The Book of Frank Herbert
The Worlds of Frank Herbert
These two collections of Herbert’s shorter fiction, reprints of stories that had appeared earlier in various science-fiction magazines, share both the virtues and the weaknesses of all such anthologies. The major weakness, of course, is the fact that the stories are not of equal quality, ranging from the very lightweight and simple to the relatively complex, from adequate presentation and characterization to very good. However, the virtues outweigh the weaknesses by a considerable margin. Perhaps the most important virtue is that these nineteen stories, which would otherwise be virtually inaccessible to most readers, but especially to those who have recently taken to reading science fiction or who do not live near a library which collects the magazines in which these stories appeared, have been brought together in two volumes; for anyone who has found Herbert’s other works interesting and worth reading, this is a worthwhile service. Another point of interest, one that will be most important in discussing these stories, is the way in which they interact with one another and with the novels, dealing with themes and ideas, and even characters, that appear elsewhere. Thus these stories provide a basis from which to view some of the themes and ideas to which Herbert consistently returns in his writings and from which to look at the variations and permutations in them as they appear in different contexts.
“Seed Stock,” the first story in The Book of Frank Herbert (these stories will be discussed in the order in which they are found in the books, beginning, first, with The Book of Frank Herbert and, later, with The Worlds of Frank Herbert), is certainly one of the best and most significant stories in these two volumes. Its subject is the mutual adaptation of humans to a new planet and of the planet to humans. The most obvious conflict in this story is between humanity and the planet which it is attempting to settle and colonize; equally important, however, is the conflict between the scientists and the laborers, with the technicians caught in the middle and carrying the balance of power. Both conflicts involve the way in which the adaptations will take place; this is the thematic focus for the story, which is really a character study of Kroudar (a laborer) and his wife Honida (a technician) that emphasizes their relationship to the land. The scientists insist that the planet should adapt to humans, that the plants and animals brought from Earth should be able to thrive here; yet the scientists are also portrayed as being somewhat mentally stagnant; they are unable to explain why the new conditions of this planet produce the effects they do, and they are unable to wrench themselves free of old patterns of thought in a new situation to find new answers. Kroudar, the embodiment, of the slowwitted, physically able worker, represents the antithesis of the scientists’ approach toward this new planet. He has begun to “feel” with this new world; he has sensed the particular “rhythms” of the land and the sea, but he can barely communicate what he feels—except by action. Honida is a technician, the bridge between the two groups; she is able to understand both the scientists and Kroudar, to draw knowledge from them, and to put it to work—that is, in her genetic research (the method she uses), the theoretical techniques which she uses are those of the scientists. But she is more curious than the scientists and thus produces a new variety of corn because of her “feeling” for the new land. This facet of her character, we realize, was the basis for her choosing Kroudar as her mate, made against the wishes of the scientists; the reader is left quite certain that their children, their line, will have the best chances of surviving and flourishing. Thus, although it is suggested that the intuition has a better chance for survival than pure intellect, survival is better enhanced by the two forces in human life working in concert. The same is true of the conflict between adapting oneself to the planet and adapting the planet to oneself: A combination of these, a compromise, is the most likely to be successful.
“The Nothing” is perhaps not quite as complex or as significant as “Seed Stock,” but it is an interesting and compact story which raises some of the issues which are explored in more detail in several of the novels. Strangely enough, the basic pattern is the girl-meets-boy story that we have read for years. Jean Carlysle, because of an argument with her father, goes down to the tavern for a drink and to talk about jobs; a good-looking young man (Claude Williams) comes in and sits down beside her; she tries to strike up a conversation; the police enter and take her and Claude to his father, a VIP; he approves of her; they get married; she goes home to get her things; when she returns, she reaffirms her decision to be married.
In one sense, this plot is similar to those stories in the Saturday Evening Post in the 1940s. However, the society in which this story takes place and the problem to be solved overshadow this simple story line. The story itself takes place sometime in the future, several generations after an atomic war, the radiation from which has produced a number of mutations. All these mutations, at least those mentioned in the story, are mental, involving the development of such psi-powers as telepathy, teleportation, prescience, and the ability to set fires with a glance. On the other hand, there are the Nothings, those who have none of these psi-powers; there are a number of preserves, apparently for the protection of the Nothings, but also (rather secretly) a place to preserve and develop the pre-Talent era means of doing things. Jean is a “pyro,” with flashes of telepathy; Mensor Williams is one of only nine people who have all the Talents to a very high degree of proficiency, but his son Claude is a Nothing. The postulated problem, which brings Claude and Jean into marriage, is that the Talents are becoming dulled with each generation and that more and more children are being born without Talents. The biological basis for this is the fact that extremes from the norm tend to produce toward the average—that is, those who are geniuses tend to have children who are less intelligent or less talented than their parents. What this means is that, although the Talents will probably never die out, a rather drastic change must soon take place in society. The preserves are doing two things: re-establishing the pre-Talent ways of doing things and matching gene charts to find those with the greatest chances of producing Talented children; this latter purpose is a primary reason for Mensor Williams’s urging the marriage between Claude and Jean, for there is a seventy percent chance that their children will be telepathic, prescient, or both. There is also the added twist that beyond a certain point, rapidly approaching, the prescients cannot see; nearly everything about Claude and Jean, for example, is a “blank” to Mensor Williams, which is rather unusual but a relief to Jean, especially because of her wedding night. Behind all of this, presented indirectly and by means of suggestions rather than in detail, is the society, which is clear and fascinating in its own right; to give only one example, one simply asks if someone is a teleporter and visualizes the destination when one wants to go somewhere.
