WEBVTT - Why Didn't We Watch, KINDRED??! 0:00:00.840 --> 0:00:04.920 My name is Jacquees Thomas and you're listening to Black Lit, 0:00:05.680 --> 0:00:12.360 a podcast about black literature and the stories behind the storytellers. 0:00:13.440 --> 0:00:15.440 There is so much we can take away from this 0:00:15.640 --> 0:00:21.640 exploration of Octavia Butler's work. At every turn, her narratives 0:00:21.680 --> 0:00:27.280 compel us to reflect, question, and reimagine the world as 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:31.600 it is. With every interview, a new depth of insight 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:35.879 into her psyche is revealed. We've only cracked the surface, 0:00:36.440 --> 0:00:40.720 and there is so much more to discover. The complexities 0:00:40.760 --> 0:00:44.159 of her life, the choices that she made to dedicate 0:00:44.200 --> 0:00:48.600 her existence to the craft of writing during a time 0:00:48.640 --> 0:00:53.440 where she didn't have strength in numbers. She was one 0:00:53.479 --> 0:00:59.920 of one. As we transform our experiences, observations and perspectives, 0:01:00.600 --> 0:01:06.520 and to the stories for tomorrow, inevitable question surface. Butler's 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:11.679 inquiries into the human condition opens pathways into understanding the mind, 0:01:12.440 --> 0:01:17.880 envisioning the future, and unraveling how our past has shaped 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:25.240 our bloodlines and family structures. She wrote, all that you touch, 0:01:25.360 --> 0:01:32.840 you change, all that you change changes you. The ony 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:40.720 lasting truth is change. God is change. The power of 0:01:40.840 --> 0:01:46.160 influence and the exploration of identity themes that resonate throughout 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:52.560 her entire Over her work prompts endless questions and ideas, 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:59.840 with each page and interview revealing new discoveries. Her writings 0:02:00.040 --> 0:02:05.200 beckon us to lose ourselves and then rediscover paths we 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:09.440 never conceived, only to lose ourselves once more and the 0:02:09.560 --> 0:02:16.560 richness of our imagination. These layers are not merely for enjoyment, 0:02:17.320 --> 0:02:22.000 but provide a textured ground to examine in seeds of thought, 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:27.240 seeds in which I can only hope will continue to 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:34.440 be planted for the next generation. Over the last few years, 0:02:34.639 --> 0:02:39.519 the word legacy has occupied my mind with a new significance. 0:02:41.040 --> 0:02:47.320 Legacy is the opportunity to leave behind something of value, 0:02:47.720 --> 0:02:53.480 something that not only inspires, but also enriches lives long 0:02:53.520 --> 0:03:00.240 after we are gone. Butler's legacy indoors. Her works are 0:03:00.280 --> 0:03:05.720 now a part of educational curricula, discussions on podcasts, and 0:03:05.800 --> 0:03:10.760 are being adapted for television and theater. Kindred, her popular 0:03:10.880 --> 0:03:13.440 narrative and the very first of her works to be 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:17.799 adapted to television, tells the story of an American bloodline 0:03:18.160 --> 0:03:21.080 and the horrors that occurred in order for the lead 0:03:21.200 --> 0:03:27.200 character and her family to exist. Kindred asks readers to 0:03:27.560 --> 0:03:31.720 examine the truth of our history as a country, and 0:03:32.240 --> 0:03:35.240 it's not a soft swallow, but a harsh reality that 0:03:35.360 --> 0:03:39.080 Butler doesn't shy away from the importance of knowing and 0:03:39.160 --> 0:03:45.080 the sensitivities around accepting what happened. To confront what is, 0:03:46.120 --> 0:03:51.120 Butler challenges us to confront these truths head on, not 0:03:51.160 --> 0:03:58.040 as passive observers, but as active participants seeking understanding. In 0:03:58.080 --> 0:04:01.800 the wake of a divisive election, the harrowing tooths of 0:04:01.840 --> 0:04:06.840 our past and present intertwine like persistent weeds at our roots, 0:04:07.120 --> 0:04:11.360 deep beneath the soil. Butler anticipated with somber pragmatism, but 0:04:11.920 --> 0:04:17.320 no less hope. Hope remains a