Back to the seaside. After this weekend I won’t get to see Lou until she’s back from India in late April. I fought my way out of the London traffic nexus and spun down to Brighton, and then we bounced back out to Lewes where there’s a little cinema. The Depot. It used to be where they stored all the beer kegs for Harvey’s Brewery, and now it’s a well appointed little cinema, and it is far from expensive. Dune 2 again. There’s plenty there for a rewatch. I was happy to sink into the world and the performances again while Lou dug through for the first time. A 1965 tale about the power of psychedelics, mixed in with feudalism, jihad and giant worms. Spice makes interstellar travel possible, take enough acid and you are in all worlds simultaneously. And this book was written at the height of it. I imagine Frank Herbert was under the influence when he wrote it.
I had always believed Herbert was a woman with a man’s name like George Eliot. It is one of those things: I was told with certainty when I was twelve by someone else at school that Frank Herbert was a woman. I never chose to question it. Thinking about it I was being wound up. “James Herbert is a woman too.” That’s what they said. I internalised that too. I’ve looked him up just now. Damn.
Neither of those literary Herberts were women. I wonder how many people I’ve told. Who was that little blighter at school with me, sending their wind-up so far into the future? I’ve carried that little glitch, unadressed and unnoticed, for decades. They deserve a medal.
I’m disappointed that these Herberts aren’t women. The most important books in my early reading were Ursula le Guin’s Earthsea books, so perhaps I was happy to absorb the lie so completely as I had experienced women’s fantasy fiction asking more interesting questions than men’s. Also le Guin had many more heroic people with my complexion than the likes of Tolkein.
Frank wrote six Dune books, and there’s plenty of distance to cover yet. His progeny banged out sequels to the extent that there’s loads of material to cover now. Things are gonna get messier and less familiar. I’m hoping that they’ll keep being able to make them though, and they don’t stray too far from the books which get thorny. Good quality widescreen epic movies, some unusual thinking, much opportunity for incredible design. British accents go down well too. Gotta believe there’s a job there somewhere for this one. And if not there’s enjoyable escapism on comfy sofas in Sussex cinemas. I’m happy to be back in the big-screen habit.
AlBarclay 