Date Posted:15:42:23 07/07/03 Mon Author: IDAHO Subject: Pardot Kynes In reply to:
The Cannabist
's message, "But I did say I was open to proof" on 00:40:46 07/07/03 Mon
Willis McNelly who was a friend of Frank's had a segment on the Dune Sci Fi Miniseries director's Cut DVD. He talks about the inception of Dune.
Frank, who was living in Seattle at the time was interested in the fact that the state goverment was trying to change the environment of some beach dunes where he lived in order to correct road problems or something.
Anyway, Frank, who already had a fascination with Man and his relationship with the environment, thought there was a potential story there.
HE wanted to use Mars as the setting for his drama. But Mars had already been used by Heinlein and others.
He created Arrakis. Since his theme was going to be environmental, he invented Pardot Kynes, the Imperial Planetologist, as the hero of the story. However, after thinking about it, he realized just having ecology does not make for good drama. Frank needed something bigger. Thus he created the drama of the two warring Houses Atreides and Harkonnen and their conflict as the center of the story with the planet and its ecology as the prominent backdrop.
Pardot Kynes became part of the backstory.