consistent anchor to cling 0:04:17.400 --> 0:04:21.800 on to a beacon amids the turmoil. As we stand 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:25.680 here thirty years from Butler's introduction to Powerable of the Sower, 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:30.320 one must wonder how she would interpret the current political climate, 0:04:31.200 --> 0:04:38.279 societal divisions, and the environmental degradation. This quote from Eddie 0:04:38.320 --> 0:04:41.080 s claud Junior stood out to me this week. 0:04:42.800 --> 0:04:45.640 When we imagine the world as it could be and 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:48.680 use that imagination to critique the world as it is, 0:04:49.240 --> 0:04:51.600 all of us have that capacity. 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:56.760 The capacity for a moral imagination that sees well beyond 0:04:56.880 --> 0:05:01.599 the opacity of our conditions, because if we can envision 0:05:01.640 --> 0:05:07.159 an alternative world, an alternative future, surely we can create it. 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:13.840 Brandon Jacob Jenkins, the creator of the Kindred series, joins 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:16.920 us in a conversation later, but here are a few 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:20.840 of his thoughts on the power of our imaginations and 0:05:20.960 --> 0:05:24.160 a necessity to have the freedom to imagine. 0:05:26.400 --> 0:05:31.880 The Black imagination is profound, you know, and we have 0:05:32.000 --> 0:05:35.920 to have unfettered access to imagine whatever we want, how 0:05:36.040 --> 0:05:38.560 we want. And it's the obligation of the creative to 0:05:38.640 --> 0:05:43.000 constantly celebrate that and honor that and defend that. Because 0:05:43.880 --> 0:05:47.200 if someone's out there not letting your life and your 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:50.200 history and your context on this planet get into that 0:05:50.279 --> 0:05:54.039 space of viewership and imagining, something's off. 0:05:55.080 --> 0:06:01.359 Beware Octavia Butler Champion science fiction are for futurism during 0:06:01.360 --> 0:06:06.320 her era, but now the fire is lit amongst mini writers, 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:16.360 creatives and citizens. So what are you thinking, What observations 0:06:16.360 --> 0:06:21.640 and questions are emerging in your own self reflection, because 0:06:21.640 --> 0:06:28.200 that's where it starts. What alternative world can you create 0:06:29.800 --> 0:06:35.960 despite the pervasive uncertainty? What will be your legacy? How 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:39.359 will you use your voice, your pen, your action to 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:42.280 shape the world beyond what it is. 0:06:44.120 --> 0:06:44.760 Or what was. 0:06:47.040 --> 0:06:52.720 Octavia's predictions were based on patterns, history repeating itself, humans 0:06:53.600 --> 0:06:59.160 repeating themselves and falling over the same lines in the sand, 0:07:00.200 --> 0:07:02.760 and then drawing it all over again, just to fall 0:07:03.320 --> 0:07:07.760 all over again. What will be here? 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:08.320 Like as he. 0:07:13.600 --> 0:07:16.080 We can be better with human beings than that. But 0:07:16.360 --> 0:07:20.640 it's so tempting to be greedy and have power and 0:07:20.720 --> 0:07:21.680 keep it from other people. 0:07:25.720 --> 0:07:29.360 In America, it is time to draw something new through 0:07:29.360 --> 0:07:33.320 the lens of a moral imagination, with the depth of 0:07:33.400 --> 0:07:38.760 knowing that everything we touch changes, and the need to 0:07:38.920 --> 0:07:44.200 heal at the root is dire, so that we can 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:47.440 grow past our stunted patterns. 0:07:49.880 --> 0:07:53.840 Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led 0:07:53.880 --> 0:07:57.040 by a fool is to be led by the opportunists 0:07:57.160 --> 0:08:00.000 who control the fool. To be led by a law 0:08:00.840 --> 0:08:02.680 is to ask to be lied to. 