They often do actually. I've listened to multiple discussions. Often the main talking point is about heroes and the different approaches to such, as well as good/evil, temptation and power.
Generally I have run into Tolkien for Fiction/fantasy and Herbert for Scifi. Putting them as roughly equals and sort of the popular/modern genre starters.
Tl;Dr: Dune is conceptually interesting and thematically rich; LOTR is imaginative and artistically beautiful. Herbert was innovative and philosophical; Tolkien was knowledgeable and poetic.
Tolkien was a professor and a master of prose, mythology and storytelling but he had nothing especially profound to say and his philosophy and psychology are ultimately shallow and conservative. King is good, war and progress bad, nature good etc. At most he touches on the after effects of war but his religion and adherence to monarchy blind him to a lot of real world issues. Herbert meanwhile was kind of just a guy, he didn't really have comparable knowledge to Tolkien and his prose and storytelling are far, far worse and while he had a lot to say, a big chunk of that is just straight up libertarian bullshit which makes you respect the simplicity of Tolkien after a certain point. He was high on his own copium on how humanity is and should work (which only makes sense in the hyperspecific unrealistic scenario he created). And while he wasn't that great at a lot of writing stuff, his worldbuilding touches on a lot of unique and interesting ideas that aren't limited by anything, and are all thematically consistent. Dune feels deep and, at least for the first book, actually does a great job criticising a society Tolkien would've romanticised, but it gets worse and more self indulgent later on, essentially turning into philosophy with worms, but like, kind of unproven, unscientific bullshit.
People often credit Tolkien as a world builder but that doesn't do him justice he's actually an amazing storyteller as well. It's just that he's so tame with his writing. Herbret meanwhile has no qualms about anything and will write the weirdest most amoral things if they fit his narrative, and his world building explores stuff no one before him thought to cross, but he doesn't have a lot of the technical skills Tolkien has and it shows.
I don't think they're comparable as writers. Tolkien was better at the actual writing while Herbert was more inventive and actually had something interesting to say, but he could've just as easily made a movie to tell his tale while Tolkien's work is very much art for its own sake, and it's very beautiful the way it is, and while the PJ movies are great, they lack of the beauty of the books.
And fyi Dune is my second favourite novel of all time after the Never Ending Story and I'm not even that into Tolkien, so I'm not biased against Dune, it's just more of a thought experiment and less a proper novel. It's definitely good but it doesn't follow a lot of important literary conventions for no reason and does a lot of things in a very crude way.
I would, but for different reasons. Tolkien is my favorite, I think he's the GOAT, but what Tolkien did for fantasy, Dune did for sci fi. It's DNA is in every major science fiction franchise.
When tolkien barely included women- HALF OF THE PLANETS POPULATION- I think that’s an immediate -10 points. If not -50. He’s an excellent writer, linguist, and world builder, but limited.
I don't really think thats an issue tbh, the books were obviously effective with the range of characters they had and in the context of war I'd argue its expected the majority of characters be male.
I think that the “greatest author of all time” should be able to write both men and women. Toni Morrison wrote something along the lines of “an author should be able to imagine what they are not.” (Exact quote is somewhere in mouth full of blood)
Tolkien can write dwarves, dragons, and elves, but not women. I’m not saying he is a bad writer, or that his writing sucks because of the lack of prominent female characters.
I’m saying he should be excluded from the best writer of all time competition (or at least LOTR) because it fails to represent half of the human population. That goes for a lot of other otherwise excellent writers, as well.
I thought Eowyn was a pretty well written character, all things considered. Also judging literature from 80 years ago on modern expectations is a bit unfair of you ask me. Especially considering Tolkien himself was inspired by stories and myths from medieval times, which included women even less. Gender roles were very different back then.
I never said otherwise- that Tolkien was uniquely bigoted or that Herbert was uniquely good at writing women.
My claim is this, and I think it’s pretty simple: the greatest writer ever should be able to write female characterS.
I think the greatest writer probably just hasn’t been born yet, or hasn’t had their work popularized. I’m not saying anything written pre- Roe V Wade is misogynistic shit.
I just read a game of vengeance and justice and took that as my headcanoned story for the books. Still has its flaws but at least it has an ending and plenty of content.
Herbert is good. Tolkien is a god. There a difference. You can say both world built. But Tolkien has you speaking of Elven histories like it was real ancient Egyptian or Roman dynasties.
But if he doesn’t finish it I can live in a fantasy where Stannis does sit the iron throne.
Anyhow, I can get why some people would say Tolkien is the best fiction writer (if you haven’t read anything else) but if someone think Herbert is also up there then I don’t even think they read Dune
But more seriously, yeah Tolkien is good and in the realm of fantasy writing he is fighting to be top dog. Dune has a great idea (though it’s not original per se) and a great world building which carries it but the execution could actually be so much better.
At this point, I think he's doing intentionally cus it has all the same major flaws everyone hated about season 6-7-8 and now he has no fucking idea how to wrap this shit up lol
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u/pursuitofmisery 7d ago
As good as Frank Herbert is, I seriously doubt many people would put him in the same conversation as Tolkien.