Herbert’s “Rat Race” is based on that hoary and overworked science-fiction premise of aliens being secretly among us, but he has managed an interesting treatment of the idea, primarily by turning it into a detective story. Welby Lewis, chief of criminal investigation under Sheriff John Czernak in a fairly large town, goes to a mortuary to deliver a bottle of stomach washings to the county hospital. When he gets there, a number of things puzzle him, which leads him to try and collect some solid facts to confirm his suspicions. He and a deputy observe the place, and Welby decides to question a Mr. Johnson, one of the owners of the mortuary. Johnson panics, decides that he must do something to prevent Welby’s discovery, and shoots him; only the fact that Welby’s heart is on the wrong side saves him (this freakish placement was carefully established early in the story). Johnson then commits suicide. With Welby in the hospital, other people keep bringing in information, pieces in the puzzle. The end result is that they discover that aliens have been using human beings as test animals in a variety of ways. But whereas many stories stop at this point, Herbert continues with his central question: What does one do with test animals when he discovers that they are intelligent and have discovered what one is doing—and what will aliens do with us now that we have discovered their operations? Dr. Bellarmine decides that he will be the volunteer to try and contact the aliens and be the first volunteer for their psychological testing. A symbolic communication is sent back from the aliens that shows their awareness of our awareness and an apparent willingness to discontinue this stage of their experimentation.
The process of suspicion, investigation, hypothesis, and tentative verification is the main interest in “Rat Race,” as it is in most detective stories or in any problem-solving story. The conclusions arrived at, and the bases for them, are what distinguish this story from mere science fiction. Whereas in the first two stories the setting was used to mark the differences from life on Earth as we know it flow, Herbert has tried in this story to make the setting real and ordinary to both counteract and accentuate the conclusions of the characters. The technique for presenting this background is, however, the same as in most of these stories: Key details and suggestions are suggested rather than detailed. For example, many people have seen offices in older court houses, and the details which are provided for Sheriff Czernak’s office—for example, a radiator, a pinup calendar, stained and flaking plaster walls, beat-up desks—are designed to remind readers and let them fill in the rest of the details. Finally, there is one thematic item which is brought out near the end of the story that should be noted. This is the idea that pure scientists of any race would follow the human pattern and would be able to control themselves, which the characters take to mean that they would be able to understand the problems of other beings. Johnson, the alien who panicked, is probably a lab man or a field technician and, thus, is not as highly trained or as disinterested as a pure scientist might be; the characters also suggest that he is not even a good technician, for he has made too many mistakes.
“Gambling Device” is a gimmick story, interesting but rather light-weight. Because they missed a turn, a newlywed couple arrives at the Desert Rest Hotel, where no gambling is allowed; once they are in their room, a voice explains that here nothing is left to chance: They have the security of predetermination, and free choice has been eliminated—totally. This means, among other things, that no one can talk unless they have made, in advance, a conscious decision to do so. The couple wishes to leave, so the husband creates a gamble that will necessarily make the hotel a part of it; the hotel, only a machine and not programmed for such things, has to remove itself, leaving them outside and free to go on their way.
“Looking for Something?” is similar to “Rat Race” in that it deals with aliens using us in much the same way that we use animals; here, however, little has been done to refresh an old idea, although the story is not badly written. The idea is that aliens are controlling human perception of reality so that they can obtain a fluid they call “korad,” which confers immortality on them—and would for us if we could keep it. The story is told from the point of view of a Denebian administrator making a report about an error, in which a hypnotist glimpsed the true reality, what is happening and how it came about.
“The Gone Dogs” is one of the three best stories in The Book of Frank Herbert. The story, and the chain-reaction that follows, begins when a rancher-veterinarian, planning to wipe out his coyote problem, releases a female coyote infected with a mutated hog cholera virus. Unfortunately, while it is effective for the coyotes, the disease spreads to other canines and becomes anaerobic, as well as being carried by humans, who release the virus through their sweat glands. With the removal of coyotes and dogs, other predators (wolves and foxes) that had been kept in check by the canines begin to be a problem. In addition, as dogs become more scarce, people begin to do strange things in order to save the dogs they have or to get a dog to replace one which died; many dogs are put on spaceships to be taken to other planets to keep them safe, only to be dumped by the crews—after they have taken the money.
