Dune

Podría centrarme en la idea de Mesias y libertador que recaen sobre su protagonista en su trama política, religiosa, en el papel de las mujeres... Pero seguiré caminos menos trillados.

Entre la amplia y diversa vida laboral de Frank Herbert hay una actividad que fue la causa de que escribiera "Dune". Era ecólogo y en una investigación sobre un desierto y sus dunas hayo la semilla (nunca una palabra fue tan acertada como esa) de esta obra. Desarrolló un planeta complejo y fascinante en el que la vida casi parecía insostenible por su sequía y peligros. Elaboró una filosofía y estilo de vida fascinante entorno a la escasa cantidad de agua disponible y el único producto abundante existente: la melange. Para la época en la que escribió esta novela, parece muy actual la idea de Terraformar ese mundo extremadamente hostil. Con sus conocimientos prácticos y su mente creativa este autor habría sido de gran utilidad en los experimentos que pretenden terraformar el planeta Marte. Aunque diría que los humanos destacamos destruyendo planetas más que (re)creándolos 🤷‍♀️ .

Me habría gustado que dedicase aún más páginas a esa modificación de Arrakis, a sus planes de volverlo más verde y adaptado a los humanos. Agradecí el Apéndice sobre su ecología.

No explicaré la trama, pero diré que en su conjunto el libro me pareció interesante y no tan difícil como lo imaginaba. Hay paralelismos más que evidentes con el pueblo bereber de Marruecos (también hay descendientes suyos en las Islas Canarias) que son habitantes del desierto, y un cierto aire a los cuentos de las 1001 noches al inicio de cada capítulo.

Estoy dispuesta a leer su continuación. Eso es mucho decir, porque no me agradan los libros grandes y este tiene más de 700 páginas.

Već neko vrijeme sam razmišljala da se uhvatim u koštac sa nekom knjigom naučne fantastike, jer sam ih uvjek zaobilazila. Čitanje ove knjige je za mene predstavljalo lični izazov i jako mi je drago što sam istrajala i pročitala je do kraja.
Sa najavom za izlazak nove filmske adaptacije, ja kao i dosta ljudi se upoznajemo sa dijelom za koje se smatra jednim od pionira moderne naučne fantastike. Pri daljem interesovanju saznajem i za druge adaptacije, kao na primer za onu neslavnu Dejvida Lynch-a i Alehandra Hodorovskog i to me još više tjera da se upustim u ovaj svijet, te naknadno odgledam njihove interpretacije ove knjige.
Kao neko ko nije nikada prije čitao ovaj žanr, trebalo mi je dosta vremena da uđem u čitav svijet u koji autor naglo gura čitaoca. Univerzum je sastavljen od velikog broja koncepata i termina inspirisanim jezicima našeg srednjeg istoka, jer se veliki dio radnje odvija na planeti-pustinji. Takođe, čitanje uspori i stalno prebacivanje na kraj knjige gdje se nalazi mali riječnik pojmova, ali mogu da vidim kako to može nekome predstavljati i poseban gušt, jer je karakteristično za ovu vrstu literature (meni je to bio otežavajući faktor jer sam čitala u pdf-u).
Voljela bih da sam se potrudila doći do hardcopy verzije. Čitala sam e-book verziju na hrvatskom jeziku što mi je dodatno otežalo čitanje jer sam jednostavno više navikla na srpske prevode.
Svakako mi se knjiga sviđela, drago mi je da sam baš nju izabrala za probijanje "sci-fi leda", originalna je i jako je interesntno bilo ući u jedan novi svijet.

This was my second time reading this book, and you know, I think I liked it a little better this time. I was able to catch and appreciate some details early on that were important later, and I had a better understanding of what to expect, so some of the more confusing passages were easier to comprehend.

There's definitely some weirder stuff in this book, and I'm not sure I understood everything. Generally speaking, whenever Paul went into a trance and started seeing the future, I got a wee bit lost.

Probably my favorite thing about this book is the world that it's set in; very little context is given (until the delightfully detailed appendixes), but it's glaringly obvious that all of the casually mentioned events from the far past were well thought out and shaped how the world ended up.

I was also extremely impressed by the thinking through of the Guild monopoly; that was a detail that was so fascinating to think through the implications of, and it gave the story so much more realism and put constraints on some of the more obvious simple paths that could have otherwise been taken to solve problems.

So, in short, the worldbuilding is fantastic. At every point it feels so real; you can see that there are problems, that not everything went well in the past. Some authors I read (especially Asimov) have very cut-and-dried, simplified backstories that only exist to set up the story, but in Dune I really saw that a rigorously planned, realistic timeline existed, and it was fascinating to see the story flow around the figurative mountains that created rather than just changing the landscape.

Also, side note: Did you know that the Planitae (plains) and Labyrinthi (pretty much what it sounds like) on Titan (probably my favorite moon or planet in our Solar System) are named after planets from the Dune universe? I love the creativity that goes into Titan's nomenclature. (My favorite is that the mountains are named after Middle Earth mountains--Like Doom Mons! [i.e. Mount Doom])