Alien Relationships In Bloodchild By Octavia Butler

What is love? To many, it is the beautiful bond between two people who deeply care for each other. Some would even imagine two parents raising their children together as a perfect example of love. Octavia Butler, however, paints a drastically different picture. In her short story, “Bloodchild,” Butler portrays the relationship between an adolescent boy, Gan, and an alien creature adorned with hundreds of legs and a stinger, T’Gatoi. This human-alien relationship contrasts with the traditional picture of love, but it does not portray an unrealistic relationship. It might not end with a prince and princess walking into the sunset living happily ever after, yet when do any actual relationships end in that fairy tale manner? Other than one of the

Love has its difficulties. Throughout this story, Gan’s love for T’Gatoi switches between adoration and disgust multiple times. He starts out by Gan laying “against T’Gatoi’s long, velvet underside, sipping from my egg” (340). The two of them start out cuddling and comforting each other. Gan gets the soft underside and the comfort of the egg; on the other hand, T’Gatoi gets the warmth from Gan’s body heat. This comforting changes as soon as T’Gatoi is extracting the eggs and grubs from Bram Lomas’ body. Gan is very disturbed by viewing what T’Gatoi would do to him in the future. Seeing the man convulse after being opened led him to “[vomit] until there was nothing left to bring up” (347). Although most fluctuation in love does not bring one to vomit, this interaction is perfect at highlighting the downs in a relationship compared to the ups. He still, in the end, accepts the love from T’Gatoi and decides not to shoot her. This may show very drastic examples of love fluctuating between good and troubled times, but it is still what happens in love. Fighting is normal within a relationship. This rather unique relationship is no

“Bloodchild” truly defies the traditional view of love while still maintaining elements of love. So then, what exactly is love? It is complicated; that is what Butler is attempting to portray. This story proves that is it vital to view love in ways other than what is told in the collections of Hans Christian Andersen and the Brothers Grimm. It is not always necessary to turn to love between aliens and humans to understand the complexity of love, but the drastic change helps one to understand that love is not always a pretty picture. Paintings are beautiful pictures from far away, yet when one gets up close you can see the brush strokes and challenges that make such a picture beautiful. Maybe if one gets close enough, one could see the alien creatures that comprise the heart form far