Otvorený dopis Briana Herberta fanúšikom Duny - december 2005
Nižšie uvedený text je prekladom otvoreného dopisu Briana Herberta fanúšikom Duny z decembra 2005, ktorý je reakciou na početné (i keď menšinové) odmietavé reakcie na jeho romány z prostredia Duniverza. Originál textu nájdete na stránkach www.dunenovels.com.
Brian Herbert's Personal Letter to Dune Fans
I have been writing new Dune novels with Kevin J. Anderson for several years now, and it has been a remarkable journey through my father's fantastic science-fiction universe. As many of you know, I did not undertake this task quickly. In fact, I delayed tackling any new Dune projects until 1997, eleven years after my father's untimely death. If I had wanted to maximize my income from these books, there was a big "window of opportunity" in the first couple of years after he passed away. For many reasons, most of them having to do with the integrity of my father's literary legacy, I did not continue the series when it would have been the most financially profitable.
It was not until many years later, after a great deal of the interest in Dune had waned, that I undertook new projects. By that time, I felt the necessary enthusiasm for the formidable task that this would involve, and I proceeded with the absolute certainty that I had found the writing partner in Kevin who matched my desire to maintain the extraordinary high quality of the series.
In 1999, several fans posted negative comments about our forthcoming series. Months before Dune: House Atreides was published, they said vitriolic things about a novel they had not even read, and they came up with insulting names for both Kevin and me. The comments troubled me, but I told my co-author that I forgave those fans. After all, they felt that they had a stake in the marvelous Dune universe, and they did not want anyone coming in with big boots on, tromping around on sacred ground. Those fans loved the Dune universe enough to want its quality to remain high, and some of them eventually apologized to us after they actually read House Atreides.
When Kevin and I appeared at the big DragonCon convention in Atlanta in the summer of 1999, the fans had only read an excerpt booklet for House Atreides. The novel was still several months away from publication. When hundreds of fans lined up to see us, I didn't know if they would come with insults or tomatoes. A short while later, we had our answer. A man at the front of the line thanked us for continuing the series after so long. He said that he had been waiting for new stories, and he was tremendously excited. That day, we heard similar comments over and over, and they have continued whenever we make public appearances for each new novel. We are very grateful for this solid base of fans who look forward to a new Dune novel each year.
Before writing a single word in the series, I spent a year compiling a huge concordance of the Dune series that my father wrote, so that we could make sure that our facts were straight. I also spent years writing a biography of him, Dreamer of Dune, a massive project that enabled me to understand my complex father even more. Anyone who claims that I hated my father, or that I somehow wanted revenge on him, did not read this book. While my relationship with him was rocky when I was growing up in his strict household, by the time I reached my twenties he and I became best friends, and we even collaborated on the very last novel that he wrote, Man of Two Worlds. I loved him deeply and I miss him tremendously. The day does not go by when I do not think of my remarkable father and the incredible literary legacy that he left for his millions of fans.
I have said many times that Frank Herbert would not have been the incredible man that he was, or the genius author, if it had not been for the contributions of my mother, Beverly Herbert. She was his inspiration, his intellectual equal, and his loving companion for nearly four decades. To understand Frank Herbert, it is essential to understand her as well, so I worked hard to bring her back to life in Dreamer of Dune. But I am also part of the process of understanding Frank Herbert. I am genetically linked to him, and I also heard him say many things (politics, philosophy, etc.) that I have been able to include in new Dune novels. I don't claim to be Frank Herbert or to have anywhere near his talent. But I have bits and pieces of him in everything I do and in every thought I have. He is always with me.
I am not asking anyone to respect me just because they respected Frank Herbert. But I am asking for a fair shake. Unfortunately, it is part of our culture for people to make snap judgments about others without a scintilla of evidence to support their views. They simply have gut reactions, or preconceived notions, and confuse that with evidence. The news media and others are constantly asking people if they think that So-and-So is guilty of this or that, and opinions pour in -- on both sides. Guilty or innocent. But those "trial by public opinion" verdicts are based, in large degree, on filtered information and not on actual evidence. This is a form of shallow thinking, if it can be called thinking at all. It is more emotion-based than intellectual, and the emotions can easily send people careening in the wrong direction.
Obviously, we have vastly more fans who support our new Dune stories than there are detractors. That's why sales of the new novels have been so strong, and why the overwhelming majority of letters that we receive are positive. It is also encouraging to us that sales of Frank Herbert's six Dune novels increased dramatically after Kevin and I started publishing our prequels. Dune in particular has enjoyed a renaissance, as new, younger readers are picking up the classic novel for the first time.
Even with the few negative and unfair comments that Kevin has responded to in his "Conspiracy Theories" blog, I respect those fans. They love the Dune universe and they want the best for it. Remember, though, that it is not possible to please everyone all of the time. Even Frank Herbert could not do that, as many fans and editors did not understand his first sequel Dune Messiah, in which he made the dark side of the hero central to the story. More than a decade after that, in 1984, the David Lynch movie "Dune" was severely criticized as well. In both cases, it was largely because fans had their own images of what the Dune universe should contain, and the sequel novel and the movie did not match those images. For some fans, it is undoubtedly the same now, as the books that Kevin and I write do not match their own images.
In the Dune universe, however, it is important to keep an open mind. It has such an incredible wealth of ideas that anyone working in that "sandbox" is bound to go in any number of directions. That's part of the enjoyment of writing new Dune stories, and I can assure you that Kevin and I are having a wonderful time in the creative process. It is great fun as we play off each other like riffing in a jazz performance, taking each other's ideas to new levels.
Thinking back, I remember how much I enjoyed L. Frank Baum's "Oz" series when I was a boy. I was six years old when my mother handed me a thick Oz novel and told me I was ready to read it. It wasn't long before I had read through all of the Baum books and I was looking for more. Baum had died, but the series was continued by others afterward, particularly by Ruth Plumly Thompson. To my delight, I found that I enjoyed her novels just as much as the originals. In a very engaging style, she wrote Purple Prince of Oz, The Gnome King of Oz, The Silver Princess in Oz, The Cowardly Lion of Oz, and other great stories. If she had not continued the series, it would have been a great loss to me.
On a different level, the Dune series is like that. While the novels are much more complex than Oz stories, Frank Herbert generated a tremendously loyal readership, and those fans were disappointed when he died. They wanted to read new stories. It would be better if he could be here today writing the new novels, but that is not possible. In his absence, Kevin and I are doing the very best job we possibly can. We don't expect to please everyone, but in each novel we always try to write for the most demanding of fans, because we understand why their standards are so high.
The Dune universe stands on its own pinnacle. We recognize that, and we will not publish any books that are not the highest quality. I take this very seriously, and you have my word on it.
Brian Herbert December 15, 2005
