Author Bio
• Birth—June 22, 1947
• Where—Pasadena, California, USA
• Death—February 24, 2006
• Where—Lake Forest Park, Washington (State)
• Education—A.A., Pasadena Community College; attended University of California, Los Angeles
• Awards—Hugo Awards, Nebula Awards (more below)
Octavia Estelle Butler was an American science fiction writer. A multiple recipient of both the Hugo and Nebula awards, Butler was one of the best-known women in the field. In 1995, she became the first science fiction writer to receive the MacArthur Fellowship, nicknamed the Genius Grant.
Life and education
Butler was born and raised in a struggling, racially mixed neighborhood of Pasadena, California. Her father Laurice, a shoeshiner, died when she was a baby, and she was raised by her grandmother and mother (Octavia M. Butler) who worked as a maid.
According to the Norton Anthology of African American Literature Butler was "an introspective only child in a strict Baptist household" who was "drawn early to [science fiction] magazines such as Amazing Fantasy and Science Fiction and Galaxy. She soon began reading all the science fiction classics."
Nicknamed Junie, Octavia was paralytically shy and a daydreamer; she was later diagnosed as dyslexic. She began writing at the age of ten "to escape loneliness and boredom" and by twelve began her lifelong interest in science fiction. As she later told the journal Black Scholar,
I was writing my own little stories when I was 12. I was watching a bad science fiction movie called Devil Girl from Mars and decided that I could write a better story than that. And I turned off the TV and proceeded to try, and I've been writing science fiction ever since.
After getting her Associate of Arts degree in 1968 from Pasadena City College, she next enrolled at California State University, Los Angeles. She eventually left UCLA and took writing classes through an extension program.
Butler credited two writing workshops for giving her "the most valuable help" she had received with her writing:
- The Open Door Workshop of the Screenwriters' Guild of America, West, a program designed to mentor Latino and African American writers. It was Through Open Door that she met the noted science fiction writer Harlan Ellison.
- The Clarion Science Fiction Writers Workshop, (introduced to her by Ellison), where she first met Samuel R. Delany.
Throughout her career, she remained a self-identified science fiction fan, an insider who rose from within the ranks of the field.
In November, 1999, Butler moved to Seattle, Washington, describing herself at that stage in life as
Comfortably asocial—a hermit in the middle of Seattle—a pessimist if I'm not careful, a feminist, a Black, a former Baptist, an oil-and-water combination of ambition, laziness, insecurity, certainty, and drive.
Themes of both racial and sexual ambiguity are apparent throughout her work. Her writing has influenced a number of prominent authors. When asked if he could be any author in the world, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Junot Diaz replied that he would be Octavia Butler, who he claimed has written 9 perfect novels.
Death
Butler died outside of her home in Lake Forest Park, Washington, on February 24, 2006, at the age of 58. Contemporary news accounts were inconsistent as to the cause of her death, whether it was from a fatal stroke or from head injuries caused by a fall during the stroke.
Awards
2012: Solstice Award
2010: Induction into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame
2005: Langston Hughes Medal of The City College
2000: Lifetime Achievement Award in Writing from the PEN American Center
1999: Nebula Award for Best Novel for Parable of the Talents
1995: MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant
1985: Hugo Award for Best Novelette for Bloodchild
1985: Science Fiction Awards Database for Bloodchild
1985: Science Fiction Chronicle Award for Best Novelette for Bloodchild
1984: Nebula Award for Best Novelette for Bloodchild
984: Hugo Award for Best Short Story forSpeech Sounds
980: Creative Arts Award, L.A. YWCA
Scholarship fund
The Octavia E. Butler Memorial Scholarship was established in Butler's memory in 2006 by the Carl Brandon Society. Its goal is to provide an annual scholarship to enable writers of color to attend the Clarion West Writers Workshop and Clarion Writers' Workshop, descendants of the original Clarion Science Fiction Writers' Workshop in Clarion, Pennsylvania, where Butler got her start. The first scholarships were awarded in 2007. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 11/12/2014.)