The Dune Reread is hoping to achieve precognitive abilities by the time this is done, because if it doesn’t, what is the point of anything?
This week we’re going to meet the Harkonnens and find out why the Bene Gesserit are displeased with Jessica Atreides for giving the Duke a male heir. (I apologize, these are short sections. I meant to do three for this week, but that’s what pre-holiday madness will do to you.)
Index to the reread can be located here! And don’t forget this is a reread, which means that any and all of these posts will contain spoilers for all of Frank Herbert’s Dune series. If you’re not caught up, keep that in mind.
To attempt an understanding of Muad’Dib without understanding his mortal enemy, the Harkonnens, is to attempt seeing Truth without knowing Falsehood. It is the attempt to see the Light without knowing the Darkness. It cannot be.
—from ‘Manual of Muad’Dib’ by the Princess Irulan
Summary
The Baron Vladimir Harkonnen is talking to his nephew Feyd-Rautha and Piter de Vries, a Mentat in his employ. He is excited about a plan that they are enacting against the Atreides family, one that he’s aggravated to concede came from Piter and not himself. They receive a letter from Duke Leto Atreides, who refuses their peace-offering as they knew he would. It would seem that the choice to hand over the the fief of Arrakis was their idea in the first place, and that someone named Dr. Yueh will soon act against the Atreides family, resulting in their demise.
The Baron is intent that this plan go slowly so that the Duke knows it is the Harkonnens who are responsible for their end. Piter thinks that the Baron is being too bold, as the Emperor is already keeping an eye on them, but the Baron knows that if the other Houses get wind of his involvement they will be frightened and he will have wiggle room for future plans. He thinks that the Mentat enjoys pain and bloodshed too much for one in his position, and threatens to deny him his payment in this scheme—the Lady Jessica. He points out that the Mentat was wrong about Paul Atreides, that he had said that Lady Jessica would have a daughter rather than a son. Piter is still baffled by the fact that he was wrong on that account.
Feyd is getting impatient and wants to leave, so the Baron implores him to take note of the various bits of wisdom he hopes to impart on the young man, the first being that Piter has bright blue eyes because he is addicted to spice. He has been trained to function as a Mentat, but he occupies a human body, and human bodies are flawed. Then he asks Piter to explain their plan to Feyd despite the Mentat’s displeasure at giving the boy access to all their information. (Feyd is excited because he assumes that this means his uncle truly intends to make him the Harkonnen heir.)
The plan, with all accounts taken in for the family’s movements goes as follows: the House Atreides will go to Arrakis and set up in the city of Arrakeen because it is easier to defend than the Harkonnen city Carthag. They will occupy the household of Count and Lady Fenrig (who are responsible for smuggler dealings on Arrakis, as the Spacing Guild is outside Imperial control). There is to be an attempt on Paul’s life, which is not meant to succeed. Thufir Hawat, the Mentat to the Atreides family, will know that the Atreides have a traitor in their midst and will undoubtedly suspect their true agent, Dr. Yueh. Their ace in the hole is that Yueh has undergone Imperial Conditioning, which is thought to be unbreakable. That allows them to manipulate the situation until Hawat suspects that Lady Jessica is the traitor. Further uprisings will destabilize the Duke before they move in with two legions of the Emperor’s fighting elite—the Sardaukar—dressed as Harkonnens. Because they are doing this dirty work for the Emperor, they will gain wealth and power beyond imagining, specifically a directorship in the CHOAM company.
It is possible that the Duke or his family will try to flee out to where the Fremen live, but the planetary ecologist Kynes is in position to prevent that. Then House Harkonnen will control Arrakis and all the wealth that comes with it. With their plan laid out, the Baron insists that they eat before retiring.
Commentary
And now we are introduced to our villains in no uncertain terms. The opening section from Irulan’s texts makes it quite clear how we are meant to view the Harkonnens: as sheer opposites to everything that Paul and his family stand for. They are the falsehood stacked against truth, the dark in play against the light. In addition, we are given a window into the terrible scheme that Piter de Vries has cooked up in league with the Baron, down to every last twist. Now, on first glance, that would seem like an infodump of epic proportions, the standard “villain monologue” that we’re so constantly bemoaning. But in this case, it actually serves as a hint as to how the plot will unfold—if we are going to learn of this plan at the outset, that means by narrative rights that it cannot go according to plan. At least, not precisely.
