Dune Essay - The Final Draft
 

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Desert Path: The Road to Dune

“A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct.” Princess Irulan speaks these words in the opening quote of the award-winning novel Dune (Herbert Dune 1). Frank Herbert, the author of Dune, knew this quote was true because he carefully planned his epic masterpiece before he started writing. The novel could only happen after research on a variety of topics. Dune has many different influences and origins. Frank Herbert’s complicated book, covering a variety of themes, took six years to complete (Wikipedia).
Frank Herbert, later known as the “Dreamer of Dune”, was born in Tacoma, Washington on October 8, 1920. At an early age, he carried around books by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Jules Verne, and H.G. Wells in a Boy Scout backpack. At the age of eight, he stood on the kitchen table and declared that he wanted to be an author. His maternal grandfather, John McCarthy, said that Frank, only a small child, was much smarter than most children were his age. Frank was very similar to Lady Alia, a character in Dune. They both had the mind of an adult in a child’s body (Dunenovels).
After a stint in the navy during World War II, Herbert attended the University of Washington. He was incredibly brilliant, but never graduated. Frank’s son, Brian, said that Herbert did not complete college because he did not want to take all of the required classes -- only what interested him. While at the University of Washington, Frank met a young woman named Beverly Stuart in a creative writing class. Herbert and Beverly, his future wife and sounding board, were the only two in the class who had sold a story for publication. Herbert had sold two adventure stories and Stuart had sold a romance. They were married in Seattle on June 20, 1946 (Wikipedia).
Herbert began reading science fiction in the 1940’s, and by the 1950’s decided that science fiction is what he wanted to write. Early in his career, he published short stories under a pseudonym that he refused to reveal (O’Reilly). Some of his short stories published under his real name appeared in Startling Fiction, a popular magazine. He wrote very infrequently, only producing twenty short stories in a decade. His first published novel was Dragon in the Sea, also titled Under Pressure (Wikipedia).
Herbert’s past work would be shadowed by what was coming next. The origins of the novel Dune began in 1959. Herbert worked on an assignment asking him to write an article about sand dunes in Florence, Oregon. The government was trying to stop the spread of the dunes over the coastline. He became very involved with the project and ended up with a mass of information. Herbert never handed in the article, but it served as the seed for the ideas that created Dune. He stated this about the incident:
I had far too much for an article and far too much for a short story. So I didn't know really what I had--but I had an enormous amount of data and avenues shooting off at all angles to get more.... I finally saw that I had something enormously interesting going for me about the ecology of deserts, and it was, for a science-fiction writer anyway, an easy step from that to think: What if I had an entire planet that was desert (O’Reilly)?