Tragically, the last dogs on Earth are killed by a woman who decides that she must have a dog and, consequently, defies nearly impassable territory and evades robot guards to get to a dog preserve. Not only does this situation have ecological and human effects but also political and even interplanetary effects.
The Vegans, with whom Earth has been on friendly terms for some time and who are far ahead of Earth’s scientists in bio-physics, are extremely proud of their mikeses generator, which allows cross-breeding between different species. Earth, however, refuses to allow the Vegans to have dogs because of their experiments on the animals; by implication, this attitude is representative of many other elements in the relationships between the two races. Finally, the Vegans withdraw from all contact with Earth when the dogs are smuggled to them by Dr. Varley Trent. The dogs, however, are “special” dogs: They have the familiar beagle head and brown and white fur—but all have six legs. Thus the story is a step-by-step look at the consequences of a single act, at the discoveries that are made in the process of analyzing what has happened, and at the attempts to do something about the situation, both legal and non-legal. The quality of the story is due to the interest of the problem postulated, the number of facets of the problem which are explored, and the unity of the whole.
“Passage for Piano” focuses on the human aspects of preparing for colonizing a new planet by examining the problems of one family as they choose what they will take. The Hatchell family seems to be an excellent choice for both the purposes of the story and the purposes of colonization: Walter Hatchell is the chief ecologist of the expedition, an expert in setting up the delicate balance of growing things to support human life on an alien world; his wife is a nurse-dietician; their two children are precocious and very talented. The problem of the story develops from the fact that each adult can take only seventy-five pounds of luggage and each child under fourteen can take only forty pounds. With Walter and with Rita, the daughter, there seems to be very little problem, for they are not particularly attached to things or items. Mrs. Hatchell, on the other hand, is quite attached to things and has been having some difficulty in choosing what to take, and she is gradually beginning to panic. The real difficulty is with their son, David, who is a blind piano prodigy who has full concert stature at the age of twelve. (One of the interesting clusters of details indicates that his blindness is the result of a rare illness brought back by an exploratory expedition; it has also apparently left his emotional balance somewhat off-center.) He is upset because he cannot take his piano with him (it weighs fourteen hundred and eight pounds); the psychiatrist believes that David could die without it and that the very least that might happen is the destruction of his talent, for he feels a connection between the piano and his talent as legacies of his grandfather. Walter’s position makes it virtually impossible, particularly at the point that has been reached in preparing, for them to consider staying behind. Mrs. Hatchell figures that if each of the three hundred and eight colonists contributes just four pounds and twelve ounces, they can take the piano; before Charlesworthy, the leader of the expedition, learns of this unauthorized plan, she has collected five hundred and fifty-four pounds and eight ounces. When Charlesworthy finally telephones Margaret to confirm the matter, David proposes the workable compromise, taking only the keyboard and the strings, with the rest to be made on the new planet; as he says, it will then be part of both worlds. The leader commits himself and his wife to contributing eight and one-half pounds allowance needed to take the “piano.” This is a rather quiet story, but it seems very real and has a solid impact. One important factor in producing both this sense of reality and its impact is the fact that Herbert takes some time to show that David is not simply throwing a temper tantrum about the piano; the roots of his problem are much deeper, most of them unconscious. For example, when his mother decides to find a way to take the piano, he is unhappy about leaving the piano behind but is also unhappy about asking people to give up some of their precious belongings so that he can take it; furthermore, he is the one who suggests, without prompting from any source, the compromise that both saves him and enriches the colony. Finally, although the situation is not as severe when the Atreides family must move from Caladan to Arrakis, this story has a great deal in common with the first part of Dune and can help us understand the feelings of all those who have been uprooted, but especially those of Jessica; the importance of psychological roots is also seen in the last part of The Godmakers.
One of the ideas that recurs frequently in Herbert’s short stories is the emphasis on the human effects of, or on human reactions to, the various kinds of changes in the situation that he explores. This, in spite of some awkwardness in the handling and presentation, is the virtue of such a story as “Encounter in a Lonely Place.” In the story, an older man who has held himself apart from the life of the village in which his family has lived for several generations tells a younger man, a writer wounded in the war, who has come back to the town where his grandparents had lived to recuperate, about his ability to read a mind. At the age of seventeen, he fell in love with a servant girl who worked for his sister. One night they were playing a card game, and he named every card that she turned up without looking at them; ever since, he has seen things through “her eyes.” Unfortunately this woman, the only woman he ever loved, thinks that he is some kind of demon and will not marry him. Although, in summary, this idea may seem contrived, Herbert’s dramatization makes it seem real and effective. The man also reveals much the same kind of loneliness and struggle in coping with his gift/curse as Paul Atreides experienced in Dune and, to a lesser extent, Lewis Orne in The Godmakers.
