A miniseries (also mini-series), in a serial storytelling medium, is a television show production which tells a story in a planned limited number of episodes. The exact number is open to interpretation; however, they are usually limited to fewer than a whole season. The term "miniseries" is generally a North American term. Various British television productions dating as far back as the 1950s can technically be labelled as miniseries, though in the UK these are referred to as "serials".

Television

The term "miniseries" is used to refer to a single finite story told in separately broadcast episodes. Before the term was coined, such a form was always called a "serial", in the same way that a novel appearing in episodes in successive editions of magazines or newspapers is called a serial. Several commentators have offered further qualifications. Leslie Halliwell and Philip Purser argue that miniseries tend to "appear in four to six episodes of various lengths", whilst Stuart Cunningham defines them as, "a limited run program of more than two and less than the 13-part season or half -season block associated with serial or series programming." Francis Wheen states, "Both soap operas and primetime series cannot afford to allow their leading characters to develop, since the shows are made with the intention of running indefinitely. In a miniseries on the other hand, there is a clearly defined beginning, middle, and end, (as in a conventional play or novel) enabling characters to change, mature, or die as the serial proceeds." In North America the format began in 1974 with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's ''The National Dream,'' featuring Pierre Berton (which aired from 3 March 1974 to 28 April 1974) and the American Broadcasting Company's ''QB VII,'' which starred Anthony Hopkins (and which began on 29 April 1974). Following these initial forays, broadcasters used miniseries to bring other books to the screen. ''Rich Man, Poor Man'', based on the novel by Irwin Shaw, was broadcast in 12 one-hour episodes in 1976 by ABC. Alex Haley's ''Roots'' in 1977 can fairly be called the first blockbuster success of the format. Its success in the USA was partly due to its schedule: the 12-hour duration was split into eight episodes broadcast on consecutive nights, resulting in a finale with a 71 percent share of the audience and 130 million viewers, which at the time was the highest rated TV program of all time. ''TV Guide'' (April 11-April 17, 1987) called 1977's ''Jesus of Nazareth'' "the best miniseries of all time" and "unparalleled television."In British television, the term "miniseries" is almost never used, except in reference to American imports. The term serial is preferred for serialised dramas, which have been a staple of UK television schedules since the early 1950s when serials such as ''The Quatermass Experiment'' (1953) established the popularity of the form.

Comic book

A comic book miniseries (also referred to as a ''limited series''), is a commonly used format of comic book distribution, as it allows creators to tell a single specific story focusing on a character or set of characters, whether that story stands alone (''Watchmen''), or is heavily interlinked with other events in the same fictional universe (''Civil War''). Most miniseries is anywhere from two to 12 issues (a story contained in a single issue is termed a one-shot; for a time DC Comics used the term "maxi-series" for a 12-issue miniseries, but this term has been abandoned). ''52'' was arguably the longest comic book miniseries at the time it was released, running for 52 weekly issues (its publisher, DC Comics, has since used the 52-part weekly series structure twice more). A comic series that does not have a planned endpoint - in other words, one which is not a miniseries - is an ''ongoing series''.

Comic book series intended from the beginning to tell a specific, finite story can become longer still, for example ''Sandman'', which lasted 75 issues, or Cerebus the Aardvark, which ran for 300, a goal creator Dave Sim set for himself fairly early in the series' run, but did not plan from the beginning. These are not considered miniseries, partly because of their sheer size and partly because no fixed number of issues was announced at the outset. Similar to a canceled television series, a series intended to be ongoing, but which is discontinued after a dozen or fewer issues (usually due to poor sales), is not considered a miniseries, though they are sometimes described as such by the publisher after the cancellation is announced.