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:08.640 But it's impossible to ignore the irony of the time, 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:15.080 the date, the topic, the year, and an exact journal 0:08:15.280 --> 0:08:20.760 entry from Lauren Olamina on Wednesday, November sixth, twenty twenty 0:08:20.800 --> 0:08:25.080 four and Powerable of the Sewer, in which she writes 0:08:25.120 --> 0:08:29.360 about the President elect and her concern about what they 0:08:29.440 --> 0:08:33.120 have ahead of them, She writes, Dad decided not to 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:36.400 vote for Donner. After all, he didn't vote for anyone. 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:41.720 He said, politicians turn his stomach. During this election, millions 0:08:41.720 --> 0:08:44.920 of people decided not to vote, not to show up 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:56.400 at all. Coincidence, perhaps having read Powerable of the Sewer 0:08:56.800 --> 0:09:01.400 and all of the things that were essentially predicted or 0:09:01.440 --> 0:09:07.720 calculated just from her watching NPR and just understanding the 0:09:07.840 --> 0:09:11.360 possible outcomes and in the state of the world that 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:15.880 we're in today, how do you feel about what she 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:19.679 prophesies and how these things have come to be as 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:23.640 a writer, as a black man, how does that sit 0:09:23.679 --> 0:09:24.000 with you? 0:09:25.280 --> 0:09:32.160 Who? I mean? I think the important thing, you know, 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:37.240 her great message inside of that was about adaptability and 0:09:37.320 --> 0:09:42.960 community and a deep understanding that change is the constant, 0:09:44.200 --> 0:09:51.200 and you know, how do we imagine our way out 0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:53.880 of the world that we've imagined our way into. That's 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:59.120 really that's really the clearing call. I think. You know, 0:09:59.160 --> 0:10:04.000 we're talking just days after the election, and people were 0:10:04.040 --> 0:10:05.959 still feeling all kinds of feelings. But I know those 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:08.240 feelings are going to be different feelings tomorrow and the 0:10:08.280 --> 0:10:11.080 day after that. And the thing to do is to 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:18.080 stay present and to locate one's dignity, locate one's worldview, 0:10:18.160 --> 0:10:22.000 and always articulate what you feel and what you know. 0:10:22.559 --> 0:10:25.160 And you keep history of life through the stories you tell. 0:10:25.280 --> 0:10:28.719 You keep your sense of self and your sense of 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:31.920 community live through the stories you tell. So that's what 0:10:32.000 --> 0:10:35.160 I kind of take away from her whole project. She 0:10:35.200 --> 0:10:38.880 didn't have to write these books, you know, and we're 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:42.960 all very grateful she did write these books. And I 0:10:43.000 --> 0:10:45.400 think it's up to us to kind of take as 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:49.760 an example for ourselves why she chose to write these books. 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:53.000 You know, that's what she decided to spend her life 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:57.359 on this planet doing. And how do we be inspired 0:10:57.400 --> 0:11:02.800 by that of human action? That's sort of my That's 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:06.480 where my mind takes me. That's where i'm today, That's 0:11:06.480 --> 0:11:16.240 where I'm staying. On Friday of Ember eighth, twenty twenty four, you. 0:11:16.240 --> 0:11:19.880 Are now listening to black Lit black List. 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:24.240 Well, the thing about Kindred that was very important was 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:27.640 it was the kind of watershed book for her. It 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:30.200 was sort of you know, I think if you take 0:11:30.240 --> 0:11:33.840 the kind of complete body of work of many great artists, 0:11:34.040 --> 0:11:36.720 there's always like a book that feels like a turning 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.520 point where nothing else could have happened unless this book 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:44.719 had happened. And I think that Kindred was that for