“Operation Syndrome” is probably the best story in this collection; it is also one of the most fully balanced science-fiction stories, along with “Seed Stock” and “The Gone Dogs,” bringing together psychological exploration, discovery of a new device, the process of problem solving in both these areas, and the human effects of both. The first paragraph, plus two one-line paragraphs, sets the problem in general terms, focusing briefly on Honolulu, the first of nine cities hit by the Scramble Syndrome. For years, they have been peaceful and normal; suddenly, the entire city is insane, almost totally. Other such brief views, each of a different city, are scattered throughout the story. The scene then shifts to Seattle, focusing on Dr. Eric Ladde, a psychiatrist who is having a dream. It later becomes clear that his dream is of Colleen Lanai and the musikron. The project on which he is working, and has been working on unsuccessfully for some time, is the construction of a teleprobe, a machine to interpret encephalographic waves to communicate with the unconscious mind.
The next morning, he meets Colleen Lanai and recognizes her from his dream. He strikes up a conversation with her, and two processes are set in motion: They gradually fall in love, and, more important, the cause and nature of the Scramble Syndrome is discovered. Finally, the knowledge that the Scramble Syndrome is tied to the musikron and sets in twenty-eight hours after it leaves a city is established. Furthermore, Pete Serantis developed the machine while working with Dr. Carlos Amanti, who is in an insane asylum and who was Dr. Ladde’s teacher and originator of the idea of a teleprobe. Ladde’s theory is that the musikron funnels disturbing impulses directly into the unconscious; after a time, the mind cannot handle the resonances, and insanity results. Because these impulses reach everyone—except a very few who are immune or prepared—within a certain radius, the results are disastrous. The love story is complicated by the presence of Pete Serantis, a man twisted physically and mentally, who is insanely jealous of Colleen Lanai. When Colleen first attempts to give Eric the plans to the musikron so he can compare them with his teleprobe and perhaps find out what is hindering its development, Pete deliberately substitutes plans that would destroy anyone who would apply them as found. Later, even though she feels guilty about betraying Pete and will not believe that he had anything to do with whatever is causing the Scramble Syndrome, she does leave the real plans behind when they leave for London. From them, Eric and an assistant recruited at the last moment build a functional teleprobe, although it is finally finished four hours after the Syndrome has hit; he has sent his assistant away before the Syndrome occurs, and he himself is only lightly affected because of his training, his work with the teleprobe, and his expectation that it would occur. When he finishes the teleprobe, he uses it to probe for the minds of others trained in psychology, gradually building up a network that can then move outward to calm the minds of the general population. At the end of the story, Colleen returns to him.
Many of the things that make this a fine and interesting story, of course, are not dwelt on in this appraisal. One of these is the construction of the teleprobe; we are given a sense that it would be possible to build one by the quotations from books by Amanti, by the discussions of circuit diagrams and the parts needed, and the descriptions of putting the instrument together (which also provides a sense of the time and urgency involved). Another, perhaps the most interesting aspect of the story, is the exploration of the mind working when Dr. Ladde first puts on the teleprobe and moves, first into some of the hidden areas of his own mind and then into the minds of others. Finally, there are such touches as the almost casual mention of things that would be taken for granted in a future society and the interactions of the characters. All of these combine to make a rich, complex, and interesting story.
The device of using an unexpected twist for an ending and the element of satire on our readiness to find a military solution for problems provide the interest in the last story in this collection, “Occupation Force.” A huge alien spaceship is sighted over the United States. A high-level conference is called to decide what to do about it, with many of those present believing it to be a mission of conquest and ready to use the “Bomb,” especially after it is reported that an Earthman has been taken aboard. However, it is decided that a peaceful means will be tried first, though military precautions will be held in immediate readiness. The general who is appointed to greet the aliens has his suspicions aroused by various references to a colonial program by the alien’s ambassador. He refers, of course, to their colonization of Earth—seven thousand years ago.
The first story in The Worlds of Frank Herbert, “The Tactful Saboteur,” is a fun story with several serious underlying themes. Much of the fun is due to the antics of Jorj X. McKie in his capacity of Saboteur Extraordinary; anyone and anything, with only a few limitations, are fair game. On a more serious level, there is a need for a government to be slow working in order to protect the rights of private citizens; it is for the purpose of slowing things down that the Bureau of Sabotage was formed in the first place. According to McKie, once in the past, red tape was eliminated from the workings of government; it then slipped into high gear and began moving even faster, with laws passed within an hour of conception, appropriations coming and going in a fortnight, new bureaus coming into being almost on whim, and so on. Thus the bureau functions to slow things down, to incite disputes and battles between agencies to expose the temperamental types who can’t control themselves and think on their feet, to keep the public entertained and fascinated by their flamboyant obstructionism, to stir up opposition between political parties on the theory that it tends to expose reality, and to provide an outlet for society’s troublemakers. However, it is also made clear that indiscriminate obstruction is not desirable. Some government agencies are apparently immune from sabotage all the time, and others some of the time under specified conditions; only the Bureau of Sabotage is never immune. In fact, the way to advance in the Bureau is through successful sabotage against one’s superiors. In addition, one of their axioms is that the bigger a project is, the more attention it should get from the Bureau.