See also

Television series

Metaseries

References

External links

The Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC) - MINISERIES

Category:Comics terminology * Category:Television terminology

de:Miniserie es:Miniserie fr:Mini-série gl:Miniserie it:Fiction televisiva#Serialità debole he:מיני-סדרה nl:Miniserie pl:Miniserial pt:Minissérie simple:Miniseries sh:Miniserija sv:Miniserie

Coordinates	29°25′″N98°30′″N
Name	Frank Herbert
Birth date	October 08, 1920
Birth place	Tacoma, Washington
Death date	February 11, 1986
Death place	Madison, Wisconsin
Occupation	Novelist
Nationality	American
Period	1945-1986
Genre	Science fiction
Movement	New Wave
Influenced	Robert Jordan, George Lucas }}

Franklin Patrick Herbert, Jr. (October 8, 1920 – February 11, 1986) was a critically acclaimed and commercially successful American science fiction author. Although a short story author, he is best known for his novels, most notably ''Dune'' and its five sequels. The ''Dune'' saga, set in the distant future and taking place over millennia, deals with themes such as human survival and evolution, ecology, and the intersection of religion, politics and power. ''Dune'' itself is the "best-selling science fiction novel of all time," and the series is widely considered to be among the classics in the genre.

Biography

Frank Herbert was born on October 8, 1920, in Tacoma, Washington, to Frank Patrick Herbert Sr. and Eileen McCarthy Herbert. He graduated from high school in 1938, and in 1939 he lied about his age in order to get his first newspaper job at the ''Glendale Star''.

A temporary hiatus occurred during his career when he served in the U.S. Navy's Seabees for six months as a photographer during World War II until he was given a medical discharge. He married Flora Parkinson in San Pedro, California in 1941. They had a daughter, Penny (b. February 16, 1942), but divorced in 1945.

After the war he attended the University of Washington, where he met Beverly Ann Stuart at a creative writing class in 1946. They were the only students in the class who had sold any work for publication; Herbert had sold two pulp adventure stories to magazines, the first to ''Esquire'' in 1945, and Stuart had sold a story to ''Modern Romance'' magazine. They married in Seattle, Washington on June 20, 1946. They had two sons, Brian Patrick Herbert (b. June 29, 1947, Seattle, Washington) and Bruce Calvin Herbert (b. June 26, 1951, Santa Rosa, California).

In 1952 Frank Herbert's first science fiction story, "Looking for Something," appeared in ''Startling Stories''.

Frank Herbert did not graduate from college, according to his son Brian, because he wanted to study only what interested him and so did not complete the required courses. After leaving college he returned to journalism and worked at the ''Seattle Star'' and the ''Oregon Statesman''; he was a writer and editor for the ''San Francisco Examiner's'' ''California Living'' magazine for a decade.

His career as a novelist began with the publication of ''The Dragon in the Sea'' in 1955, where he used the environment of a 21st century submarine as a means to explore sanity and madness. The book predicted worldwide conflicts over oil consumption and production. It was a critical success but not a major commercial one.

Herbert began researching ''Dune'' in 1959 and was able to devote himself wholeheartedly to his writing career because his wife returned to work full time as an advertising writer for department stores, becoming the main breadwinner during the 1960s. Herbert later related in an interview with Willis E. McNeilly that the novel originated when he was supposed to do a magazine article on sand dunes in the Oregon Dunes near Florence, Oregon, but he became too involved in it and ended up with far more raw material than needed for a single article. The article, entitled "They Stopped the Moving Sands," was never written, but it did serve as the seed for the ideas that led to ''Dune''.

''Dune'' took six years of research and writing to complete. Far longer than commercial science fiction of the time was supposed to run, it was serialized in ''Analog'' magazine in two separate parts ("Dune World" and "Prophet of Dune"), in 1963 and 1965. It was then rejected by nearly twenty book publishers before finally being accepted. One editor prophetically wrote back "I might be making the mistake of the decade, but..." before rejecting the manuscript.

Chilton, a minor publishing house in Philadelphia known mainly for its auto-repair manuals, gave Herbert a $7,500 advance, and ''Dune'' was soon a critical success. It won the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1965 and shared the Hugo Award in 1966 with ''...And Call Me Conrad'' by Roger Zelazny. ''Dune'' was the first major ecological science fiction novel, embracing a multitude of sweeping, inter-related themes and multiple character viewpoints, a method that ran through all Herbert's mature work.