So the question becomes: where is the plan going to deviate from Piter de Vries’s careful considerations?
More interesting mashups with language here: we have Piter de Vries, which is a Dutch last name, if I’m not mistaken. But the Mentat himself seems to have a certain fondness for inserting French into conversation—noting the Duke’s rudeness to the Baron Harkonnen by saying that he didn’t begin the letter with words such as “Sire et cher cousin” for example. It’s a great device for incorporation in this universe of vague references, giving different cultures the chance to shine through in different ways, and those little tells only get more numerous as the book continues. I’m curious as to whether the interest and common use of French is something that he learned from his Mentat studies or elsewhere; after all, we know that Piter de Vries is not an average Mentat by any means.
In fact, with Piter de Vries we have a man who is both sadist and masochist at once. He take great joy in the pain of others, but seems barely concerned with his own, noting that the Baron Harkonnen will surely do away with him at some point and hardly seeming to care. We only know that the payment he has demanded is the Lady Jessica herself. So we have a concept of slavery in this universe, and one that the Baron knows will not be challenged in their victory.
The Baron is intending to teach his nephew Feyd about how to employ careful manipulation to the most odious of ends. He points out Piter’s spice addiction in that lesson, to make it known that even someone with a mind as clever as a Mentat can still be twisted to a purpose due to his addiction. For that reason, the Baron actually suggests that maybe those machines of old were a better solution, which is funny mostly because that is the precise the reason why people create technology to do human jobs today; the machine can’t get tired, it can’t be injured, it can’t be distracted by the wants and needs and addictions that every human falls prey to.
This is also the first time that we learn of spice addiction properly, though we still haven’t been told how it relates to Arrakis and its supply of “melange.” It is also the first time that he hear about the ubiquitous blue eyes that will become a hallmark of the series. We begin to get a clearer picture of how the current system functions for those with influence, with the Emperor and Great Houses operating within the CHOAM company if they have any legitimate power. And of course, we find out that the Emperor himself has sanctioned the Baron Harkonnen’s plan, equally pleased at the idea of bringing House Atreides down… though we’re still not sure why. It was suggested even in the first chapter that the Emperor’s “gift” of Arrakis might have been no gift at all, but these plans within plans within many other plans is only just starting to come clear.
So the rapidly unfolding picture we are getting here is an empire that functions by playing people against one another. There are economics and politics and power at work, all of it determined by the ways that the powerful engineer those around them. This universe is a very dangerous place, and the philosophies of the ruling elite are to amass nothing but more power and wealth, and to sustain that power and wealth. Not so different from any other period in history (present day included), but perhaps a little less sneaky about it.
And now we have to discuss something discomfiting where this series is concerned. Because these people we’ve just been introduced to are all clearly despicable, power-mad, and odious in every possible way. They want terrible things and they do terrible things in no uncertain terms. You can’t get around that. What you also cannot get around are the ways that Herbert chooses to communicate that to us—the Baron is fat, so fat that he is incapable of supporting his own weight and must be carted around by hanging suspenders. Piter de Vries is described as “effeminate” when we first hear of him. (Because the “easiest” way to quickly belittle a male character is to suggest that he either seems queer or womanly.)
Coding fat people as evil is one of the oldest tricks in the book, and it certainly hasn’t let up in fiction even to this day. What’s distressing about Herbert’s choices in this matter are the lengths that he takes it to—the Baron is grotesque in the extreme because that is how we’re meant to know the depths of his decay. He’s barely a person by this description; he’s a thing, a monster out of a horror movie. While that visual is pointed in its own way, it is rare that people can be so easily discerned by their appearances, yet that is what the narrative wants us to do. This actually gets worse as the story continues, so we will come back to this, back to how the audience is meant to view the Baron and his cohort due to a set of deeply offensive cues.
Thus spoke St. Alia-of-the-Knife: “The reverend Mother must combine the seductive wiles of a courtesan with the untouchable majesty of a virgin goddess, holding these attributes in tension so long as the powers of her youth endure. For when youth and beauty have gone, she will find the place-between, once occupied by tension, has become a wellspring of cunning and resourcefulness.”
