Dune Names Are Good, Actually

On language, names, and worldbuilding

Before I dive into this week’s post, I wanted to write a little note to you—my handsome, noble, generous, undoubtedly stylish, certainly well-read—subscribers. I started this newsletter two years ago with not much of a plan. A few days before my two-year anniversary, Counter Craft passed 10,000 subscribers. I truly never expected this to grow so large. Thank you for reading. I love you all.

Today I’m talking DUUUUUUUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNEE. Yes, I am buying into the hype for Dune: Part Two. Even though I’m apparently one of the few people alive who admires the weird mess of David Lynch’s Dune, I’m excited for part two. It seems to be getting rave reviews from all corners, including people who didn’t love Part One. Give me some sand, ships, and space drama. I’m ready.

One thing I’ve always loved about Dune is the worldbuilding, which—while certainly problematic in some ways—is an excellent mélange (pun intended) of the surreal, the futuristic, and the familiar. Much of the worldbuilding of the Dune universe is quite recognizable from our own history. There’s an Emperor, dukes, barons, guilds, etc. But these are twisted in bizarre ways that evoke an unknowable future, such as a “spacing guild” with mutated humans who consume magical “spice” to control starships. A lot of space operas feel far too familiar, and a few feel too strange, but the Dune series strike a great balance. Much of that is the language Herbert chose for his people, creatures, and technology. Dune has a lot of cool names.

So, I have to roll my eyes a bit when I see tweets like this that attempt to chide Dune for “unrealistic” or bad worldbuilding language:

Yes, these tweets are jokes. But also, my first thought was, dude, your name has literally been in use since the Bronze Age. Alexander has been a commonplace name across cultures since Alexander the Great in 300s BC, and it far predates that with examples such as Alaksandu King of Wilusa in 1200s BC. Why wouldn’t there be a Paul in the future? Names can last a long time.

The second tweet—by a random user, so I’ve blocked the name—is even more off. In the Dune universe, “spice” is just the nickname for the substance called “melange.” But that’s exactly how language works! In 2024 we are transported around in vehicles that are powered by petroleum that we all call “oil.” Oil also comes from ancient Greek, via Latin, from olive oil. According to Etymology Online, “[i]n English it meant ‘olive oil’ exclusively till c. 1300.” At some point, humans decided flammable liquids looked kinda like olive oil and started calling those substances “oil.”

I don’t think science fiction, much less space opera, is required to be realistic at all, this is a very realistic aspect of Dune’s language. We could come up with a million examples of modern technology being named after other, older things. “Computer” was a term for a person whose job was doing mathematical computations long before the machines were created. We “scroll” the “feeds” of social media apps because ancient parchment scrolls roll out in one long lengthy piece and because farm animals are given a constant stream of food. So on and so forth.

Dune having creatures called “worms” and a drug called “spice” is now humans tend to name things. Humans would absolutely nickname a future drug something like “spice” just as we today named drugs “weed,” “angel dust,” “junk,” “nose candy.”

Again, the above tweets are mostly just jokes. However, they bring up actual worldbuilding craft questions. I see readers sometimes express similar sentiments seriously. And as an editor and professor, I see a lot of work that attempts to feel “science fiction-y” (or “fantasy-y”) by making all of the language weird.

In science fiction, this is often done in the name of realism. The writer thinks in the future new inventions will have new names. So, they write, “Detective Blork opened a cryo-cannister of frozen ungalte silt slurry as he activated his Omicron XTC-5819 Holographic Telephoning Device” or whatever. Is this actually how humans think or speak?

It’s not that the technical names wouldn’t exist. It’s just that most of us don’t use them in most contexts. Detective Blork might indeed have a “cryo-cannister of frozen ungalte silt slurry” but he’d probably think of it as “a cold slurpee.” Similarly, he’d probably think of his “Omicron XTC-5819 Holographic Telephoning Device” as just a “phone” or maybe “holo-phone.” Do you think, “Oh, let me activate my handheld Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra smartphone device and send an SMS to Joe”? Or do you think, “Oh, I should grab my phone and text Joe”?