her, 0:11:44.880 --> 0:11:47.559 like I think at some ways she was born as 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:50.120 a writer through the writing of that book. And you know, 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:53.960 she would say, I, since we come rather close with 0:11:54.040 --> 0:11:56.920 Merrily Hypetz, who is her great champion and her agent 0:11:57.000 --> 0:11:59.760 and currently her you know, Elery executor, and has really 0:11:59.760 --> 0:12:02.600 done incredible a lot of work to keep Octavia in 0:12:02.640 --> 0:12:05.520 the imaginary and keep her alive and keep her legacy alive, 0:12:06.160 --> 0:12:10.080 merely told me that she would say to to Octavia, 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:14.560 you know, you really should write a memoir. And Octavia say, 0:12:14.559 --> 0:12:18.480 I've already written a memoir. It's Kindred, and that there 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:20.880 was something about that book that was very personal, and 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:22.840 that was that was a book of a young person 0:12:23.480 --> 0:12:26.040 trying to make sense of what they cared about and 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:29.520 trying to figure out the themes that would motivate them 0:12:29.880 --> 0:12:32.160 and carry them through the rest of their body of work. 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:34.720 And when I began to sort of look at it 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:35.959 through that lands, you know, I was a teacher and 0:12:36.000 --> 0:12:37.800 I teach write. I haven't teaching writing about for over 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:40.480 a decade. You know, you do see in young writers, 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:43.000 you know, you see what them you see they're actively 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:47.680 wrestling with in those early works, and I really let 0:12:47.720 --> 0:12:50.760 that what I see her doing is actually trying to 0:12:50.880 --> 0:12:54.680 find the confidence to be a black female writer. 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:55.640 You know. 0:12:55.679 --> 0:13:00.160 I think it's no mistake that it's about you know, 0:13:00.240 --> 0:13:02.559 I always said, the art of that book is she's 0:13:02.640 --> 0:13:05.360 the black female writer married to a white male writer 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:08.520 who's very successful. But in the end, the book that's 0:13:08.520 --> 0:13:11.959 in your hands, it's her book techniquey right, that it's 0:13:12.000 --> 0:13:16.319 about a woman claiming an identity as an author and 0:13:15.600 --> 0:13:22.120 an artist and a person through this strange traumatic experience 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:26.920 that's part imagined, part reality, part historical, market temporary, you know. 0:13:27.160 --> 0:13:30.040 And that was really that was really fascinating, and I 0:13:30.040 --> 0:13:35.480 also was really moved to learn more about you know, 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:37.800 she It's hard for people to understand now, but like 0:13:37.880 --> 0:13:40.560 she was a real researcher at a time when research 0:13:40.679 --> 0:13:44.439 was not easy, and she was not affiliated with the university, 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:49.040 she was not an academic, you know, and she really 0:13:49.160 --> 0:13:53.320 was so such an autodidact and so self motivated that 0:13:53.440 --> 0:13:57.760 she paid her she paid for a greathound bus that 0:13:57.840 --> 0:14:00.680 took her all the way across the country to do 0:14:00.800 --> 0:14:04.960 research on this book at a time when you know, 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.040 we don't understand how lucky we are living or be 0:14:09.120 --> 0:14:12.320 living in an era that is dedicated to the moralization 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:18.640 of the American chattel slavery and like the memory of it. 0:14:18.960 --> 0:14:23.240 But at that time, which was you know, right around 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:27.640 the country celebration of it's like bi centennial, you know, 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:32.560 nobody was out here caring about this stuff in a 0:14:32.640 --> 0:14:38.200 significant way, writing