but never does. Their conflict also turns physical during multiple instances. The most poignant moment of physical violence is probably at the end of the novel, where Rufus attempts to rape Dana, Dana stabs Rufus, and Rufus attempts to force Dana to stay in the past, resulting in the loss of Dana's arm.

Other characters that illustrate external conflicts are Tom and Dana, Tom and Rufus, and Alice and Rufus.

Another important conflict which is illustrated in the novel is Dana's internal conflict, whereby she struggles with the knowledge that her relationship with the past is a complicated one. On one hand, she must save Rufus in order to secure her ancestral lineage. On the other hand, she has to live with the knowledge that she is helping and saving the life of a slave-owning man who abuses and rapes those same ancestors she is trying desperately to protect.

A third conflict that arises in the novel is Dana's conflict with nature. In this case, nature refers to the process of time travel as it exists within the novel. Dana has no control over when she travels back in time and very little warning that it will happen. Thus, Dana is constantly in conflict with her destiny—she has no choice in what is happening to her, and her participation in fate's scheme is completely involuntary. Still, she has no choice but to go along with it despite the obvious threat to her safety it poses.

Kindred has many different conflicts that you could choose from. One conflict that I think too often gets ignored is the conflict between Rufus and Alice. This conflict involves rape and the selling of her children. It escalates to the point where Alice feels that her only escape is through suicide.

Another important conflict is the internal conflict that Dana struggles with throughout much of the novel. She knows that Rufus has to live long enough to have the children that will eventually give rise to herself, but Dana is fully aware that Rufus is pure evil and deserves to die. It is a struggle between saving people she comes into contact with in the past or saving her future potential self. What makes this internal conflict even tougher is that the tension and conflict between Dana and Rufus is also an external conflict. Rufus beats her and also attempts to rape her. Dana eventually kills him.

You could also explore a conflict that is wider in scope that involves the general plight of black slaves and society at this point in history. The novel does a nice job of showing readers a picture of slavery beyond what is happening to only Dana.

In Kindred, Octavia Butler presents all three of the fundamental conflict types: human versus nature, human versus human, and human versus himself.

Human versus nature is present throughout as an abstraction, in the basic premise of science fiction: affecting outcomes by changing events in the past. "Nature" here, rather than a component such as the wilderness, is the laws of nature, specifically time. Dana repeatedly tries to affect what happened with her ancestors.

Human versus human conflicts appear throughout, with many but not all instances involving Dana. Her efforts to understand Rufus and change his behavior are underlying causes of many conflictual episodes, such as his angry reaction to her inaction regarding his father's death.

The internal conflicts that Dana faces are the most important. She struggles with the idea of having white, slave-owner ancestry. She worries about the ethics and possible inadvertent ripple effects of her intervention. Kevin as well must confront his attitudes toward race and slavery.

Sure. The most basic conflict is between historical periods. By having Dana jump back and forth between the different periods, Butler puts them in contrast, making them clash.

Almost as central to the story is the clash between social context and individual self-image. This happens for Dana when she travels between time. Is she the free and independent woman she thought she was in modern times? Or is she the woman a slave-holding society expects her to be?

A third conflict is interpersonal: Dana and Rufus. She is trying to shape and change him; he is trying to be the person he wants to be, and that sometimes conflicts.