Kindred

Better to stay alive," I said. "At least while there's a chance to get free." I thought of the sleeping pills in my bag and wondered just how great a hypocrite I was. It was so easy to advise other people to live with their pain.

Repressive societies always seemed to understand the danger of "wrong" ideas.

That educated didn’t mean smart. He had a point. Nothing in my education or knowledge of the future had helped me to escape. Yet in a few years an illiterate runaway named Harriet Tubman would make nineteen trips into this country and lead three hundred fugitives to freedom.

...I realized that I knew less about loneliness than I had thought - and much less than I would know when he went away.

She means the devil with people who say you're anything but what you are.

Like all good works of fiction, it lies like the truth.

I'd rather see the others." "What others?" "The ones who make it. The ones living in freedom now." "If any do." "They do." "Some say they do. It's like dying, though, and going to heaven. Nobody ever comes back to tell you about it.

Rufus had caused her trouble, and now he had been rewarded for it. It made no sense. No matter how kindly he treated her now that he had destroyed her, it made no sense.

Then, somehow, I got caught up in one of Kevin's World War II books - a book of excerpts from the recollections of concentration camp survivors. Stories of beatings, starvation, filth, disease, torture, every possible degradation. As though the Germans had been trying to do in only a few years what the Americans had worked at for nearly two hundred. ... Like the Nazis, antebellum whites had known quite a bit about torture - quite a bit more than I ever wanted to learn.

There are so many interesting times we could have visited.

I closed my eyes and saw the children playing their game again. 'The ease seemed so frightening.' I said. 'Now I see why.' 'What?' 'The ease. Us, the children ... I never realized how easily people could be trained to accept slavery.

As a kind of castaway myself, I was happy to escape into the fictional world of someone else's trouble.

I lost an arm on my last trip home.

She lowered her voice to a whisper. “You need to look at some of the niggers they catch and bring back,” she said. “You need to see them—starving, ’bout naked, whipped, dragged, bit by dogs … You need to see them.” “I’d rather see the others.” “What others?” “The ones who make it. The ones living in freedom now.” “If any do.” “They do.” “Some say they do. It’s like dying, though, and going to heaven. Nobody ever comes back to tell you about it.

Frankly, it never occurred to me that I needed someone who looked like me to show me the way. I was ignorant and arrogant and persistent and the writing left me no choice at all.”9

The ease. Us, the children… I never realized how easily people could be trained to accept slavery

in an interview Butler has stated that the meaning of the amputation is clear enough: “I couldn’t really let her come all the way back. I couldn’t let her return to what she was, I couldn’t let her come back whole and that, I think, really symbolizes her not coming back whole. Antebellum slavery didn’t leave people quite whole.”1 Time

Strangely, they seemed to like him, hold him in contempt, and fear him all at the same time. This confused me because I felt just about the same mixture of emotions for him myself. I had thought my feelings were complicated because he and I had such a strange relationship. But then, slavery of any kind fostered strange relationships. Only the overseer drew simple, unconflicting emotions of hatred and fear when he appeared briefly. But then, it was part of the overseer’s job to be hated and feared while the master kept his hands clean.

I lost an arm on my last trip home. My left arm.

I couldn’t let her come back whole and that, I think, really symbolizes her not coming back whole. Antebellum slavery didn’t leave people quite whole.

Daddy’s the only man I know,” he said softly, “who cares as much about giving his word to a black as to a white.

She was strange now, erratic, sometimes needing my friendship, trusting me with her dangerous longings for freedom, her wild plans to run away again; and sometimes hating me, blaming me for her trouble. One

He led the way past the main house away from the slave cabins and other buildings, away from the small slave children who chased each other and shouted and didn’t understand yet that they were slaves.

Someday Rufus would own the plantation. Someday, he would be the slaveholder, responsible in his own right for what happened to the people who lived in those half-hidden cabins. The boy was literally growing up as I watched—growing up because I watched and because I helped to keep him safe. I was the worst possible guardian for him—a black to watch over him in a society that considered blacks subhuman, a woman to watch over him in a society that considered women perennial children. I would have all I could do to look after myself. But I would help him as best I could. And I would try to keep friendship with him, maybe plant a few ideas in his mind that would help both me and the people who would be his slaves in the years to come.

She went to him. She adjusted, became a quieter more subdued person. She didn't kill, but she seemed to die a little.

Slavery was a long slow process of dulling.

You want to know how moral she is?” His tone made me frown. “What do you mean?” “If she chases me any harder, she and I will wind up playing a scene from that Bible she reads. The scene between Potiphar’s wife and Joseph.

Sometimes I wrote things because I couldn't say them, couldn't sort out my feelings about them, couldn't keep them bottled inside me.

But tired as I was, I couldn’t sleep. I thought of Alice, and then of Rufus, and I realized that Rufus had done exactly what I had said he would do: Gotten possession of the woman without having to bother with her husband. Now, somehow, Alice would have to accept not only the loss of her husband, but her own enslavement. Rufus had caused her trouble, and now he had been rewarded for it. It made no sense. No matter how kindly he treated her now that he had destroyed her, it made no sense. I

This is the biggest lot of abolitionist trash I ever saw.” “No it isn’t,” I said. “That book wasn’t even written until a century after slavery was abolished.” “Then why the hell are they still complaining about it?