Dune begins in the year 10,191 A.G. Many changes have occurred to the universe. Humans have spread among the stars, but have resorted to ancient practices of chivalry and feudalism. The planet Caladan, the home of House Atreides under the rule of Duke Leto, has an abundance of water. The Atreides have just received word from the emperor that they must move from their comfortable home to the harsh, desert planet of Arrakis. Shortly after their arrival, the Atreides must deal with a traitor from within their own household while dealing with their rival, House Harkonnen. Unbeknownst to them, the Harkonnen are in alliance with another powerful family. Duke Leto has a card up his sleeve though; he has sent his most trusted soldier, Duncan Idaho, to find the desert-dwelling people of Arrakis -- the planet the tribal Fremen call Dune (Sparknotes).
When Herbert started writing the novel that eventually evolved into Dune, he originally conceived of several topics he wanted to cover. He wanted to have a human occupied planet being used as a giant energy machine. In the novel, the planet Arrakis is mined for a certain spice every day. Herbert also wanted to examine absolute prediction and its pitfalls. Paul Atreides can see the future, but he is a slave to his visions. He must always follow the path he has seen. Another goal of Herbert’s was to write a novel with a story about people and their concerns with human values (Wikipedia).
The author of Dune was one of the first science-fiction writers to stress the importance of ecology. He wanted people to think about the present and the future. In the Dune saga, the transformation of Arrakis changes the planet from a barren wasteland into a fertile planet, but has dire consequences in the end. Herbert wanted the human race to analyze what they were doing to their own planet, and how they slowly let the world deteriorate around them. One character, Liet Kynes, says this in Dune:
The thing the ecologically illiterate don’t realize about an ecosystem is that it’s a system. A system! A system maintains a certain fluid stability that can be destroyed by a misstep in just one niche. A system has order, a flowing from point to point. If something dams the flow, order collapses. The untrained miss the collapse until too late. That’s why the highest function of ecology is the understanding of consequences (O‘Reilly).
Herbert included the themes of human evolution and human survival, subjects with which he was fascinated. The Fremen on the planet Arrakis, more commonly known as Dune, adapted to the desert to become a truly formidable fighting force. The Emperor’s warriors, called the Sardaukar, overcame their harsh conditions on the world of Salusa Secundus to become deadly fighters (Wikipedia). Herbert explores the possibility of human potential. The Bene Gesserit is a sisterhood who has extraordinary abilities. They use a hypnotizing voice to make people do things against their will, control bloodlines, and have complete command over every function of their body. Most are not naturally talented, though. They must go through rigorous training. The mentats are essentially human computers. They calculate problems and tell the possible outcomes (Sparknotes). Herbert elaborated in an interview: “I can state it for you very straightly: human beings are not through evolving. And if we are going to survive as a species, we're going to have to do things that allow us to keep on evolving. And that's it. It's a very simple statement.” (O’Reilly).
Drug use is a very strong theme in Dune. On his 1953 trip to Mexico, Herbert had met a medicine man in Oaxaca who gave him a drink compounded of morning-glory seeds. It gave him nothing more than a headache. However, the trip planted seeds of awareness about drugs and shamanism. Many characters in Dune are addicted to a substance called melange. This spice is found only on the planet of Arrakis. The spice is used in many different things throughout the Empire. Melange also has the ability to prolong life, but it can be very addicting. The mentats also use a beverage called sapho juice to enhance their abilities. Herbert once stated, “To use such a substance, you pay the great price. You no longer live in the protective and gregarious midst of your own kind. Now, you are the shaman, alone and forced to master your own madness. You have grasped the tail of the ultimate tiger” (O’Reilly).
The novel also goes into depth about government, religion, and leaders. Frank Herbert said, “Never give over all your critical faculties to one person. They have human faults as well.” Herbert also said “[Dune] began with a concept: to do a long novel about the messianic convulsions which periodically inflict themselves on human societies. I had this idea that superheroes were disastrous for humans.” Comparisons have been made between the messiah in Dune, Muad’dib and political figures such as Adolph Hitler and Usama Bin Laden. Muad’dib, once known as Paul Atreides, used religion to rally the Fremen against the enemy, the Harkonnens (Wikipedia).
Dune has deep Islamic and Arabic roots. The ancient Semitic practices of concubines and arranged marriages are present, and many terms come from Arabic, a language dating back to the fourth century (Highlander). A holy war, known as a Jihad, occurs between the Fremen and their oppressors, House Harkonnen. The stereotype of the word “jihad” today is that of followers of Islam crashing planes into buildings and organizing suicide car bombings, but the way Frank Herbert described a jihad is much more accurate (Baheyeldin).
The main character of Dune is Paul Atreides. The son of the murdered Duke of House Atreides, he encounters the Fremen, gains their respect, and becomes their leader. The Fremen call him the Mahdi. In Arabic, mahdi means “the rightly guided one”. The Mahdi is a human messianic figure who comes to "fill the world with justice.” The private name given to Paul is Usul. In Arabic, it means “the base of the pillar.” Paul chooses the Fremen name of Muad’dib. The muad’dib is a desert rat that lives on the planet of Arrakis. The word mu’adib in Arabic means “private tutor” or “teacher.” The Bene Gesserit give another title to Paul. They call him Kwisatz Haderach, literally meaning “the shortening of the way.”
The title given to Paul's mother among the Fremen is "Sayyedina". It means “friend of God” in Herbert’s novel. This is clearly derived from "Sayyed” meaning "master.” Both the Ottoman Sultan of Turkey and the Shah of Iran once had the Persian title Padishah, which means “sovereign.” Shaddam IV, Emperor of the Known Universe, uses this title (Baheyeldin).
The Fremen call the huge worms that inhabit Dune “Shai Hulud.” The worm is also the source of the spice. In Arabic, the name can be split into "Shai" ("thing") and "Hulud" ("eternal" or "eternity"). Some characters call the sandworms Shaitain. This is the Arabic word for "Satan" or "The Devil" (Baheyeldin).
When asked why he used Arabic derivatives in his novel, Hebert said:
If you want to give the reader the solid impression that he is not here and now, but that something of here and now has been carried to that faraway place and time what better way to say to our culture that this is so than to give him the language of that place… That oral tool--it has its own inertial forces; it's mind- shaping as well used by mind (O’Reilly).