Frank Herbert's life before "Dune"
A true story about Christmas and those difficult years before his sci-fi success
Christmas 1959 was not a merry one for Frank Herbert.
At the age of 39, he had published a moderately successful novel and a few short stories, but he hadn’t held a real job for years. Sometimes he’d piece together freelance assignments or speechwriting gigs but it was never enough to support his wife and family. He owed back taxes and child support. The Herberts were constantly on the move as he chased one crazy scheme after another.
As they sunk deeper into poverty, Herbert became increasingly desperate to maintain a veneer of middle-class propriety. When guests came over, he deployed family codewords to ration out servings at the dinner table. (“FHBNMIK” was code for “family hold back, no more in kitchen.”) He and his wife, Bev, signed up for catalogs and newsletters they didn’t want so that they could use the piles of junk mail to burn for warmth.
That winter, he announced that the family would celebrate on January 6, Epiphany. The rationale, Herbert told his kids, was that Epiphany (which honors the visit of the Magi to the infant Jesus) was far more significant to the Christian faith than the birth of Christ. The real reason was that the Herberts could save money and buy gifts for bargain rates at post-holiday sales.
The truth is, Frank Herbert was driven by a dream. A dream so big he could hardly contain it.
The spark came when he got an assignment from a fancy San Francisco magazine to write about the little town of Florence, on the Oregon coast, and its struggle against the sand dunes that were threatening to swallow it.
In the course of his research, Herbert learned that dunes are dynamic systems that can swallow vast tracts of land. The Middle East was once a verdant, fertile crescent—until the Arabian Desert squeezed the life out of it. Dunes don’t just engulf solid land. They drain swamps, they strangle rivers, they dry up lakes.
What if dunes swallowed the whole planet?
Herbert never finished the magazine piece, but he became obsessed with sand dunes. Which was typical. He was also obsessed with religious sects, secret societies, systems of communication, charismatic leaders, prophets, and prophecies. He was particularly fascinated with the concept of the Messiah. He wanted to write an epic that would weave all these strands together into a coherent pattern.
And that was the problem. At this point, his dream was no more than a cardboard box full of notes.
Somehow Herbert found the strength to hold fast to his vision. With the help of his family and friends, he found ways to buy himself the time he needed to work on it. And five long years later, he would publish Dune, which was destined to become one of the most influential science fiction novels ever written.
So this Christmas, spare a thought for all the writers out there who are wrestling with their dreams. And if you’re curious about Herbert’s masterpiece, join me for an epic Frizzlit class on Dune. Our first meeting is Monday, January 6. Hope to see you there!
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This was a great post that taught me a lot of things that I didn't know before. Thank you.