Undergraduate Honors Thesis Projects
Date of Award
Spring 2023
Document Type
Honors Paper
Degree Name
English Literary Studies-BA
Department
English
Advisor
Karen Steigman
First Committee Member
Karen Steigman
Second Committee Member
Paul Eisenstein
Third Committee Member
Louise Captein
Keywords
American Literature Post-45, Speculative Fiction, Utopian Studies
Subject Categories
Literature in English, North America
Abstract
I argue that there is a vitally important dimension of Utopian politics which infects the first three novels of the Dune series, Dune (1965), Dune Messiah (1969), Children of Dune (1976) which goes unacknowledged in the scholarship surrounding the Dune series. I argue that Herbert uses the Dune series to articulate what literary theorist, Fredric Jameson, describes as an anti-Utopia, a baleful vision of Utopia. He argues that the Utopian projects which seek to imagine new ends for humanity require giving up the self to some vaster collective. In the text, I explore how this baleful vision of Utopia appears: (1) in Herbert’s representations of the body and mind racing past their biological limits (2) in the formal qualities of narrative causality in the Dune series (3) in Herbert’s depiction of collectivity swallowing the individual. In the end, Herbert’s hatred of Utopian forms of progress ensures he invests his politics in inaction, conservation, and stagnation in line with various figures of movement conservativism after the second world war.
Licensing Permission
Copyright, all rights reserved. Fair Use
Recommended Citation
Stobart, Seth, "Writing Against Progress: Frank Herbert's Anti-Utopia" (2023). Undergraduate Honors Thesis Projects. 150.
https://digitalcommons.otterbein.edu/stu_honor/150
Acknowledgement 1
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Acknowledgement 2
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