—from “Muad’Dib, Family Commentaries” by the Princess Irulan
Summary
The Reverend Mother is scolding Jessica for having a son instead of a daughter. Jessica does not regret her decision, especially as it mattered so much to the Duke to have a son and she sensed the possibility that she could produce the Kwisatz Haderach. It turns out that the Bene Gesserit had commanded her to have a daughter so that she could be wed to the Harkonnen heir, combining the bloodlines and sealing the breach between the houses. The Reverend Mother tells Jessica that she may come to regret her decision when there is a price on her head and she is begging for the life of herself and her son. The political climate is precarious this point in time with the Emperor and his cohort having nearly 60 percent of the CHOAM directorship votes. There are three prongs to this political situation: the Imperial Household, the Federated Great Houses of the Landsraad, and the Guild, which holds a monopoly on interstellar travel. The Reverend Mother worries that Jessica’s choice will cause unrest or worse.
She also tells Jessica that there is very little chance that Paul is the Bene Gesserit Totality, and her decision was likely for naught. Jessica is emotional in that moment, saying that she has been so lonely… the Reverend Mother says that should be one of their tests, as humans always are. She asks that Paul be called in so that she can ask him questions bout his dreams.
Paul comes in and she asks whether he dreams every night. Paul says that not all of his dreams are worth remembering, and when he she asks how he knows that, he replies that he simply does. Last night he had a dream worth remembering: he was talking to a girl with all-blue eyes and telling her about meting the Reverend Mother, that she put a “stamp of strangeness” on him. The Reverend Mother asks if he often dreams things that come true, whether he knows this girl. Paul explains that his dreams are often prophetic and that he will know this girl. He says that he will be sitting with her, about to meet some people that he’s excited to meet, and she will say “Tell me about the waters of your homeworld, Usul.” He had thought that was strange, since Usul is not his homeworld, then realizes that she may be calling him Usul. He says he will tell the girl a poem that he learned from Gurney Halleck, which Jessica recites for them.
The Reverend Mother tells him that they seek the Kwisatz Haderach, and that it might be Paul. She gives him a hint: “That which submits rules.” Paul grows upset, noting that while she has come to talk about his potential in this, she has said nothing about helping his father, that she speaks of him as though he’s already dead. The Reverend Mother tells him that if there were anything to be done for the Duke, they would have done it. She will help Paul, but not his father—once he accepts that, he will have learned a real Bene Gesserit lesson. The Reverend Mother then tells Jessica that she cannot pay attention to the regular rules of training, that she was right to teach Paul their ways without permission, and that she needs to move his training forward much faster now. The she wishes Paul luck, and as she makes her leave, Jessica sees tears on the old woman’s cheeks and knows that is far more worrying than anything.
Commentary
This opening section from Alia (a character whose relevance is lost on us during a first read) is fascinating to me. It starts off with what sounds like a typical lament on the fleeting nature of female youth and beauty, but ends on a very different note—the suggestion that once these distractions have left us, women become more powerful than ever. And I’ve seen women, middle-aged and older, make similar assertions in writing and conversation; that while people are so concerned with no longer being young and hot, there is real power in no longer being beholden to those attributes. That letting them go offers a clarity and freedom that you’re not expecting.
We finally learn precisely why the Bene Gesserit are angry that Jessica chose to have boy instead of a girl—her daughter was meant to be married to the Harkonnen male heir. By this we can easily discern that Feyd is a bit older than Paul–the previous section said that he was about sixteen, which is a very slight difference indeed–and can also collectively feel grossed out that Jessica’s daughter would have likely had no choice in this matter had things unfolded the way the Bene Gesserit wanted. We have to assume that this marriage would have taken place relatively soon, too, and that this heightened animosity between Houses Harkonnen and Atreides would have been smoothed over in the interim. So the suggestion that Jessica has shaken up all that hard work by choosing to have the son her Duke wanted is a fair point, as far as the Bene Gesserit are concerned. (If we want to get into how fate operates in this universe, and whether or not events are unfolding as they are truly “meant to,” we’d be here forever in an endless philosophical discussion. Not that we can’t do that at some point, but we’re only a few pages in.)
My favorite thing about this section is seeing the Reverend Mother show emotion, even tenderness, toward Jessica. While the Bene Gesserit are masters of manipulation, there’s clearly some truth to the pity that she feels for her old pupil, and even for Paul. So while these women expertly train and mold their students, it doesn’t mean that they have no love for them. And even saying that, it doesn’t mean that we should forgive them for what they put these girls through all their lives—the Bene Gesserit way is largely cruel and vicious and demands all from its initiates.