The book was not an instant bestseller. By 1968 Herbert had made $20,000 from it, far more than most science fiction novels of the time were generating, but not enough to let him take up full-time writing. However, the publication of ''Dune'' did open doors for him. He was the ''Seattle Post-Intelligencer's'' education writer from 1969 to 1972 and lecturer in general studies and interdisciplinary studies at the University of Washington (1970 – 1972). He worked in Vietnam and Pakistan as social and ecological consultant in 1972. In 1973 he was director-photographer of the television show ''The Tillers''.

By 1972, Herbert retired from newspaper writing and became a full-time fiction writer. During the 1970s and 1980s, Herbert enjoyed considerable commercial success as an author. He divided his time between homes in Hawaii and Washington's Olympic Peninsula; his home in Port Townsend on the peninsula was intended to be an "ecological demonstration project". During this time he wrote numerous books and pushed ecological and philosophical ideas. He continued his ''Dune'' saga, following it with ''Dune Messiah'', ''Children of Dune'', and ''God Emperor of Dune''. Other highlights were ''The Dosadi Experiment'', ''The Godmakers'', ''The White Plague'' and the books he wrote in partnership with Bill Ransom: ''The Jesus Incident'', ''The Lazarus Effect'', and ''The Ascension Factor'' which were sequels to ''Destination: Void''. He also helped launch the career of Terry Brooks with a very positive review of Brooks' first novel, ''The Sword of Shannara'', in 1977.

Herbert's change in fortune was shadowed by tragedy. In 1974, Beverly underwent an operation for cancer. She lived ten more years, but her health was adversely impacted by the surgery. During this period, Herbert was the featured speaker at the Octocon II science fiction convention at the El Rancho Tropicana in Santa Rosa, California in October 1978; in 1979, he met anthropologist James Funaro with whom he conceived the Contact Conference. Beverly Herbert died on February 7, 1984, the same year that ''Heretics of Dune'' was published. In his afterword to 1985's ''Chapterhouse: Dune'', Frank Herbert wrote a moving eulogy for his wife of 38 years.

1984 was a tumultuous year in Herbert's life. During this same year of his wife's death, his career took off with the release of David Lynch's film version of ''Dune''. Despite high expectations, a big-budget production design and an A-list cast, the movie drew mostly poor reviews in the United States. However, despite a disappointing response in the USA, the film was a critical and commercial success in Europe and Japan.

After Beverly's death, Herbert married Theresa Shackleford in 1985, the year he published ''Chapterhouse Dune'', which tied up many of the saga's story threads. This would be Herbert's final single work (the anthology ''Eye'' was published that year, and ''Man of Two Worlds'' was published in 1986). He died of a massive pulmonary embolism while recovering from surgery for pancreatic cancer on February 11, 1986 in Madison, Wisconsin age 65. He was raised a Catholic but adopted Zen Buddhism as an adult.

Ideas and themes

Frank Herbert used his science fiction novels to explore complex ideas involving philosophy, religion, psychology, politics and ecology, which have caused many of his readers to take an interest in these areas. The underlying thrust of his work was a fascination with the question of human survival and evolution. Herbert has attracted a sometimes fanatical fan base, many of whom have tried to read everything he wrote, fiction or non-fiction, and see Herbert as something of an authority on the subject matters of his books. Indeed such was the devotion of some of his readers that Herbert was at times asked if he was founding a cult, something he was very much against.

There are a number of key themes in Herbert's work:

A concern with leadership. He keenly explored the human tendency to slavishly follow charismatic leaders. He delved deeply into both the flaws and potentials of bureaucracy and government.

Herbert was probably the first science fiction author to popularize ideas about ecology and systems thinking. He stressed the need for humans to think both systematically and long term.

The relationship between religion, politics and power.

Human survival and evolution: Herbert writes of the Fremen, the Sardaukar, and the Dosadi, who are molded by their terrible living conditions into dangerous super races.