Another of these more serious themes is the inter-relationships between various sentient beings. Although several others are mentioned, the two main types focused on are humans and the Pan-Spechi. In the course of an investigation for the Bureau, it becomes necessary for Jorj X. McKie to probe beneath the commonly known facts that the Pan-Spechi are a five-gendered race in which ego-dominance passes periodically from one to another member of a creche (their basic five member unit) to find out as much as possible about their creche life and ego-transfer. This is complicated by the fact that these are among the most private elements of Pan-Spechi life, and that the Pan-Spechi have rather rigorous requirements about the propriety of conversations about them; talking about the creche could easily lead to immediate death. It is a tribute to McKie’s courage, sensitivity, knowledge, and tact that he manages to reveal these things without getting killed. As he points out near the end of the story, these two races and cultures have lived together in apparent understanding for centuries; only now are they really attempting to understand each other, to find out the values and systems of meaning that are most basic to each culture, without which mutual understanding and respect are virtually impossible.
In both “The Tactful Saboteur” and the story which follows it, “By the Book,” a problem is postulated, data is gathered, and a solution is arrived at; nevertheless, they are quite different stories, for while the problem and the exploration in “The Tactful Saboteur” deals with cultural and semantic materials, “By the Book” deals with technological materials. “By the Book” postulates that an angle-space transmission beam has been developed. Through angle-space, the theory goes, every place in the universe is just around the corner from every other place. Although scientists have developed a beam that sends things through angle-space when conditions are right, they are not sure just how it works or exactly what happens at the other end, and they are just now developing the mathematics to explain the phenomena involved; this, of course, is often the way that scientific discovery proceeds. Using the angle-space transmissions, humans have sent out containers with human and animal embryos toward new, inhabitable worlds. These containers have everything necessary to care for the embryos once they land, with gestation vats, mechanical “nursemaids” and educational systems, materials for development, and so on. However, the farther away the containers, the muddier the contact with them, and the more uncertain their fate becomes. Thus, the Haigh Company and its best troubleshooter, Ivar Norris Gump, must find out what is clouding contact and how to insure the safe arrival of the containers; before the story begins, six other troubleshooters have died trying to solve these problems. Much of the story, then, is a description of the beam tube hollowed out of rock on the moon and of the process of examining the situation and gathering data that Gump goes through. Finally, he develops a hypothesis and convinces the company to build him a container that will allow him to test this hypothesis and to be sent out along the beam. His theory is borne out, and he provides data that will change the mathematics and the theories being developed to explain the beam and its actions toward greater accuracy; in addition, he is in a position to help guide the containers down, and he has suggested the means to have others come through to help and return to Earth. Gump, however, has decided that he would like to stay. Thus, the process of the scientific method provides the major interest of the story, but it does not lack the human element. One of the nicer touches, in fact, is the way that Gump uses the rule books; he has one of the finest collections of them, including some very old ones. He often quotes from them, but many times he refers also to the fact that they were written by people far from the situation they are supposed to be applied in. He uses these choice quotations for many purposes: to amuse himself, to get things done by quoting their own words back to the company’s board, to help himself sort out his thinking, and to determine a point from which to approach a problem; finally, he senses that the value of handbooks is to provide a sense of order and system, and to protect people against chaos.
“Committee of the Whole” could take place at just about anytime, for the change that the story postulates is very slight, and very little (if any) new knowledge or technology would be needed to bring it about. The main focus of the story is the revolutionary impact that a single, rather simple device could have on our society. Part of the interest of this story is the satiric portrait of a Senate Committee in action, with a particular focus on the chairman, who is attempting to twist matters to his advantage and who will throw his weight around if necessary to do so; this Senate hearing provides the frame of the story, the situation in which the device is introduced. Another part of the interest is the fact that William R. Custer, the prime witness before the Committee, can out-think the senator and refuses to let things be twisted; in addition, he knows he has something which can put a stop to the kind of power games which the senator is trying to play.