One of the quotes that always sticks with me is when Jessica bemoans feeling as though she’s back in lessons with the Reverend Mother, reciting one of their pieces of wisdom: “Humans must never submit to animals.” Now we know that the Bene Gesserit consider all people who do not pass their tests to be merely animals, and the majority of the population is considered as such despite never undergoing them at all. To my mind, this line is about the Duke—Jessica submitted to an “animal” by agreeing to have a son for him. It makes you wonder what it must be like to spend your life being told that you are elevated, but still being made to marry someone who is considered to be beneath you for the sake of politics. And of course, Jessica follows this up by talking of how lonely she is, which makes me wonder if giving Leto the son he wanted helped them grow closer and eased that loneliness somewhat.
We don’t know explicitly why the Duke asked for a son, but the Dune universe seems to set a lot of store by male heirs. It’s one of the few things that strikes me as odd—so far into the future and women are bartering chips and items to be married off? We have the Bene Gesserit, but they use their students to the same ends, so their pupils are acting for the sake of an order instead of families. While I understand the desire to formulate things this way from a storytelling perspective, it’s one of the few areas where I wonder if being a little more creative with the power dynamics wouldn’t have yielded more intriguing results.
The fact that the Reverend Mother suggests that loneliness should be another of their tests because “human are always lonely” is one of those punch-in-the-gut lines. Sure, we’d probably all be “animals” according to the Bene Gesserit line of thinking, but there is some deep truth in there. It stings.
Paul gets the chance to tell the Reverend Mother about one of his relevant dreams, featuring a girl we will later come to know as Chani. She calls him by the name Usul, which is a Fremen word that means “the strength at the base of the pillar.” It is also an Arabic term that means “fundamental principles.” So we have an interesting similiarity here where you could almost see the meaning of the term “usul” shifting throughout time until we arrive at the Fremen meaning. (Also, I saw all the great alternate translations for various terms in the comments last week and I am so excited, we are going to have so much fun with language, peoples.)
The Reverend Mother’s departure is unsettling both for her tears, which Jessica makes note of with some trepidation, and for the fact that we have now seen multiple people have very strong opinions on a character we have never met—Duke Leto Atreides. The choice to put off his introduction is an excellent one, to my mind. While he is not the main character of this story, he is the person that all the current plot threads revolve around, and it’s a smart dramatic choice to keep us in suspense about him. We know literally nothing about him as a person, and what we suspect may not bear out by the time he is introduced. I’m curious if anyone had formed a solid opinion of him based on the early pages when you first read? I definitely thought he was going to be less likable on my first pass; noble yes, but not quite so shrewd and reasonable.
Oh, and I have a fun treat for everyone! Some of our rereaders mentioned the full-cast audio version of Dune and how much they enjoyed it, so Tor.com is partnering up with Macmillan Audio to give you little excerpts of the book! Here is this week’s scene, featuring the Baron himself:
Emmet Asher-Perrin is also getting super into this audio version now, so thanks everybody. You can bug her on Twitter and Tumblr, and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
Is there a schedule for this reread posted somewhere? So that I can read along at the proper pace.
Part 1: I actually appreciate the infodump of the Baron’s plot. It lays everything out to you and seems to say “this is but a small part of this story”. Yes, the Harkonnen attack is the catalyst, but the real story is how the Atreides react to it.
Regarding the Baron’s appearance and the description of Piter, while these are pretty obviously not in line with what is considered “ok” today, it fits pretty well with the viewpoints of the time it was written. I think that if Herbert were to write this in this day and age, the Baron and Piter would be described completely different.
Part 2: I am looking forward to the language aspect of this as well. It seems to me that the Fremen use distinctly Arabic words in their language. (a later term, “umma”, is where I get the first part of my screenname)
It’s worth noting that the Baron’s corpulence is an intentional affectation – he’s basically intentionally obese as a display of wealth and power, not involuntarily so. At least he was until the execrable prequels changed the canon to make his obesity a result of deliberate infection caused by Mohiam during Jessica’s conception (also an alteration from the original).
Not that this detracts from the larger point of obesity as a proxy for villainy in much of speculative fiction, but Frank Herbert at least seems to have been aware of that trope and possibly even addressing it through the Baron.
Thank you for including the audio sample! It’s really very well done.
