LITR 4632: Literature of the Future

Student Midterms 2011: Sample Essay 2

Katherine Fellows
24 June 2011

Creation/Apocalypse Versus Evolutionary/Alternative Narratives and Their Effects on Visions of Future Literacy

          When my parents attended primary school, both print and cursive writing were emphasized, but by the time that I left the fifth grade, cursive was but a faded memory in my mind. Now, as I graduate from college, educators argue whether cursive script is relevant at all to today’s population; the more old-fashioned often claim that cursive is necessary when providing one’s signature, while more new-minded thinkers state that pens and paper are being replaced by computers, anyhow. When reading this semester’s texts, then, I could not help but notice how differently stories following different primary narrative structure—creation/apocalypse versus evolutionary—emphasized or deemphasized literacy in their visions of the future.

          In Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, for instance, more privileged characters enjoy the benefits of literacy. Lauren, the main character, draws from exposure to her father’s Baptist religion and eventually creates her own religion, Earthseed, based on a self-written text. Lauren seeks to help Amy—a young, troubled girl—improve her personality and moral standing by enrolling her early in school:

Tonight I asked Cory if Amy could start school early. Cory doesn’t take kids until they’re five or close to five, but she said she’d let Amy in if I would take charge of her. […] I think, though, that if someone doesn’t help Amy now, someday she’ll do something a lot worse than burning down her family’s garage.

In Parable of the Sower, then, literacy is portrayed as an opportunity to improve one’s situation in life.

          In Paul Di Filippo’s “Stone Lives,” however, literacy is seen as obsolete. Cave paintings were once replaced by an alphabet, and the natural evolution of language is for the written word to be replaced by speech. Citrine explains to Stone,

As for reading and writing—those outmoded skills of my youth—June will assist you in learning those if you wish. But you have machines to read to you and transcribe your speech. (187-188)

          This seems to contrast the importance of literacy depicted in Parable of the Sower. Parable of the Sower, a primarily apocalyptic narrative, portrays literacy as one of the few remaining characteristics of humanity; as people rape, assault, steal, and burn all things and people in sight, the language Lauren uses to create Earthseed band her group of traveling companions together and, at the end of the novel, their community forms a strong bond that presumably carries Earthseed on past the approaching apocalypse. Language is Lauren’s redemption.  However, in “Stone Lives,” non-apocalyptic thinking prevails. As Citrine dies and is replaced by Stone, the written word dies and is replaced by the spoken word. Written language is unnecessary and not missed.

          I find the contrast between literary emphases interesting, then, and particularly telling as to how our own emphasis on literacy may change in the future. As an evolutionary thinker, I cannot help but think that the written word will eventually become obsolete—that, somehow, we will find a more effect method of communication. Only time will tell.