about it, memorializing, theorizing, historicizing it. You know, 0:14:38.280 --> 0:14:40.760 that was We're looking at the very beginnings of the 0:14:40.800 --> 0:14:43.600 birth of like African American studies as we understand it 0:14:43.680 --> 0:14:46.560 a lot of ways, you know. And so for her 0:14:46.600 --> 0:14:49.160 to like decide she's gonna write this book, pay her 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:51.240 way on a greyhound, be on that bus for however 0:14:51.320 --> 0:14:54.800 many days, to go to like basically where I grew up, 0:14:54.960 --> 0:14:58.840 you know, Maryland, Eastern Shore, DC, and look at these 0:14:58.880 --> 0:15:02.680 crumbling plantations and I have government funding, you know, and 0:15:02.760 --> 0:15:06.600 try to piece together enough sense memory and reality to 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:10.120 kind of go into herself and tell this story is 0:15:10.120 --> 0:15:13.880 a profound undertaking with no Internet, no nothing, you know, 0:15:14.160 --> 0:15:18.520 it's ridiculous. And Merrily also told me that all through 0:15:18.560 --> 0:15:24.080 her career she was obsessed with she would like record 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:28.680 things on her like on like tailor and like cassette tapes, 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:32.680 and she would make these, especially she make podcasts for 0:15:32.720 --> 0:15:36.240 herself and she's like audible audibles, yes, by herself. She 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:38.840 would make them, you know, and she would just she 0:15:39.000 --> 0:15:41.440 just had a methodology of bringing that knowledge to her 0:15:41.480 --> 0:15:44.480 and synthesizing that knowledge, and her work is proof of 0:15:44.480 --> 0:15:48.160 how you know, that work yields more than just the 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:50.920 knowledge itself. In some ways, people argue she brings she 0:15:51.160 --> 0:15:53.240 was a prophet in many, many of these books, but 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:58.480 she was definitely making these interesting arguments through fiction about 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:02.880 thinks like genetics, epi genetics, like providence of racial you know, 0:16:03.000 --> 0:16:06.400 racial like interracial lisms and forms. You know, She's doing 0:16:06.440 --> 0:16:08.640 all this stuff in an imaginative way that now, of 0:16:08.680 --> 0:16:14.040 course we have entire shells of scholarship kind of talking 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:16.840 through the reality of you know. So that was really 0:16:16.880 --> 0:16:22.680 just inspiring that if you really just dig down into 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:24.880 your calling and you take the work seriously and you 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:28.160 just get what you need at whatever the cost, there's 0:16:28.240 --> 0:16:29.120 real yield there. 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:31.640 One of the things that I tell people who are 0:16:31.920 --> 0:16:34.640 reading my work critically is that what they bring to 0:16:34.680 --> 0:16:37.600 it is at least as important to them as what 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:39.440 I put into it, and that's true. 0:16:40.000 --> 0:16:43.640 Once we sold the show, soeld the idea. At that time, 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:48.760 Huntington Library had just received her papers and no one 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:50.920 could really get access to them, and honestly, nobody want 0:16:50.960 --> 0:16:53.400 to access them because she wasn't really in the air. 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:56.200 I say, in like twenty when was this mus have 0:16:56.240 --> 0:17:01.240 been like twenty fourteen, twenty fifth teen around then when 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:04.280 we actually sold it, and Merrily was like, listen, you can, 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:06.240 I can get you access to this library. So I 0:17:06.440 --> 0:17:08.480 messedlf out to La and I like went to that 0:17:08.520 --> 0:17:12.560 library every day, and they had barely organized these things. 0:17:12.600 --> 0:17:14.240 I mean because she wrote in these scraps of paper. 