Human possibilities and potential: Herbert offered Mentats, the Bene Gesserit and the Bene Tleilax as different visions of human potential.

The nature of sanity and madness. Frank Herbert was interested in the work of Thomas Szasz and the anti-psychiatry movement. Often, Herbert poses the question, "''What is sane?''", and while there are clearly insane behaviors and psychopathies as evinced by characters (Piter De Vries for instance), it is often suggested that "normal" and "abnormal" are relative terms which humans are sometimes ill-equipped to apply to one another, especially on the basis of statistical regularity.

The possible effects and consequences of consciousness-altering chemicals, such as the spice in the ''Dune'' saga.

How language shapes thought. More specifically, Frank Herbert was influenced by Alfred Korzybski's ''General Semantics''.

Sociobiology. How our instincts unconsciously influence our behavior and society.

Learning, teaching and thinking.

Frank Herbert carefully refrained from offering his readers formulaic answers to many of the questions he explored.

Status and impact in science fiction

''Dune'' and the ''Dune'' saga constitute one of the world's best-selling science fiction series and novels; ''Dune'' in particular has received widespread critical acclaim, winning the Nebula Award in 1965 and sharing the Hugo Award in 1966, and is frequently considered one of the best science fiction novels ever, if not the best. According to contemporary Robert A. Heinlein, Herbert's opus was "powerful, convincing, and most ingenious."

''Dune'' is considered a landmark novel for a number of reasons:

Like Heinlein's 1961 ''Stranger in a Strange Land'', Herbert's 1963 novella and 1965 novel, ''Dune'', represented a move toward a more literary approach to the science fiction novel. Before this period, it was often said that all a science fiction novel needed to be successful was a great technological idea. Characterization and great story took a distant second place.

''Dune'' is a landmark of soft science fiction. Herbert deliberately suppressed technology in his ''Dune'' universe so he could address the future of humanity, rather than the future of humanity's technology. ''Dune'' considers the way humans and their institutions might change over time.

''Dune'' was the first major ecological science fiction novel. Frank Herbert was a great popularizer of scientific ideas; many of his fans credit Frank Herbert for introducing them to philosophy and psychology. In ''Dune'' he helped popularize the term ''ecology'' and some of the field's concepts, vividly imparting a sense of planetary awareness. Gerald Jonas explains in ''The New York Times Book Review'': "So completely did Mr. Herbert work out the interactions of man and beast and geography and climate that ''Dune'' became the standard for a new sub-genre of 'ecological' science fiction." As popularity of ''Dune'' rose, Herbert embarked on a lecture tour of college campuses, explaining how the environmental concerns of Dune's inhabitants were analogous to our own.

''Dune'' is considered an epic example of literary world-building. ''The Library Journal'' reports that "Dune is to science fiction what ''The Lord of the Rings'' is to fantasy." Frank Herbert imagined every facet of his creation. He lovingly included glossaries, quotes, documents, and histories, to bring his universe alive to his readers. No science fiction novel before it had so vividly realized life on another world.

Herbert wrote more than twenty novels after ''Dune'' that are regarded as being of variable quality. Books like ''The Green Brain'', ''The Santaroga Barrier'' seemed to hark back to the days before ''Dune'', when a good technological idea was all that was needed to drive a sci-fi novel. And some fans of the ''Dune'' saga are critical of the follow-up novels as being subpar.

Herbert never again equalled the critical acclaim he received for ''Dune''. Neither his sequels to ''Dune'' nor any of his other books won a Hugo or Nebula Award, although almost all of them were ''New York Times'' Best Sellers. Some felt that ''Children of Dune'' was almost too literary and too dark to get the recognition it may have deserved; others felt that ''The Dosadi Experiment'' lacked an epic quality that fans had come to expect.

Largely overlooked because of the concentration on "Dune" was Herbert's 1973 novel, ''Hellstrom's Hive'', with its minutely worked-out depiction of a human society modeled on social insects, which could be counted a major utopia/dystopia.

