Like smallpox, influenza, Black Plague, malaria, AIDS, and typhus, the disease that Octavia Butler writes about in her science fiction is one that affects the American people in pandemic proportion. Octavia uses her story to illustrate the difficulties of life without written or spoken language.
"Speech Sounds" is a science fiction short story by Octavia Butler. Its most recent publication was 2008 in a collection of short stories titled Wastelands; first it was published in Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine in 1983; and in 1994 it won the Hugo Award for Best Short Story. The story is about an illness that hits America; this disease acted like a stroke and those that it left alive are left with an impediment; either they could not speak, or they could speak but could not write or read or any two combination of the three. A woman in Los Angeles, Rye, whose family the disease had whipped out, decides to leave her home and go to Pasadena to find her brother and two nephews, the only relatives she has alive. A fight breaks out in the bus on which she was travelling, and a man wearing a police uniform restores order to the bus and offers Rye a ride in his car. He could read but could not speak or write; Rye could speak but could not read or write. On the way to Pasadena, they made love and reluctantly he agrees to go home with her. They saw a man attacking a woman and tried to help her but it resulted in the death of the man and the woman and Obsidian. Rye discovers two small children who could speak and she decides to take them home.
Only the person who has lost the gift of communication can understand what has happen to the people of butler story. The people in Butler story is worse than what happen to the people of the Tower of Babel because they were fortunate to go with the group that speak their language. All that is left to the people in Butler’s story is universal signs that do not say much. This is confusion and frustration and it is no wonder that Rye has gotten to the point of hopelessness, and contemplates killing herself. “She had put off going until loneliness and hopelessness drove her outShe had left her home, finally, because she had come near to killing herself” (Butler). It is as if each person is in his and her own little world; people who could speak keep silent because no one understands them; and people who could read and write could not be understood either; that is the reason Rye thinks that the disturbance on the bus derived from misunderstanding. “Two young men were involved in a disagreement of some kind, or, more likely, a misunderstanding” (Butler). It is easy to comprehend why Rye thinks that there would be trouble on the bus at some point; frustration and misunderstanding can be very counterproductive.
Rye is a teacher and it must hurt very much when she discovers that she cannot read a book or write her name. She is prepared to take care of herself and that is the reason she carries a gun; she is well aware of the toll the disease has taken on the people who are left alive; she endures the obscene gestures that are made towards her and she trusted Obsidian to go into his car with him but she could not endure the fact that he could read and she could not. For a moment she is consumed with intense jealously she wants to kill Obsidian. “He could read, He could probably write, too. Abruptly, she hated him—deep, bitter hatred. ‘’’ But he was literate and she was not. She never would be. She felt sick to her stomach with hatred, frustration, and jealousy” (Butler). Of course Rye is not the only one in this predicament, there are bound to be others like her and that is the reason if she had to walk to Pasadena, she believes that it would be a dangerous twenty miles walk. Rye found a purpose to live and hope again when she realizes that the two supposedly orphan children can speak, her three years of silence is broken. She will still carry a gun to protect herself especially from her neighbor but now her life has meaning and she no longer needs to go to Pasadena. “When she (Rye) suddenly hears the children speak, fluently, she is suddenly hopeful. She believes that very young children won’t suffer from the disease. She begins to accept Obsidian’s death. He had been her protector, and now that his “job” was done, she had found her own calling” (web).
“Speech Sounds” is a sad story; the disease has changed lives in many ways, and it shows the importance of spoken and written language. “Butler wants to show the reader that language is important to a culture and without communication and human speech the breakdown of the social structure will affect people’s lives as seen in the story” (web)
Work Cited
“A Woman’s Voice in Butler’s ‘Speech Sounds.”’ (2013) Science Fiction, Media, and Culture in the 20th Century. A Graduate Seminar at IUP. Spring 2013 web. 4 Aug. 2013
Butler, Octavia. ( 1983). “Speech Sounds.” web. 2 Aug, 2013
“Speech Sounds.” (n.d.) web. 4 Aug,2013