The third point of interest in this story is the technological gadget that Custer introduces before the committee—and to the world, through the television coverage of the hearing. This device is a homemade laser, which Custer explains very fully, including the materials and the process involved in making one; the materials are easily found, with many substitutions possible, and nearly anyone who is interested could make one. Custer has used this opportunity to broadcast the details of this device because he feels that the power over people’s actions is becoming far too concentrated in too few people, whose interest is in preserving that power and in playing power games; the committee chairman illustrates the point very well. Ultimately, then, Custer’s concern is for the dignity of individual human beings; he feels that his device will introduce an element which will force every human to consider the dignity of every other human. However, he is not purely an idealist, for he recognizes that there will be no period of violence as the change in behavior is made, but he is sufficiently an idealist to believe that humanity will survive and emerge strengthened and moving in a more positive direction. It is interesting to note that all of Herbert’s novels are concerned in some way with the question of the ways in which governments use their power; most of the novels postulate either some way to subvert that power or some means of limiting its effects.
The central target of “Mating Call” is human ignorance, our feeling that we must uplift the ignorant and backward beings in our world (our universe), our self-centered definitions of ignorance and backwardness, and our tendency to act before we know all the facts. The problem to be solved, which forms the framework of the story, is that the birthrate on Rukuchp has been reduced since the introduction of foreign music to that planet. Marie Medill, a young woman with a doctorate in music, and Laoconia Wilkinson, a senior field agent of the Social Anthropological Service who is tone deaf, are sent to the planet to implement Marie’s plan to teach the natives more about our musical forms; they are escorted by a full crew in space.
This plan has been accepted because music seems to have something to do with the process of conception and birth on Rukuchp, although the humans have never found out exactly what the relationship is or how the natives reproduce. The contrast between these two agents provides most of the thematic thrust of the story, for Marie Medill has a great deal of sympathy for these natives and has taken the trouble to begin to recognize them as individuals, while Laoconia, the professional, views them simply as specimens to be put through a battery of tests without regard to individuality or dignity—mere creatures to have her opinions and beliefs imposed on. In addition, Marie doubts the wisdom of what they are about to do and wishes to refrain until they have more complete information; Laoconia, on the other hand, insists on going ahead once she has made up her mind. Because Laoconia is the professional and the senior member of the group, her decision is final; as a result, all the women who hear the natives’ Big Sing reproduce parthenogenically, as in cell division. Because this event is transmitted back to the ship, this includes all the women in the crew; because the concert was pirated and rebroadcast, it includes nearly all women who are capable of conceiving. Thus are the tables turned on the originators of a hasty and potentially disastrous action, rather than wiping out the recipients, as the story indicates happened to one race just before this story opens.
“Escape Felicity” concerns Roger Deirut, a D-ship man exploring the universe of places habitable by humans. The first part of the story focuses on Deirut’s struggle to overcome the “Push,” a compulsion to turn around and go home, which grows stronger as the D-ship pilots get farther from Earth. He believes (wrongly) that the Bu-psych operators are responsible for this, to make sure the pilots return to let them know about any finds or information. This belief is one of the devices that he uses to keep himself going, to keep from turning back; this part of the story records the basics of the methods he uses to stay out ninety-four days, breaking Bingaling’s record of eighty-one days. On the ninety-fourth day, he emerges from the hydrogen cloud that has defeated other pilots and finds a planet .998 of Earth norm. Particularly in view of the end of the story, this constitutes a brief study of humanity’s ability to rationalize its discoveries. The largest part of the story deals with his contact with the aliens inhabiting this planet. To a major degree, this contact is a mutual exploration of each other’s language. Deirut uses the ship’s computer; the aliens translate mentally. Although the world and the aliens with whom he comes in contact seem very primitive and pastoral to Deirut, their civilization is twenty-five million years old, and even these simple shepherds have abilities far beyond Deirut’s understanding.
Finally the aliens sit around, mentally altering Deirut’s memory and that of the ship and intensifying the “Push.” He is then sent on his way home, dreaming of, someday, finding a planet like the one he has just left, proud of his ninety-four days out, and wondering why the force he feels is called “Push” instead of “Pull.” The story makes it clear that this has happened many times in the past and suggests that, contrary to our expectations, we really have very little to offer other intelligent beings. This is a fine reversal of a great many alien contact stories and makes an interesting complement to “Mating Call.”
