Originally Posted by
pendell
Spice is the equivalent to oil in the modern world , and I believe it was written as a direct parallel; the resource of the 20th century, control of which decided the destiny of nations. Spice is ... well, everything in the Dune universe. It enables mentat computation, bene gesserit precognition, space navigation, as well as extending life such that everyone who can afford it takes it for medical reasons. A mere handful of it will buy a permanent estate on Tupile, the exile planet.
There is no Imperium, no civilization, without the spice.
That is considerably more than a Mcguffin. A mcguffin is something you can swap in and out of a production without doing any violence to the story. The One Ring from Tolkien is one such: It was just a bog-standard fairy tale magic ring in the original hobbit before being promoted to All-Powerful Doomsday Weapon in the sequel. If Tolkien had decided to promote Sting or the mithril waistcoat or some random treasure from the dragon's hoard instead, the story wouldn't have changed all that much. A mcguffin is a placeholder, the football in a match, the thing the characters fight over but is ultimately completely replaceable.
By contrast, you can't tell the story of Dune without both Arrakis and the spice; this is not just an adventure serial but an in-depth look at the resource conflicts of the 20th century, brought on by colonization, as the great power scheme to manipulate both each other and the indigenous locals in the hope of monopolizing the supply.
Take the Ring out of Lord of the Rings, it isn't too hard to find some other bauble to fight over. Take the Spice out of Dune, and not only the story but much of the worldbuilding falls apart as well.
Respectfully,
Brian P.
) and have everyone trying to murder Frodo so they can take his shiny-but-still-just-a-sword sword
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