Malcolm Edwards in the ''Encyclopedia of Science Fiction'' wrote:

Much of Herbert's work makes difficult reading. His ideas were genuinely developed concepts, not merely decorative notions, but they were sometimes embodied in excessively complicated plots and articulated in prose which did not always match the level of thinking ... His best novels, however, were the work of a speculative intellect with few rivals in modern science fiction.

Film adaptations

A film of the novel, ''Dune'', was directed by David Lynch in 1984. Although panned by many fans and film critics, Frank Herbert was pleased with the movie. It has done well on video and DVD.

The Sci Fi Channel produced a commercially successful 2000 television miniseries called ''Frank Herbert's Dune''. The ''Dune'' saga continued with a sequel miniseries in 2003 entitled ''Frank Herbert's Children of Dune'', which combined the novels ''Dune Messiah'' and ''Children of Dune''.

A new feature adaptation of ''Dune'' is in development at Paramount Pictures, who hope the remake will be a "tentpole film," and potentially lead to a new franchise based on Herbert's series.

Continuation of the ''Dune'' series

In recent years, Frank Herbert's son Brian Herbert and author Kevin J. Anderson have added to the ''Dune'' universe, stating that they in part used notes left behind by Frank Herbert and discovered over a decade after his death. Brian Herbert and Anderson have written two prequel trilogies (''Prelude to Dune'' and ''Legends of Dune'') exploring the history of the ''Dune'' universe before the events within ''Dune'', as well as two post-''Chapterhouse Dune'' novels that complete the original series (''Hunters of Dune'' and ''Sandworms of Dune'') based on Frank Herbert's own ''Dune 7'' outline.

Bibliography

References

Further reading

Allen, L. David. ''Cliffs Notes on Herbert's Dune & Other Works''. Lincoln, NE: Cliffs Notes, 1975. ISBN 0-8220-1231-6

Clarke, Jason. ''SparkNotes: Dune, Frank Herbert''. New York: Spark Publishing, 2002. ISBN 1-58663-510-7

Grazier, Kevin R. ''The Science of Dune''. Dallas, TX: BenBella Books, 2008. ISBN 1933771283

Herbert, Brian. ''Dreamer of Dune : The Biography of Frank Herbert''. New York: Tor Books, 2003.

Levack, Daniel JH; Willard, Mark. ''Dune Master: A Frank Herbert Bibliography''. Westport, CT: Meckler, 1988. ISBN 0-88736-099-8

McNelly, Dr. Willis E. (ed.) ''The Dune Encyclopedia''. New York: Berkeley Publishing Group, 1984. ISBN 0-425-06813-7

Miller, David M. ''Starmont Reader's Guide 5: Frank Herbert''. Mercer Island, WA: Starmont, 1980. ISBN 0-916732-16-9

O'Reilly, Timothy. ''Frank Herbert''. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1980.

O'Reilly, Timothy (ed.) ''The Maker of Dune''. New York: Berkeley Publishing Group, 1987.

External links

Official website for Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson

Frank Herbert SF Hall of Fame induction (Kevin Anderson report with his speech)

Arabic and Islamic themes in Frank Herbert's ''Dune'' novels

Study by Tim O'Reilly of Frank Herbert's work up to the ''Jesus Incident''; one of the more in-depth studies of Frank Herbert's thoughts and ideas

Article on the inspirations for ''Dune''

"Frank Herbert, the Dune Man" -(Frederik Pohl)

* "Frank Herbert, the Dune Man, Part 2"

Category:American science fiction writers Category:American novelists Category:American Zen Buddhists Category:Clarion Writers' Workshop Category:Language creators Category:Science Fiction Hall of Fame inductees Category:Hugo Award winning authors Category:Nebula Award winning authors Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:University of Washington alumni Category:Writers from Port Townsend, Washington Category:Writers from Seattle, Washington Category:Writers from Tacoma, Washington Category:Deaths from pancreatic cancer Category:1920 births Category:1986 deaths Category:Deaths from pulmonary embolism Category:Cancer deaths in Wisconsin

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