“The GM Effect” might be the other side of “Committee of the Whole,” a view of what might have happened if Custer had not made sure that his invention received wide publicity. First, two of the developers of the GM effect gather together everyone who has had anything to do with developing or experimenting with it—or who knows anything at all about it. They then find a convenient excuse to leave, for the others are to be destroyed by soldiers. They obviously feel that they are safe from any action against them, though one felt the possibility of some kind of action and tried to get out some copies of the formula and to hide others. However, the Brigadier General in charge of the operation anticipated him and intercepted or found all these copies. The two conspirators are shot, and the General implies that all the soldiers involved in this operation will be effectively silenced. He retains the only copy of the formula, as well as some of the information gained from the experiments, both of which he intends to use in further power games. The “hows” of the effect are never explained. Working from the Jungian concept of racial memory, Herbert postulates that this liquid (even this is not clearly the case) unlocks in an individual the memories of his ancestors in the direct line: Father A, Mother B, Grandfathers and Grandmothers A and B, and so on. In addition, he suggests that, at least for a time, there is a dual awareness of oneself in the present and the past of one’s ancestors. The first thing that occurs to the scholars who developed the GM effect is that it will change history as a written record, for they discover ancestors who were involved in important events. In addition, they can find out the backgrounds of people, the hiding places of secret records, and so on, because of the overlap between people with the same ancestors. Whereas the academics see this information as changing history, the General sees it as a lever that can be used to increase his power. This seems to be exactly what would have happened with Custer’s laser tool/weapon had he not broadcast instructions about it to the world before those in power could stop him.
“The Featherbedders” is rather nicely summed up by the quote from Swift that ends the story: “A flea hath smaller fleas that on him prey; and these have smaller still to bite ’em; and so proceed ad infinitum.” The story is about two Slorin, both of whom have effectively blended into Earth society and have found their niche. They are on a mission to find out about a set of events and mental disturbances which suggest something very much like a Slorin gone wild and revealing himself. They find him, one who was injured in the forced landing of their ship on Earth and who has only a partial memory of who he is, what he is, and how he should be behaving. Although it isn’t revealed until the end, the village on which the damaged Slorin has been imposing law and order is completely composed of other beings who prey on the Slorin; they forced the landing of the Slorin ship so they could use it, and they usually wait until the Slorin have moved in before they move in themselves. The story is filled with aphorisms about how to be an effective parasite. The Slorin can take, for example, any form to at least seventy-five percent accuracy. But whereas the Slorin tend toward bureaucratic roles, the other race works further down the economic ladder, as peasants, common people, and so on. The Slorin also believe it to be imperative to avoid nudging humans to an awareness of their existence and the development of undeveloped powers, and the other race feels exactly the same about the Slorin. Furthermore, actually filling the niche they have selected rather than just “acting” at it is a prime directive of the Slorin, as is moderation in all things. Because these two directives are not going hand-in-hand at the village is the reason for Slorin concern and investigation. In a way, then, this story is a handbook for fitting oneself into a system, of adapting oneself to the system and slowly changing it; with very little difficulty, it can be applied to humans and their relationship with Earth’s ecosystem, showing the errors of the incomplete and undisciplined approach and the possibilities of a better approach.
“Old Rambling House” is another story in which hasty action based on an incomplete view of the consequences leads to an undesirable conclusion. On the surface, it is a story about swapping an old rambling house for a trailer house. The couple with the trailer is very anxious to have the house, but they are a little suspicious about getting something for next to nothing; in the end, their greed convinces them to ignore their suspicions, just as the couple with the house planned. The couple with the house seems only interested in getting rid of the house. After the Grahams decide to take the house, something strange happens and the “stinger” in the deal is explained. The Rushes, the former inhabitants of the house, were subjects of the Rojac, tax collectors conditioned so they could not leave the job, but clever enough to find assenting substitutes. The house is a kind of space conveyance traveling along the collection route; the irony is that travel and rootlessness are precisely what the Grahams were trying to escape. The Rojac, from the little information given in the story, are strong believers in the Puritan ethic; they are severe, hard-working, against such frivolity as poetry, and so on. Furthermore, they are always looking for new inhabitable places. The final shock is that the Rushes discover that because Mrs. Graham is pregnant, and because the unborn child did not participate in the decision, Mr. Rush will feel compelled to call the Rojac at the time of decision, confess, and thus give them another planet to take over. Because two couples acted hastily, Earth has eighteen years before take-over.
“A-W-F Unlimited,” the final story in The Worlds of Frank Herbert, is a love story, a problem-solving story, and a story of a confrontation with people playing power games, all neatly tied together with a background that satirizes advertising and the world it is strangling. The problem to be solved, around which all the rest revolves, is that the enlistments in WOMS (Women of Space) have fallen to nearly zero. The advertising firm of Singlemaster, Hucksting and Battlemont has been chosen by the military to find out why this has happened and, as a result, to create a way to reverse this trend; as an incentive, suggested by Psych Branch, the entire male membership of the company will be drafted if a solution is not found. One complication is the fact that Gwen Everest (note the name), who has been the problem-solving genius of the firm for twenty-two years, is beginning to detest the world which she has helped create and to lose control of herself; for example, as she comes to work one morning, amidst the ever-present advertising that she has created, instead of tuning it out, she uses a code word which sends an advertising robot out of control, and it destroys itself. A second complication is Brigadier General Sonnet Finnister of WOMS, an unattractive woman who has designed the uniform of WOMS to mask her own physical deficiencies even though it looks hideous on every other member of the service. This uniform and the space armor, the military has discovered, seem to be the cause of the dropping enlistments. The story makes it quite obvious that Gwen would normally react to people like Generals Finnister and Owling in much the same way as she does under any circumstances, but it also makes it clear that this time she does not weigh the consequences of what she does or look at the limits; her actions are reckless. Nevertheless, she confronts the military establishment and makes them uncomfortable and outraged, finds a solution to their problem, nearly pushes it through—and collapses. Andre Battlemont, who has been meek and mild and in love with Gwen for years, asserts himself, for the first time, when the military representatives try playing power games; he bests them by pointing out exactly what he could do to them through advertising. At this, Gwen melts—no one has ever loved her before—and the military accepts Battlemont’s solution, though ungraciously. Thus there is a good deal of interest through the characterizations and the thematic elements, but much of the fun of this story comes through the confrontations between Gwen and the two generals.
