Parable of the Sower Analysis

Literary Devices in Parable of the Sower

Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory

Setting

Don't you forget it: setting is made up of two elements, both place and time. This novel, Parable of the Sower, is set in California in the near future, during the years 2024-2027.We start off in t...

Narrator Point of View

Okay, so what's the narrative technique in Parable of the Sower? Is the first-person pronoun "I" strewn over all the pages? Yep, check. So what we've got here probably a first-person narrator. But...

Genre

This novel, written in the early 1990s, is set in the years 2024-2027: you know, the future. That helps define the book as science fiction. But really, there's not all that much in the book that's...

Tone

Just by looking at the kind of writing Lauren does, we can say that her attitude could probably be described pretty well by two adjectives: truthful and intense. Let's take a look.Lauren actually a...

Writing Style

Wait, how can something be both plain and poetic? We've got you on this. Read on.Plain could be considered an insulting word, sometimes. Like—Oh, she looks so plain. It's not a nice statement. Bu...

What's Up With the Title?

The title Parable of the Sower is totally a reference to a certain parable that appears multiple times in the New Testament of the Bible. That story is—you got it—the parable of the sower. At t...

What's Up With the Ending?

At the end of Parable of the Sower, we find Lauren summarizing the service the Earthseed group is holding when they bury their dead—all the people Lauren's crew has lost along the way. Members sp...

Tough-o-Meter

Parable of the Sower is a pretty straightforward read. Setting aside the verse passages, the prose is fairly plain and unadorned, with our teenage narrator simply telling it like it is, with few hi...

Plot Analysis

The story starts in the fictional southern California town of Robledo, where Lauren observes things slowly falling apart. She's dreaming up her Earthseed religion, but at this point she doesn't eve...

Booker's Seven Basic Plots Analysis

Anticipation Stage and "Call"The first chapter of Parable of the Sower describes Lauren's recurring dream. Basically, she's trying to escape from fire, and she's trying to find her way to the stars...

Three-Act Plot Analysis

So in a three act plot structure, the first act is pretty much equivalent to the exposition. In Parable of the Sower, that's Lauren growing up in Robledo, scribbling out her religious verses withou...

Trivia

Octavia Butler was a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship, popularly called the genius grant. She was the first writer from San Francisco ever to receive it. Not too shabby, Ms. Butler. (Source)Th...

Steaminess Rating

There are totally some steamy scenes in this novel, but they're not described in any juicy detail. Lauren just tells us about them in a matter-of-fact PG-13 kind of way. The sex in this book is pre...

Allusions

Benjamin Franklin (2.46)Thomas Jefferson (2.46)Frederick Douglass (25.105)