0:17:14.359 --> 0:17:14.560 You know. 0:17:14.680 --> 0:17:16.720 That was the beginning of me trying to really get 0:17:16.760 --> 0:17:20.800 inside her mind, because I felt that was my obligations 0:17:20.880 --> 0:17:23.160 as an adapter, was to like just know every inch 0:17:23.200 --> 0:17:25.280 of her intention and every inch of this book. And 0:17:26.040 --> 0:17:29.240 I read like her her like multiple drafts and like 0:17:29.320 --> 0:17:32.280 half drafts and falls drafts, and and I was like, man, 0:17:32.320 --> 0:17:35.160 this woman, really we're not joking around with the body. 0:17:35.240 --> 0:17:39.520 She was really a deep, deep, deep serious thinker and writer. 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:44.600 And I couldn't just comment her with like there was 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:46.720 just gonna everything you every thread you pulled, just took 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:49.040 you on her whole journey, and I just wanted to 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:52.280 know every part of that map. So that was part 0:17:52.280 --> 0:17:54.359 of my process for the many, many years I was 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:57.240 just stating a series. 0:17:57.480 --> 0:18:01.639 So knowing that it was her essentially her memoir, wanting 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:05.359 to make sure that you're capturing her intention of the book. 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:10.960 Did that play a role in your character development within 0:18:11.040 --> 0:18:12.840 the series, because I know there were some changes that 0:18:12.880 --> 0:18:16.040 were made, but how did you maintain that intention within 0:18:16.119 --> 0:18:16.600 the changes? 0:18:16.760 --> 0:18:19.520 Within the changes? Yeah, I think what I did well, 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:20.960 I want to say, I don't think it was I 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:22.840 don't think she's being literal about it being her memoir. 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:24.440 I think that what she was sort of saying is 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:28.679 that she told her emotional story through that. You know, 0:18:29.040 --> 0:18:33.120 I think it was about trying to first of all, yes, 0:18:33.160 --> 0:18:37.200 it did, because it was about what I felt in 0:18:37.320 --> 0:18:39.880 the book. What I wanted to do in the series 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:42.120 was to do with the trick of the book, which 0:18:42.160 --> 0:18:44.720 is that in the end you realize this whole thing 0:18:44.800 --> 0:18:49.200 is a memoir of an author, But it was about 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:53.040 you know, I think she very intentionally wanted to write 0:18:53.040 --> 0:18:58.520 about a driven black female creative in an industry that 0:18:59.240 --> 0:19:03.960 in which she was was just gonna be like automatically 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:07.879 a weird anomaly. And I also felt like one of 0:19:07.880 --> 0:19:11.159 the things about Octavia that I loved is that she 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:14.560 never you know, my other queen mother is Tony Morrison, 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:17.000 which you know, Tony Morrison has this whole origin story 0:19:17.040 --> 0:19:19.520 of like I went to the library, I read all 0:19:19.520 --> 0:19:22.159 the children's books on the bottom shelf, and then the 0:19:22.200 --> 0:19:25.440 next shelf it was Dostoyevsky, and I read all that too, 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:27.600 you know. And so her story as a writer was 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:32.520 very much and justifiably wrapped up in an exposure to 0:19:32.680 --> 0:19:35.560 like great literature and the formation inside of herself of 0:19:35.600 --> 0:19:37.680 what it meant to be a great author of literature. 