There is also the question of simply what is evocative and readable. Let’s say you’re writing a fantasy story and you have a bear-like creature with bright red fur. You can have your characters call it an invented name like “smorponk” or you can have them call it a “blood bear.” I think the latter is normally the better route, as it evokes something in the reader while still signaling a different reality than ours. These aren’t mutually exclusive. In Dune, we have “sandworms” but they’re also called “Shai-Hulud” by the Fremen who worship them. The planet is both Arrakis and Dune. Give the reader a visually evocative name and a linguistically evocative one, in different contexts.

Similar questions and tactics apply to character names, like Paul Atreides. You likely want a balance of familiar and unfamiliar to evoke the otherness of the world while still being comprehensible to read. You probably won’t effectively evoke a far future if everyone is named Jim Johnson, Allie Smith, and Tom Miller. OTOH, it’s simply annoying to read a book where everyone is named Fl’imabib DoXlolak, Sththk Ta Lo, and Tlijadjlll’d’d’d’d’a Gonkdaborg.

Dune has plenty of strange, invented terms: Muad'dib, the Gom Jabbar, Kwisatz Haderach, etc. But yes, many characters have names like Paul and Jessica or titles like Baron and Duke. It’s a good balance, in my view.

Now obviously, anything can be done well. When it comes to the language of worldbuilding, it is always a question of intentions and effects. George Saunders has a lot of fun playing around with stilted corporate language—lots of ™s sprinkled through his stories—which thematically makes sense for his stories of alienated corporate drones in dystopian visions of America. Saunders’s linguistic worldbuilding is thematic and evocative.

I always tell my students that as much as possible you should have your sentences do “double duty.” Language is an excellent place to do the double duty of worldbuilding and reinforcing themes. Take N.K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth trilogy, perhaps the best epic fantasy written in the past decade. A central theme in those books is our relation to the earth, and many of the creatures and objects have a geological theme. The land is wrecked by earthquakes and called “the Stillness.” There are “Stone Eaters” and “Equitorials” and floating “obelisks” and “boil bugs” that shoot geysers of hot liquid. Jemisin also invents magical terms and names, but these familiar-yet-off names add a great thematic texture to the series.  

To tie this back to Dune, the reason some characters have Biblical names like Paul and Jessica isn’t just that it’s realistic that such names would survive. It’s also because religion is central to Dune. It takes place in a future where humanity has returned to religion after a rebellion against artificial intelligence. Herbert imagines a future with a hodgepodge of our current religions, mixing elements of Islam, Christianity, and more. The central religious text of the “Padishah Empire” is the “Orange Catholic Bible,” God is “Buddallah,” the rebellion against machines is the “Butlerian Jihad,” the Fremen’s religion evolved from “Zensunnism,” etc. The language is all mixed together from different real-world religions, which reinforces themes in the series. Which, I might also point out, contains titles like Dune Messiah, God Emperor of Dune, and Heretics of Dune if you’re unsure of the centrality of religion.

(And again for the realist worldbuilding crowd, I’ll note the mixture of past religions is quite realistic. Think of how Christians celebrate Easter, taken from the pagan goddess Ēostre, or how the Bible has demons like Baal and Beelzebub that were originally the names of gods in other religions.)  

To sum this up, my advice when worldbuilding a far-future or second-world setting is to first strike a balance of otherness and familiarity. Secondly, remember that most people speak and think colloquially, using common names instead of scientific/technical/corporate/etc. jargon (unless there is a character reason for them to speak in jargon). Thirdly, use worldbuilding language as an opportunity to reinforce the themes of your work.

And of course ignore all this advice if it doesn’t make sense for your specific work.

Okay, enough about this. I need to get to a theater and cheer on some worms.

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If you like this newsletter, consider subscribing or checking out my recent science fiction novel The Body Scout that The New York Times called “Timeless and original…a wild ride, sad and funny, surreal and intelligent.”

Other works I’ve written or co-edited include Upright Beasts (my story collection), Tiny Nightmares (an anthology of horror fiction), and Tiny Crimes (an anthology of crime fiction).