All of these stories are related, to some degree, to Herbert’s novels and usually explore topics, themes, and ideas that can be found in one or more of the novels. Because Dune is the largest and most complex of the novels, it is no surprise that most of these stories can shed light on particular elements in it. However, it is equally interesting that only one of the nineteen stories is directly related to one of the novels. “The Tactful Saboteur” provides the background out of which Whipping Star arises; this story introduces the Bureau of Sabotage and the world in which it exists at a stage approximately thirty years before the action of Whipping Star takes place. Furthermore, the central character in both is Jorj X. McKie, Saboteur Extraordinary, and Ser Bolin, about to begin his stint as head of the Bureau of Sabotage in the story but very near the end of his career in the novel. Finally, the qualifications necessary for McKie to establish contact with and understanding of the Caleban in Whipping Star are well established in “The Tactful Saboteur.” Even though the other stories do not have this kind of relationship with any given novel, the relationships they do have are illuminating.
Perhaps the thematic concern that occurs most frequently in both the novels and the stories is the nature of government, particularly as it grows larger; a prominent sub-theme concerns power-games which people play, always with a view toward expanding and preserving that power. However, Herbert does not simply repeat the same ideas over and over; instead, each of his treatments adds other elements and thus changes the theme for each story, as well as changing the overall theme that comes from an examination of all the works. All of the novels deal with this theme in some way, but it is especially a central theme in Dune, Dune Messiah, Hellstrom’s Hive, and The Eyes of Heisenberg.
Almost as widespread and nearly as important as the theme of government are the closely related themes of “fools rush in” and the need to carefully adapt to the system in which one finds oneself. In many cases, the system is an ecosystem and the problem is how to use that system; furthermore, Herbert frequently makes the point that human beings as a society are a part of the ecosystem and that human society is a subsystem within the larger system. Among the novels, Dune and Dune Messiah lead the way in the exploration of these themes, stressing the length of time necessary to change the ecosystem in a sensible way; they also indicate that careful planning is necessary before such a massive change can take place.
The other side of the coin, the attempt to change the ecosystem quickly, and with insufficient knowledge, is one of the main elements of The Green Brain. Just as the Fremen in Dune are closely attuned to their environment, so too are the Santarogans in The Santaroga Barrier; furthermore, the linkages between the individuals and the group as a whole are clear in both societies. To a lesser extent, Hellstrom’s Hive also deals with these themes. In addition, each of the other novels seems to include an element of people acting on incomplete knowledge.
A third theme which is rather pervasive might be called “getting along with others who are different“; this includes the stories about aliens but also includes stories about people who have different values and ways of living. For example, consider that in Destination: Void, an artificial intelligence is created; consider, too, the problems of learning the Freman way of life in Dune, trying to find out what makes the Santarogans different from the rest of the country in The Santaroga Barrier, the insects trying to figure out how they can contact humans to prevent destruction of the ecosystem in The Green Brain, the adjustment to long periods of time in a submarine in Under Pressure, the attempts to infiltrate the Hive in Hellstrom’s Hive, and the exhaustive and exhausting attempts to make meaningful contact with the Caleban in Whipping Star—all these suggest the different directions from which Herbert explores this general theme in his novels.
There are many other themes in these stories that can be found also in the novels in a somewhat different form, although they are not used as frequently as those already mentioned. For example, the themes of heightening human awareness, the idea of racial memory, psi-powers, the limitations of prescience, and the gift/curse of unusual talents are particularly important in Dune, Dune Messiah, The Santaroga Barrier, and The Godmakers. The use of the detective story approach in “Rat Race” is particularly applicable to The Santaroga Barrier, while a variation on this, the spy-thriller, can be seen in both Hellstrom’s Hive and Under Pressure. The emphasis on the scientific method found in such stories as “The Gone Dogs” and “By the Book” has particular relevance to Destination: Void. Thus, not only do these stories provide interesting, entertaining, and provocative reading in their own right, but they also complement the novels and provide a way into some of the topics explored more fully in the novels.