Kindred by Octavia Butler Book Analysis

The 1800s were a cruel time that lacked a lot of morals. People in the 1800s did many unforgivable things and people were led to do them because of their environment around them, people were raised seeing cruel things making them see it as normal, constantly perpetuating the cycle, and leaving the world as an awful place for most areas. In Kindred, Butler was trying to say that the influences and upbringings of people directly change how they view the world and how they will treat others. Furthermore, the principles that people have at the start of their lives rarely change. For example, no matter how much time Kevin has spent in a harsh environment he still wants to be a good person because that is one of his core values. 

Throughout the story of Kindred, Kevin’s character changes drastically. While he does not necessarily get worse he becomes more of a grim person with a very altered view of life. As the story progresses Kevin is faced with many hardships, the biggest being when he was trapped in the past for 5 years. He was seeing how terrible things were back in the 1800s and how much better he had it. “ There was a long silence. He pulled me closer to him. “Do I really look like that patroller?” “No.” “Do I look like someone you can come home to from where you may be going?”  “I need you here to come home to. I’ve already learned that”’ He gave me a long thoughtful look. “Just keep coming home,” He said finally. “I need you here too.’””(51). At the start of the book Kevin is an extremely caring and supportive character, he tries to come to Dana’s every need after she has her first and second travel to the past, and he wants to make sure she is well and not injured. Dana also relies on him to support her so they are much more connected at the start of the book, they act more like a pair than individuals. “ He pulled away from me and walked out of the room. The expression on his face was like something I’d seen, something I was used to seeing on Tom Weylin. Something closed and ugly. I didn’t go after him when I left his office. I didn’t know what to do to help him, and I didn’t want to look at him and see things that reminded me of Weylin. But because I went to the bedroom, I found him. ” (194). After five years of being in the past, Kevin had changed a lot. He was an angrier and less comfortable person, he did not want to talk about his experiences or open up to Dana as he did in the past. He had also adopted some traits that reminded Dana of Tom Weylin, such as his accent and his anti-social tendencies. This makes one wonder how much worse Kevin could have gotten if he was there longer. 

Kevin's strong moral compass made him intervene with the injustices witnessed first hand. He did this by helping slaves escape and trying to be as helpful as possible given the circumstances. When he returns to the 1980s Dana questions him about what he did in the past. ““Were you helping slaves to escape?” “Of course I was! I fed them, hid them during the day, and when night came, I pointed them toward a free black family who would feed and hide them the next day.” I smiled and said nothing. He sounded angry, almost defensive about what he had done. ” (193). While Kevin had changed in the past he did not necessarily become a bad person. The quote illustrates how closed of a person Kevin had become, Dana had to almost interrogate him to get him to open up. even though he had become a grimmer person and adopted some worse traits, he was still good at heart and wanted to do the right thing. The way Butler wrote his character, he will never change wanting to do the right thing. “You’re beautiful,” I said. “You look a little like a heroic portrait I saw once of Andrew Jackson.” “No way,” he said. “Man was skinny as hell. I’ve seen him.” “But you haven’t seen my heroic portrait.” “Why the hell did you cut your wrists? You could have bled to death! Or did you cut them yourself?” “Yes. It got me home.” “There must be a safer way.” I rubbed my wrists gingerly. “There isn’t any safe way to almost kill yourself. I was afraid of the sleeping pills. I took them with me because I wanted to be able to die if … if I wanted to die. But I was afraid that if I used them to get home, I might die before you or some doctor figured out what was wrong with me. Or that if I didn’t die, I’d have some grisly side-effect—like gangrene.” As soon as Dana gets back after being lost for 8 months, Kevin is there and reconnects with Dana instantly, she is reminded of her love for her husband before addressing the extreme hardships she went through. Kevin quickly changes the topic to her health and well-being, pondering why she hurt herself and how he can help. He tries to be supportive as soon as he can. 

In Kindred,  Octavia Butler did an excellent job writing a character that while not being a white knight or saving grace, really supports and helps Dana throughout the challenges she faces. Throughout the book, Kevin changes from being a very cheery supportive character to being a grimmer but still caring person. He never strayed from his core values and always tried to do what he saw as the morally correct thing to do. Kevin changes a lot but never broke his principles and never did something that would hurt or negatively affect Dana. Overall Kevin is a good person and a great character.