In 1984, I was 13 years old and in Grade 7. Was I the coolest kid in school? You bet I wasn’t. I was a comic book loving, sci-fi watching, horror movie fanatic, and all-around obsessive dork. It was a tumultuous time, to say the least.
I went to a country school, about half an hour from Kingston, Ontario. One sunny day after school, my teacher packed me and a few other boys in his car to take us book shopping. No teacher in their right mind would do such a thing these days, but we were excited to go shopping, and, as hayseeds, were impressed by his vehicle, which spoke to you if you left the door down or didn’t buckle up. It was just like K.I.T.T. on Knight Rider! It even had electric window openers- commonplace today, but the stuff of science fiction at the time.
He drove us to the school resource centre where teachers could purchase discounted books and supplies. After being reprimanded for perusing a rack of comics, I picked up a copy of Frank Herbert’s Dune, in anticipation of the David Lynch film that was due out that year. I knew nothing about the book or the movie, except what I’d read in a magazine (possibly Starlog.) An epic, outer space extravaganza? I’m in! I had a very isolated life out in the country, and lived for whatever sci-fi or fantasy materials I could get my hands on. I knew nothing about David Lynch, but would grow into a fan over the years. (Twin Peaks was still six years away at this point.)
I’m a slow reader, always have been and always will be. In fact, I think I’m getting even slower over time. But even when my brain was younger and my synapses were still firing, it took me months to get through the book. (Decades later, when she reached the age of 13, my own offspring read it in a matter of weeks, just to show off. Little rapscallion.)
I had never read anything like it. It never occurred to me that there even *was* a 20,000 years in the future! The world was immense and alien, but also close and familiar; behind all of the unfamiliar words (I’m looking at you, Kwisatz Haderach) lay a very familiar world. An emperor ruled over a series of nobles who were growing restless. (Mediveal England.) Factions were fighting in the desert over a valuable resource. (Oil.) The indigenous population were treated as vermin by the occupying colonialists. (Basically everywhere.) And the good guys didn’t stand a chance without playing dirty. (Also basically everywhere.) This wasn’t Star Wars or Star Trek, this felt real.
Despite the epic length and strange vocabulary, I kept at it. I felt a beam of pride when my doctor saw me reading it and told me he’d given up halfway through. Aren’t I smart! Side note: I also discovered the comic book adaptation, illustrated by Bill Sinkiewicz. A lifelong appreciation of his work was born..
When I finished the book, I was excited to see the movie. Even at that young age, I knew that the special effects were mixed, and that the casting wasn’t always appropriate, but I liked it well enough. At times, it even came close to creating images that matched those in my own imagination, especially the Lady Jessica and her Bene Gesserit sisters. I know the film gets a bad rap, is truly laughable in places, and has been disowned by its own creator, but I stand by it for what it is.
The made-for-TV series that followed was better from a technical point of view (and had some stellar actors) but was a little too slick to capture the gritty world of Dune. (Which *is* made of sand, after all.)
I tried to read the other Dune books, but found it hard to stay interested in their endlessly, talky narratives. It was also hard to accept that the joyful liberation of Dune at the end of the first book led to a violent, galactic jihad. I wanted my heroics a little purer than that. I still do. So I gave up, and only read the remainder of the original series when it arrived on audiobook. I even listened to some by the author’s son, who picked up the mantle of the series after his father’s death.
In university, I discovered the Dune board game. It was so far ahead of its time that I couldn’t even believe it existed. High in concept, epic in length, and discombobulating in complexity, it combined the player specialization of D&D with the tabletop combat of Risk.
The game fell into copyright hell, apparently, but has recently been reborn in a beautiful new package, which was released *just* in time for the Denis Villeneuve film adaptation… had it not been postponed due to COVID.
I continue to be fascinated by the world of Dune, it’s incomparably crafted world, and it’s applicability to real-life. The books are problematic in many ways- politically, socially, and even aesthetically. (The author can’t help but have the most exciting plot points happen OFF THE PAGE? Why???) So, yeah. I can’t justify everything about them. But I still admire them, and will always be there for the next adaptation…