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:41.280 But Octavia's story is very different. Where Octavia read whatever 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:45.000 her mom, who was a domestic could bring home from 0:19:45.040 --> 0:19:47.680 the house that she was cleaning. So she was reading 0:19:47.720 --> 0:19:50.280 comic books, she was reading manuals, she was reading whatever 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.120 she could. So she didn't have, I think, a necessary 0:19:53.160 --> 0:19:57.760 division between high and low literature in her conception of herself, 0:19:58.440 --> 0:20:01.520 and that she had to someone she was someone who 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:06.840 understood the value of watching things that most people would 0:20:06.840 --> 0:20:11.600 write off as not like disposed, like disposable or not 0:20:11.760 --> 0:20:14.399 valuable or not meaningful, and so I needed to make 0:20:14.440 --> 0:20:16.159 I really wanted to make a character who was like, 0:20:16.880 --> 0:20:18.600 I'm about here to bring digny to the thing that 0:20:18.880 --> 0:20:21.439 staying so many people I know and look like me, 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:25.080 but you're going to write it off as not meaningful enough, 0:20:25.119 --> 0:20:26.719 and I don't care, because that was what Oh, that's 0:20:26.720 --> 0:20:31.199 what octavit. She was the only one in her field 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:35.639 for so long, she was the only black woman, you know, 0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:39.320 and that's a lot. That is a lot, and that 0:20:39.400 --> 0:20:42.040 takes a lot of commitment to stay there, you know. 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:46.000 And that felt kind of important to me. And also 0:20:46.160 --> 0:20:48.360 just looking at how in the drafts that I read 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:50.800 and kind of in some ways being able to track 0:20:50.840 --> 0:20:53.679 the evolution of the finished project and seeing where her 0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:56.080 mind went and the roads she went down and why 0:20:56.119 --> 0:20:58.720 she decided to back up out of them versus go 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:01.560 down some of them. I was like, Oh, I actually 0:21:01.560 --> 0:21:05.159 think there's ways to honor this impulse she had in 0:21:05.200 --> 0:21:08.240 a television form in a way that she couldn't necessary. 0:21:08.320 --> 0:21:11.040 She knew that she somehow instinctively knew she couldn't actually 0:21:11.040 --> 0:21:13.440 pull off in a novel that needs to be about 0:21:13.440 --> 0:21:16.119 two hundred pages, you know. So yeah, that did all 0:21:16.200 --> 0:21:19.520 kind of all that was definitely in living in me 0:21:19.840 --> 0:21:22.959 and with me through that whole process. And of course, 0:21:23.680 --> 0:21:28.479 you know, making TV has other challenges, but everything I did, 0:21:28.560 --> 0:21:30.280 I tried to do in the grain of what I 0:21:30.320 --> 0:21:33.840 had come to understand was her thinking and as a 0:21:33.880 --> 0:21:36.840 creative at that time in her life. One of the 0:21:37.000 --> 0:21:40.320 often cited kind of aha moments was she was in 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:42.320 a class and he was a history class where some 0:21:42.359 --> 0:21:44.680 students stood up and was like, if I go back 0:21:44.680 --> 0:21:47.359 in time, I would have killed all these Uncle Tom's 0:21:47.359 --> 0:21:49.560 and these house slaves, this, that, and the other. And 0:21:49.600 --> 0:21:53.240 she was going home to a parent who was a domestic, 0:21:54.680 --> 0:21:59.320 you know, and just that experience of like, wait a minute, 0:21:59.560 --> 0:22:02.760 you know something that's so poisonous about our history that 0:22:02.800 --> 0:22:07.040 people don't even acknowledge that the people in these in 0:22:07.080 --> 0:22:09.840 this history didn't know the future. This is the only 0:22:09.880 --> 0:22:12.280 world they knew and they were still human beings who 0:22:12.320 --> 0:22:15.920 had to navigate the reality dating right, you know, as 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:21.359 we all are today, you know. And just the profundity 0:22:21.400 --> 0:22:23.439 of that thought was to me like right, of course, 0:22:23.560 --> 0:22:26.520 like it's so easy for people to want to judge 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:30.040 any story about slavery because all we've received is like 0:22:30.080 --> 0:22:31.760 a copy of a copy. But if you'd stopped for 0:22:31.800 --> 0:22:36.000 five seconds and think about these people's lives, they had 0:22:36.040 --> 0:22:37.760 no reason to believe that this was not going to 0:22:37.800 --> 0:22:40.720 be the history of humanity forever and ever. So when 0:22:40.720 --> 0:22:43.760 you have that thought, how does your behavior and your 0:22:43.760 --> 0:22:47.080 sense of entitlement in your relationship to violence or violence 0:22:47.119 --> 0:22:50.520 you think you'll do shift or change? You know? That's 0:22:50.640 --> 0:22:53.159 really the story. That's what's that's the interesting story. 