77 pages • 2 hours read
Parable of the Sower
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Chapters 23-25Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 23 Summary
Overnight, two people slip into the group’s camp while Jill is on watch and bed down among them. They are a mother-and-daughter pair, and they are scared when everyone awakes. Lauren offers them food, and they promise not to steal from them. However, Lauren does not trust them and believes they are thieves. Justin breaks the ice, and they laugh at Bankole combing his beard. Everyone shares what they can spare.
The woman, Emery, asks if she and her daughter, nine-year-old Tori, can come with them. Lauren holds a conference with her group and asks if Bankole has enough room for them. This is the first the others have heard about Bankole’s land and want to know if there are jobs. The group agrees to let the two join, although Allie predicts they “will both be pains in the ass” (291). Harry thinks Lauren is going soft and that she would not have allowed this a few weeks back. He reminds her that it might be much harder to get rid of them if things don’t work out.
A couple of days later, Tori finds two more companions for them: Grayson Mora and his daughter, Doe, who is one year younger than Tori. Grayson doesn’t like the group, but he likes Emery, and their daughters like one another. Lauren thinks the two adults were enslaved and thinks that all four of the new recruits are “odd” (297). Everyone is wary of Grayson. Bankole and Lauren talk about slavery, and she comments that “Things are breaking down more and more” (298).
Chapter 24 Summary
Talk of Earthseed calms even the new people. Nonetheless, Lauren relates that the week has been horrible, and they are taking at least two rest days to recover.
In these two days, Grayson and Emery, now a couple, are attacked when Emery takes their children to urinate. Grayson runs away with Doe. In the ensuing battle, Jill dies, as do some pyros. Lauren receives a minor injury, what Bankole calls a “cowboy wound” (303).
Lauren realizes that Emery, Tori, and Grayson are also “sharers” like her. Grayson returns and admits that he doesn’t know how to shoot. He agrees to live as the group does, but he doesn’t seem to understand why the group acts as a team when Lauren is the only hyperempathetic one. He shows himself to be a potential source of conflict within the group when he does not get his way.
The gang of pyros that attacked them starts to burn the land in retaliation for their dead. Lauren and her group hope to reach Clear Lake by the following day, but it’s not soon enough as they can already smell smoke. As they travel through the night, the fire roars around them. Lauren thinks they will die, especially when they run out of water. They must continue moving or burn to death. The firestorm veers to the northwest, but they can’t stop. Instead, they slow down.
Finally, they reach Bankole’s land. It’s empty, wild, and inconvenient, which could be good for them. However, they see neither houses nor buildings, just a big black smear on the hill and a chimney like a tombstone.
Chapter 25 Summary
The group argues for a week over whether to stay or go. It’s hard for them to leave this place because they have a well and are working on a garden. Fruit and nut trees reside on the land, too. Lauren thinks they can grow more, build shelter, and successfully get through the winter.
Harry believes they can’t make it here, but Lauren thinks nothing they see further north will be better or safer. She emphasizes how it will be tough but maintains that they can build a community. The others throw up obstacles, saying that the place is a target and lamenting that there are no jobs around. They believe that growing their own food for sale won’t be fruitful.
Lauren says they should decide, at which point Allie wants to know about the seeds she brought with her and asks if they can help the group survive. Allie agrees that she and Justin will stay. Lauren turns to Harry and Zahra, but Harry still has hopes of a job further north. To Lauren’s surprise, Grayson is the next to agree, saying, “I’m not sure you have a hope in hell of building anything here, but you’re just crazy enough to make it work” (328). Travis and Natividad agree to stay. Harry and Zahra, the first to join Lauren, are the last to agree.
They hold a funeral for Bankole’s family, and Lauren wants to symbolically bury everyone’s dead with them. Everyone will speak, and they will plant acorns for each of their dead.
Bankole doesn’t think Lauren quite understands all the losses the world has faced and all the challenges ahead, and he doesn’t think they will succeed. After their ceremony, the group talks and decides to call the place Acorn.
Chapters 23-25 Analysis
As the book reaches its climax, the Earthseed group reaches its final form. With Jill’s death and the recruitment of Emery, Tori, Grayson, and Doe, the group consists of Lauren and 12 others. This creates a parallel with the New Testament of the Bible with Jesus and his 12 apostles. This number foreshadows the group’s successful arrival to their promised land even as their trials escalate and they lose one of their comrades. While the newest recruits are skeptical about the group’s communal nature, they all come to appreciate the emphasis on Community Versus the Individual, once again showing that people can only survive by working together rather than against each other.
The pyros’ final attacks on the group heighten the tension, as they are surrounded by fire with no choice but to move forward. In another subversion of the expectations established by biblical allusions, the group finds Bankole’s land similarly scarred and his family dead. The opportunities that many expected do not exist, but they all decide to stay in the end. They find some solace in Lauren’s Earthseed verses, and the idea of creating a home there is appealing. Allie says, “I want to build something, too. I never had a chance to build anything before” (325). The opportunities offered by the bare land highlight the chance not only to resettle but to establish an entirely new world, one free of Class Divisions and Inequality. This is symbolized by the group planting a garden in the charred soil, as well as planting acorns to commemorate their dead loved ones. From the ashes of tragedy, a new world can be born. Their naming the place Acorn is a small but optimistic note, signifying their hope that their community will grow into something strong, living, and thriving. This resolves the theme of Religion as a Living Framework for Hope and Change.
Nonetheless, Butler stresses how much of a challenge is before them. Bankole cautions the group: “You know, as bad as things are, we haven’t even hit bottom yet” (331). This comment creates a cliffhanger, which is resolved in the sequel, Parable of the Talents. The second volume in this unfinished trilogy, it takes place four years after the events of Parable of the Sower when the US falls under Christian fundamentalist leadership. The fate of Acorn hangs in the balance in the sequel, but as Parable of the Sower ends, Lauren is determined to create a haven for humanity—both on Earth and beyond.
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