@3, it has to be at least partially hereditary though. When the Baron describes Raban he says that he is showing signs that he will eventually need the suppressors also.
#2 on the “enter the wicked baron” section. Yes, it is possible to appreciate the infodump, The first section of the book leaves the head spinning, by touching on so many things that it’s a relief when the second section has a character explain stuff. And yes, while the Baron sets things in motion, it is clear that Dune is about Paul and the planet: the title, and the very first page, make it clear.
I would say that FH gets away with the infodump, but that would be unfair. I’m sure that he knew he was infodumping, and that this was one of the rare occasions it would work.
I confess that he got away with the “fat and effeminate = bad” signalling on my first reading of Dune. I was a teenager, it was the 1970s… It is very jarring now. FH wrote Dune in the 1960s: with hindsight, a far less enlightened decade than it seemed to many at the time. But perhaps that goes for all decades, and will go for this decade…
@6 ” and will go for this decade…”
Given the events just of this past month, I’d say that’s a certainty.
@5 “it has to be at least partially hereditary though.”
Wasn’t Rabban consciously imitating the Baron’s debauchery though? Feyd doesn’t have any of those markers, and he’s Rabban’s brother.
Emily – cute typo to correct – last line should read “excerpts” rather than “experts”.
In general, I love the set up in these initial chapters. Everyone knows it is a trap and the reader is left wondering whether the H’s can pull it off and whether the A’s can escape.
@8 – Typo fixed, thanks!
As others have noted the characterizations of the Baron and de Vries are problematic today, but were fairly normal for when this was written (I think some of this applies to the roles of women, too). Think of it as a visit from one of the suck fairy’s relatives. Harkonnen’s obesity is also meant to demonstrate his general decadence. It’s also in fairly stark contrast to the Fremen and other residents of Arrakis. But that’s something we still haven’t seen at this point. Also, am I misremembering or is there an implication that the Baron is using Feyd sexually and/or Feyd is using sex to manipulate the Baron? If so, it’s probably a reference to Tiberius and Caligula.
About the Baron’s obesity, while I agree that it’s not a decision that has aged well (and Herbert does tend to make the good guys classically attractive), I’m not sure I understand the reasoning here:
“Coding fat people as evil is one of the oldest tricks in the book … What’s distressing about Herbert’s choices in this matter are the lengths that he takes it to—the Baron is grotesque in the extreme because that is how we’re meant to know the depths of his decay.”
This seems to be saying that if Herbert had depicted Harkonnen as being just fantastically evil and pretty fat, that would not be as bad as making him fantastically evil and fantastically fat… even if he were still obviously “coding fat people as evil” in both scenarios. To me it seems like either it’s the same thing, or possibly the extreme fantasy version is [slightly] less offensive because it’s not using anyone remotely like someone in the real world to denote awfulness.
This book, more than any other, is one that I keep coming back to and reading again and again. Thanks for a great re-read so far!
I don’t believe any shorthand for evil was required. After all, Herbert presents actual Harkonnen internal landscapes for our… delectation? The contrast with the Atreides is key. These are extreme personalities in positions of enormous power. And if the Harkonnen exaggerate some of their vices for tactical effect, they have no tradition of self-restraint. The Baron isn’t evil because he is obese. That this was apparently voluntary, that he consciously decided at some point that he would use machinery to move rather than adjust his lifestyle… is scary. I believe that was the point.
The early reveal of the bad guys’ Cunning Plan means that the Harkonnen aren’t just a shadowy menace. We get to see their flaws. But if they raise self-indulgence to self-destructive levels, they also seem very practiced at destroying other people. Stepping into a trap that they have spent many years preparing seems like a Bad Idea.
regarding de Vries, I’ve always read him as belgian, given the mix of flemish and French.
Also #3 is correct with regard to the baron’s corpulence, it is intentional. (And I would add to the plea of ignoring the prequel books)
I still can’t read this chapter (or even a re-read of it) without thinking of the scenes from the movie with Sting as Feyd-Rautha,, ha. The infodump is fun because – given that it’s at the beginning of the book – we know that there must be even more twists and surprises and ‘plans within plans’ to come.
Anyway – everybody else has said what needs to be said here, so really I’m just along for the ride. It’s been awhile since I read it and I’m excited to see the insights/connections people make. I’m definitely still getting a Bene Gesserit/Aes Sedai comparison vibe.
