst case, she might be stoned to death or burned.” (Butler, 55)

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What if our American society was perfect in every sense of the word. We did not have homelessness, violence, poverty; everyone had a job and made a decent living for themselves. What if the government did not have to do much governing because we conducted ourselves in a civil fashion that required little law enforcement? You may ask well how could this be?
One day out of the every year every citizen is able to wreck havoc amongst the country; you can rob, steal, kill, fight, burn up a town if you like! You will not suffer any consequences for the crimes you commit, all of the anger you may have had for the entire year can be released on anyone or anything and no one could reprimand you. All for the sake of peace, tranquility, and prosperity throughout the rest of the year. Your only goal is to stay alive during this period and make it to the next day; twenty four hours of mayhem, in order to live a great life for 364 days. Would you choose to live in such a society, would the pros our way the cons?
This is actually a movie that will be in theaters next month. But what if American society did function as such; one night of suffering for a year of happiness. This reminds me of “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas”, in order to maintain a great lifestyle, someone had to suffer. As long as the person is not you and your loved ones, would you live there for the sake of a great life throughout the year?
Check out the movie trailer: The Purge, and tell me what you think!

The outside source which I chose for this second blog post is a dissertation paper which focuses on comparing the utopian aspects of Atlas Shrugged and The Dispossessed. Comparing these two is very interesting, because despite their obvious differences, both novels place a huge emphasis on the importance of the individual, and the development of both narratives parallel the development of the main characters.
The piece caught my eye because Atlas Shrugged is one of my favorite novels of all time, and The Dispossessed… Not so much. Because of this, the comparisons that the author of the dissertation found are fairly interesting, because she argues that the two books are not in-fact polar opposites.
In Atlas, the main story spends most of its time following the personal development of Dagny, as she discovers the ethos which Rand wants her story to embody. The same can be said of Shevek. If you were to read Dispossessed chronologically, the parallels would be even stronger, as you could likely mark similar points in both plots.
What’s most interesting is the fact that Shevek does share some key similarities with characters like Dagny and Hank Rearden, and at the same time presents the antithesis to them. Many of the decisions that Shevek makes during the course of The Dispossessed are driven by a desire for Shevek to improve Shevek’s life – he is fundamentally selfish in this respect. In contrast to that, however, Shevek wishes to freely give his invention of instant interstellar communication away to all of humanity for free; this would make Hank Rearden gag.
Reading the dissertation and “knowing” both Ayn Rand’s characters and Ursela Le Guin’s characters, I find it really interesting to think about what a conversation between some of them would be like. I wonder if Hank and Shevek could find any common ground, or if they really would be the worst of enemies. Also, I wonder if the ‘individualism above all else’ mentality has any place in an anarchist society like Annares.

Today at my internship I had to review information published by local organizations about their volunteer programs and opportunities. There is a section within the website where the organization is suppose to include any requirements needed in order to be a volunteer. In this section, most organizations include training or certifications, maybe vaccinations are required, or simply a particular schedule. So it caught me off guard when I came across one organization and read as their requirement: “Volunteers must be in good standing with the community.”

I kept starring at this listed requirement and wondered what “good standing” really meant? And who determines this “good standing” anyways? In order to be a volunteer did you have to have good standing with literally the entire community?  Needless to say, I was taking this one sentence a bit too far. But then in class we discussed Le Guin’s attempt at desiging an egalitarian society and it brought to mind a few things: social norms, misfits, and Shevek.

Let’s imagine that the organization I came across was Le Guin’s attempt at egalitarianism.  Let’s also imagine that Shevek wanted to volunteer in this community.  While the society may aim for pure equality, having “good standing” as a requirement eliminates all sense of equality because of the need for interpretation.  Much like Plato’s “body” metaphor, a individual or group will have to decide what “good standing” means, thus who can fit into this “good standing” norm.  Additionally, what happens when someone doesn’t meet this requirement?  Are they not allowed to volunteer because a member of the community simply didn’t like him/her?  If so, how fair is that – let alone, how egalitarian?

(Clearly I’m on the verge of overanalyzing one organizations volunteer requirement, but I thought it was an odd demand for them to include on their page.)

During class discussions, we talked about the severity to which one can, “dispossess,” themselves and remove any and all possessive pronouns. For example, it is not, “my coffee,” but instead, “the coffee i drink.” The removal of these property values can go to the extreme and the complete removal in my mind is possible, especially on a planet like Anarres. However, despite this fact, I believe that politics cannot be completely removed, even in a anarchic society like on Anarres.

The article I chose to discuss in relation to this topic describes this in three different societies created in literature: Aldous Huxley’s The Island, Le Guin’s Anarres, and Callenbach’s Ecotopia.  In these three societies, Christie Mathisen Werner addresses the slight, but influential factors of politics that develop the utopia. This claim is based upon the fact that there is an institution on Anarres; despite it being utterly powerless, institutions signal politics in action.

The institution mentioned before on Anarres is the, “Production and Distribution Coordination,” (PDC). Werner goes on to state, “[the] PDC has no formal authority; it cannot give the communities or individuals of Anarres any orders.” (59)   This political institution is not created for the purpose of governing, but instead consulting. I, along with Werner, believe that because Le Guin so successfully eliminated the hierarchical system normally associated with politics, that this point is ignored or missed completely. Le Guin assimilated the little portion of politics in the daily life of an anarchy; hiding it completely. Werner states, “The informality and emotionality of political discussions in both Ecotopia and Anarres are indications of – and contribute to – a low degree of differentiation and institutionalization of political activity in these Utopian societies.” (61)

The PDC serves as the only systematic and central instrument within the civilization of Anarres. The PDC serves as a political paradox; acting as the only political or central institution in this society, the simple existence of this entity prevents and protects against any further institutional power being gained anywhere else. Therefore, because of politics, politics cannot form or grow into what we know it as now.

http://www.jstor.org.nuncio.cofc.edu/stable/pdfplus/20718238.pdf?acceptTC=true

This past week, an embryo was formed from the DNA of three people, in an attempt to prevent the passage of certain genetic disorders. While it is technically still illegal in the United Kingdom, the study from “The Britain’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority” generally supported by the public. The process to create the embryo is a method of in vitro fertilization which uses trace amounts of DNA from one woman to replace damaged portions of DNA in the original mother’s egg. “The process in question involves replacing the genetic information governing the mitochondria in the cells.” Other people are concerned with the path this may lead down, as we have heard worries about designer babies time and time again. While it has been some time since we discussed Oryx and Crake, I thought it tied in well to some of the discussions we’ve had in class.

Check it out here: http://www.itechpost.com/articles/6927/20130321/uk-supports-three-parent-genetically-modified-babies.htm