Road to Dune (31 page)

It’s also long because it contains what I call “vertical layers”—many levels at which a reader may enter it (another experiment on my part). You can choose the layer you want and follow that throughout the story. Rereading, you might choose an entirely different layer, discover “something new” in the story.

My opinion of the novel? First, we’d have to do that semantic thing, define what the hell a novel is; then we’d get involved with analysis of that verb “to be” in our answer, and at the end, we’d be nowhere.

This isn’t a thing that submits to analysis. There’s no
truth
to be found this way. The novel, as generally understood, simply involves good story, which means “entertainment that instructs.” Entertainment.
Dune
has elements of caricature—desert reduction and absurdum; Victorian poses. Is it a novel? It falls within the usual classification. It is representative? I hope not, but feel unqualified to judge.

The novel? Lord, man—give me Occam’s razor. You’re asking me to be a critic, a role I despise. There’s only one useful kind of critic, the one whose tastes are so similar to your own that when he says, “I liked it” you can be sure you’ll like it, too. He pre-reads the yearly offerings and keeps you from wasting time on things which he turns down. Unfortunately most criticism is by poseurs. They use their comments about someone else’s work as a platform on which to strike poses. What they’re really saying is: “Look at me! Look at me!” Most such critics can’t write worth a damn in the field they’re judging or are afraid to cast their own efforts adrift in the sea of poseurs. I guess the only worthwhile critic is Time. If it endures … And what we classify as “the novel” appears to be enduring. What I’m hoping is that it also is undergoing improvement, keeping up with the times.

Another letter from the author contained even more insights: “The way I write a book, I knew better than to send off outline and sample chapters. I compose a book (musical sense)—filling, balancing, emphasizing, re-writing … Obviously, the finished product will bear little resemblance to any damned sample!”

AS CHILTON BOOKS prepared for the release of its hardcover volume of
Dune,
Sterling Lanier asked Frank Herbert to help in promoting the book. Using his many friends and newspaper connections, Frank wrote:

August 23, 1965

Dear Sterling,

Enclosed is the list for the 25 books you said your promotion department would mail to help sales on
Dune.
I’ve been doing a bit of scurrying on this and have an old friend who runs a Tacoma advertising & promotion firm (and who is
very
good) all set to mount a PR campaign for me through the Pacific Northwest. I have plenty of old friends, school chums and the like in key positions (radio and TV commentators, editors, columnists and such) throughout the region. This shouldn’t be too difficult.

For San Francisco and Los Angeles—I can be of some promotional help. I’m working on City Lights [bookstore] for a window display and whatever other help they can give in the North Beach “Little Bohemia.” When I go back south next month, I’ll deliver a few copies to editor friends on the leading papers.

Oh, one more thing—if your promotion department can spare two more copies—I’d like them to go to Robert C. Craig, 3140 E. Garfield, Phoenix, Ariz., 85008. He’s the only relative I have who can be of any help in this. He travels throughout the Southwest (Arizona, Texas, New Mexico and Oklahoma) for the USDA and has hundreds of important friends down there.

The book looks beautiful and was out sooner than I expected.

Warmest regards,
Frank

Chilton also produced a two-minute radio spot, which ran on over five hundred radio stations.

September 30, 1965

Dear Mr. Herbert,

Attached is the two-minute script on
Dune
which was broadcast over more than 500 commercial and educational stations, plus 170 Veterans Administration Hospital stations during the week of September 27. Many stations will use it more than once.

The
Inside Books Radio
programs are sponsored by libraries and book stores throughout the country. We believe these broadcasts will broaden the audience for your book among people who are not ordinarily reached by the traditional book media, as well as those who are.

Sincerely yours,
Mrs. Mary Jo Groenevelt

WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 27
INSIDE BOOKS SCRIPT #4,
DO NOT BROADCAST BEFORE
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30

Title: Dune Author: Frank Herbert

Publisher: Chilton Books, 227 S. 6th Street, Philadelphia.

Price: $5.95 Publication Date: 10/1/65

Time now for our daily look inside the exciting world of books … based on reports we receive from
Publishers Weekly,
the Book Industry Journal. (sponsor time) One of the most fantastic novels that we’ve seen in a long time is
Dune
by Frank Herbert. When we say that
Dune
is a
fantastic
novel, we mean just that: a work of pure fantasy … an exciting science-fiction story that takes place far in the future on a distant planet. Actually, we should have said
several
distant planets … because the story of
Dune
concerns a Duke named Leto who moves from one planet to another. The planet that he leaves is a rich and fertile one … and the planet that he moves to is a terrible desert, with almost no water at all. Duke Leto is the head of a very ancient noble house, and when he moves from the good planet to the desert planet, the future of his entire household is put into jeopardy. But he doesn’t really have a choice because he has to follow the orders of the Emperor. The Emperor has sent Duke Leto far away because he is jealous of Leto’s great wealth and popularity … and because he is under the influence of Leto’s greatest enemy, an evil baron named Vladimir (VLAD uh meer) who is the head of a rival noble family. Actually, Duke Leto’s new planet is not
entirely
a wasteland. It’s also the only planet where one can find the most valuable drug that exists … a drug that contains the secret of everlasting life. But if we tell you very much more about the background of
Dune,
we’ll be giving away essential parts of the story. So let’s change the subject a little bit and say that the real hero of
Dune
is not Duke Leto but his son, Paul, who is only fifteen years old when the story begins. Paul is not an ordinary child. He is much more sensitive than most … and has a particular mental power which sets him apart from all other people … a power that he has inherited from his mother, and that allows him to recognize the
real truth
when he finds it. We said at the beginning that
Dune
was an exciting novel, and it is … but it’s also something more. It’s the creation of a whole society of the future, worked out to the very last detail. You might call it a kind of
super
science fiction … where the author has even gone so far as to provide a short dictionary of special words that refer to powers and states of being that don’t exist—or don’t
yet
exist—on our world … but that form the very basis of the world of
Dune.
(sponsor time) We’ve been talking about
Dune
by Frank Herbert. We’ll have another Inside Books report for you tomorrow, at this time.

