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Bretty_boy t1_j26384f wrote

Reply to comment by RegulusRemains in The 1984 Dune film makes a lot more sense if The Spice is referred to as Space Cocaine instead. by neoengel

There have been plenty of times throughout history where a commodity was hugely in demand, I don’t think it needs to be ‘about’ any one of them in particular. Now it’s oil, before that sugar, before that spices through India

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RegulusRemains t1_j266mav wrote

This is from frank Herbert. Not exactly spice, but chaom controls spice too.

"All of this encapsulates the stuff of high drama, of entertainment-and I'm in the entertainment business first. It's all right to include a pot of message, but that's not the key ingredient of wide readership. Yes, there are analogs in Dune of today's events-corruption and bribery in the highest places, whole police forces lost to organized crime, regulatory agencies taken over by the people they are supposed to regulate. The scarce water of Dune is an exact analog of oil scarcity. CHOAM is OPEC."

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Bretty_boy t1_j266tbu wrote

Haha ok well when you’re wrong you’re wrong I guess lol

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RegulusRemains t1_j268c8d wrote

When I first read it I had this crazy epiphany that emperor shaddam was like general saddam hussein.

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greenknight884 t1_j27b79c wrote

On the planet of IRAQkkis

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RegulusRemains t1_j27g9ee wrote

Exactly haha. After I read it and googled publication date and the Iraq conflict I was left with a blown mind

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QuickSpore t1_j272sa5 wrote

Probably not the inspiration though.

Dune was first published in 1965. Back then Saddam was a minor revolutionary figure in jail while the anti-Ba’athist Abdul Salam Arif was president and functional dictator of Iraq. Back then Saddam was a known, but rare, Arabic name.

Saddam Hussein wouldn’t rise to prominence until the 1968 coup where his cousin Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr became president and Saddam became vice President.

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RegulusRemains t1_j2788wz wrote

Oh that's why the epiphany stuck. I thought it predicted the future haha. Literally thought this book was a prediction of our future.

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bigwebs t1_j26m50t wrote

Interesting that he says the scarce water of dune is oil. Was that misspoken and meant to mean the scarcity of spice on dune is oil?

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RegulusRemains t1_j26o5gk wrote

I think he was talking about the idea when he was writing the book. In the end spice was the thing that was controlled and caused the other entities to fight, scheme, and bribe over.

Edit. It might also be that if the water was unleashed upon dune the spice would end? I've barely read past the original novel so maybe something deeper lol

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bigwebs t1_j26oeyz wrote

Thanks for sharing that quote. I loved reading the dune series. Like many other novel series, that later books that take deep dives into characters are awesome.

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