0:22:53.640 --> 0:22:55.960 I remember you saying something in an interview once that 0:22:56.280 --> 0:22:59.800 you know, this idea of binging gives us an opportunity 0:22:59.880 --> 0:23:02.040 to almost approach it as if it were a book. 0:23:02.560 --> 0:23:05.360 But can you talk to me about like your approach 0:23:05.440 --> 0:23:08.359 to time and because I feel like, even in the 0:23:08.400 --> 0:23:10.960 first eight episodes, we got through a good amount of 0:23:11.000 --> 0:23:13.960 the book, and I'm so curious, I don't know if 0:23:14.000 --> 0:23:15.919 you can talk about her if you're so shopping it, 0:23:15.960 --> 0:23:18.800 if there's potential of it ever being another season. 0:23:18.840 --> 0:23:21.720 I don't know, y'all. It would require a lot of activation, 0:23:24.160 --> 0:23:26.320 you know. Well, one thing I knew is for a 0:23:26.400 --> 0:23:29.119 long time I think people were like, why is this 0:23:29.160 --> 0:23:30.840 stop being made yet? And I think one of the 0:23:30.960 --> 0:23:33.840 issues was people were trying to make it a movie. 0:23:34.600 --> 0:23:37.040 And the truth is that like part of the effectiveness 0:23:37.040 --> 0:23:39.399 of that book that she manages so beautifully and I 0:23:39.440 --> 0:23:41.080 think you really see her like get better and better 0:23:41.080 --> 0:23:42.800 at this. Like I think Parable is a great example 0:23:42.800 --> 0:23:44.879 of this, is you have you know, part of the 0:23:44.880 --> 0:23:47.320 emotional experience of those books is how much time you 0:23:47.359 --> 0:23:50.000 spend with these people. You know, it's getting to know 0:23:50.040 --> 0:23:52.400 the people and feeling how important it is for them 0:23:52.440 --> 0:23:56.000 to be changing so vividly over time. That's what part 0:23:56.040 --> 0:23:57.359 of the book is about. If you think about the 0:23:57.440 --> 0:24:00.920 arc of Missus Whale Margaret Whalen, you know by the 0:24:01.000 --> 0:24:03.480 end of the book, which we didn't get to a show, 0:24:03.920 --> 0:24:08.040 but she is a totally different person. And it's also 0:24:08.320 --> 0:24:11.399 kind of implied that that woman is the reason why 0:24:11.680 --> 0:24:16.320 Dana's line gets to continue on something right. So, but 0:24:16.359 --> 0:24:18.000 you can only feel that, you can't feel that in 0:24:18.000 --> 0:24:19.600 two hours that's not gonna mean nothing to you. If 0:24:19.760 --> 0:24:21.800 Glenn close to whoever is really mean for like ten 0:24:21.800 --> 0:24:24.120 minutes and then twenty minutes later she's like old lady 0:24:24.160 --> 0:24:26.440 and she's blind, Like, it's just gonna feel different. Yeah, 0:24:26.480 --> 0:24:28.320 So I was so early on, I was like, he 0:24:28.320 --> 0:24:30.080 has it has to be TV, because the thing about TV, 0:24:30.400 --> 0:24:33.000 you're constantly having to ask yourself, why would the audience 0:24:33.040 --> 0:24:36.080 member bring this person back into my living room every week? 0:24:36.359 --> 0:24:39.360 Because when you're trying to build there's a relationship to characters, 0:24:39.400 --> 0:24:41.920 You're trying to build familiarity. You know, you think about 0:24:41.960 --> 0:24:44.840 these these long running shows and it's like you literally 0:24:44.880 --> 0:24:47.960 feel like you know Aria Stark. But you would not 0:24:48.119 --> 0:24:51.239 have that same experience if Game of Thrones had been 0:24:51.240 --> 0:24:54.280 into our movie. You just wouldn't have because about the 0:24:54.320 --> 0:24:57.120 time you spend with people. And truthfully, yes, and part 0:24:57.160 --> 0:25:00.800 of also part of what she woul the revolutionary about 0:25:00.840 --> 0:25:03.840 what she was doing in Kindred was talking about how 0:25:04.119 --> 0:25:06.199 it's easy to pretend that the worst part about slavery 0:25:06.200 --> 0:25:08.600 is that people got whipped, But the truth is people's 0:25:08.680 --> 0:25:12.879 lives were robbed from them. People were trapped, and they're incarcerated. 0:25:13.640 --> 0:25:17.280 The theft of your time is the crime. And how 0:25:17.280 --> 0:25:19.480 do you really show that to people unless you give 0:25:19.520 --> 0:25:21.600