Chilton also sent out an extensive press release, entitled “DUNE Will Never Let the Reader Go”:

Frank Herbert’s latest novel,
Dune,
is a giant work of literature and a gripping excursion into fantasy.

Because the all-powerful Emperor fears Duke Leto’s growing wealth and popularity, the Duke must exchange his lands. Duke Leto Atreides must move from a
planet,
which he owns, to another planet which he has been given in exchange. And the Emperor, Shaddam IV, is the Emperor of the
Universe.
Duke Leto’s son, Paul, is so little normal in any way that he is the possible key to all human power and knowledge. The Duke’s lady, Paul’s mother, is the creature of the Bene Gesserit, the strangest religious matriarchy ever conceived, whose aims are also universal rule.

The answer to all questions lies in a world called Dune, the planet Arrakis, which produces as its sole export Melange, drug of immortality. Arrakis is a world of sand, rock, and heat, where roam armed savages who kill for drops of water.

A book as universal as time, brilliant in scope, and dazzling in narrative,
Dune
is an example of what can be done when an inspired writer turns his eyes
forward
into history rather than back.

Frank Herbert, whose work has been compared to both Aldous Huxley and Edgar Rice Burroughs, is a newspaperman whose published works include
The Dragon in the Sea
and scores of short stories.

Science-fiction luminaries also weighed in. Poul Anderson wrote: “By any standards whatsoever,
Dune
is an important book, and within the science fiction field a major work—a suspenseful story, four-dimensional characters, and a setting worthy of Hal Clement. But there is much more. There is pity, terror, irony, Machiavellian politics, and the best study I have seen of one of the most important and least understood phenomena in history: the messiah. Frank Herbert is not only concerned with the impact of such a prophet on human events. He looks deeper, he asks what it feels like to have a destiny. In so doing, he tells us much about the nature of man.”

And Damon Knight wrote: “The highest achievement of a science fiction novelist is the creation of an imaginary world so real, so vivid, that the reader can touch, see, taste, hear and smell it. Arrakis is such a world, and
Dune
is clearly destined to become a science fiction classic.”

Then the reviews started coming in. One of the newspapers for which Frank Herbert worked (the
Santa Rosa [CA] Press Democrat
) ran an article titled “Ex-Staffer’s Weird Novel”: “Frank Herbert, once a Press-Democrat reporter, has been compared to Edgar Rice Burroughs as a spinner of unusual tales. This book is, of course, no exception, and will hold the reader spellbound from beginning to end.”
Kirkus
said: “This future space fantasy might start an underground craze. It feeds on the shades of Edgar Rice Burroughs (the Martian series), Aeschylus, Christ and J. R. R. Tolkien.”
Science Fiction Review
claimed that
Dune
“is, I think, the longest science fiction novel ever published as a single book … . I won’t attempt to sketch the plot; suffice it to say that there should be something in the book for everyone: adventure, psychology, power politics, religion, etc.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, the reviewer for
Analog
liked the novel: “
Dune
is certainly one of the landmarks of modern science fiction. It is an amazing feat of creation.” However, the reviewer for
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
was not so kind: “I don’t think any amount of effort or ability could have made this odd hodgepodge of concepts stick together. I cannot possibly trace the many strands interwoven in the novel … . This is a long book, and in its major premises quite unworthy of the work put into it.”

The
El Paso Times
wrote: “The creation of an imaginary country, complete with flora, fauna, myths, legends, history, geography, ecology and so forth, demands an agile and informed mind. Herbert obviously possesses the requisite knowledge to devise and develop such a concept, but unfortunately his fantasy is more fascinating to him than to the average reader … . What with struggling with an 18-page glossary of terms, and concentrating on perfervid prose which makes that of H. Rider Haggard seem austere, it is no easy matter to ingest this 412-page tome.”

Early in 1966, the British publisher Gollancz made arrangements to publish
Dune
in hardcover throughout the United Kingdom, while New English Library would do the UK paperback version. In the United States, Chilton sold paperback rights to Ace Books.

Then, on February 17,1966, Frank Herbert received the news that
Dune
had won the Nebula Award for the best science-fiction novel of 1965, awarded by Science Fiction Writers of America. Damon Knight, president of the organization, wrote to him in advance of the banquet in Los Angeles:

February 17, 1966

Dear Frank,

It is my pleasant duty to tell you that
Dune
has won the best-novel award in the SFWA balloting (as, in my opinion, it richly deserved to do). Please don’t shout this from the housetops yet; it is supposed to be under wraps until the March 11 banquet.

I hope you will be able to attend the L.A. banquet and pick up your trophy; if you haven’t sent in your reservation yet, it should go to Harlan Ellison. If for any reason you can’t make it, please tell Harlan who you would like to accept the award for you.

With personal congratulations & best wishes,
best,
Damon

(He added a handwritten postscript: It would be even nicer if you could come to the New York banquet on the same date, but that’s a long way … )