A very little thing, but one I always get a kick out of, is the goofy awkwardness of the name “CHOAM” for a super-powerful galactic institution. and how Herbert cobbled it together from various languages (Combine Honnete Ober Advancer Mercantiles). A lot of ’50s and ’60s SF writers tended to name things in a way that was either 1. totally functional (the Empire), 2. allusive but concise (the Instrumentality), 3. faux-exotic, or 4. based on 20th-century marketing and public relations style. Herbert did plenty of the first three and pretty much avoided the fourth, but “CHOAM” is more like the kind of globs of obsolete verbiage you get from companies and political units evolving and recombining over long periods of time. Just a nice piece of texture to emphasize how his future setting isn’t supposed to be just “the way things seem to be going now, but more so.”
It’s been about 20 years since I’ve read the Dune series. I also got through most of Brian’s books. Looking forward to following and participating in this rereading. Thanks for making it happen.
I like how you are laying out the sections starting with beginning excerpts, the summary and then the commentary. As I read the book I am also listening to the Macmillan audio book so that works out well.
Maybe at the end of each week you can give us a heads up to how far you think you will cover for the upcoming week. I am trying to keep pace with the reread and not get to far ahead,
Firstly, I must say that I always LOVED the Harkonnen parts of the book, and wished they’d been included in the movie (particularly the later ones, with Feyd and Fenring).
I saw the Baron’s body shape as indicative of his attitude towards excess in all of its forms. I know that later in the book there are references to the Harkonnen’s use and ostentatious wastage of water.
The depiction of the Baron as homosexual is FAR more problematic IMHO, particularly in the way that he drugs and rapes male slaves at various times in the book. As the only depiction in the book of a non-straight character (that I can recall offhand) it unfortunately reinforces the depiction of gay men as either effeminate nonentities or voracious predators.
On the first read through you didn’t think you would like Leo? Wow. I remember considering him to be the innate version of good in the series the way he ruled his people, everything we knew about him. He is the perfect example of Nobles Oblige (which is not a dirty term) and pretty much the white to the harkonnens dark. I mean it is only in the prequels we learn he is as manipulative as everyone else (as someone mentioned last week – him getting into the ring to kill the bull was likely a myth he used for power) and it can be argued that was not intended (as I think Herbert employs grey more than some I think it might have been but I am not sure).
The bene gesserit are a great example I think of how power makes everyone the same. Women with power are no different than men with power. My favorite BS quote is the one talking about how power attracts the corruptible. The way the set up the government of their organization I love actually – I can’t wait until we get more into this.
For an understanding of Frank Herbert’s feelings about women and their place in society, I recommend that you read The White Plague. I haven’t read it since it came out, and I found it particularly infuriating (and large chunks of it tedious) at the time. I do think it gives you an insight into Herbert’s feelings about women, though. The gender power dynamic in Dune is what it is because (I believe) Herbert wasn’t capable of breaking past it. It isn’t just due to the feudal sheen with which he coats the Dune universe.
@20 not going to get farther into the femminist waters here – I had to stop commenting on the WOT reread for such things. Suffice it to say I do not fit in with the version of femminism on this website and many of the postings I don’t read (especially ones pertaining to the marvel universe) as they would make me rage against the author to much.
So finished reading up ahead likely two weeks now as I couldn’t stop myself (how do people read at the pace of these things – any half good book I can’t stop) so I can now comment more intelligently – and doing so while still fresh. Much of what I remember is still there but much has changed. I am not sure if it is later or how much my perception changed, but before rereading I had a positive thought of the Benne Gesserit. Reading up to where I am now – not so much. I wonder if it is because I have no truck now with anyone wanting to control – and the Benne Gesserit seem to be all about control. Not only of the self (which is good) but of others, of all. Rereading Dune as a teenager (and coming off of teenage power fantasies like Magician apprentice/master) I can see myself finding that attractive. As an adult and a libertarian – not so much. The opening wow do I not like them. As Paul says – they take much on themselves. They also seem almost blatantly antidemocratic with their hatred of tripartiate government and their love of “order” and a through-line. They oddly seem scientific and mystical in odd mixtures. They talk about genetics and securing domininat traits and hating a world that is anti-scientific but then they say you can not understand a process by stopping it – a very religious anti scientific viewpoint. (as this part comes when Paul is talking to Gunnery I almost wondered if it was unreliable narration but I doubt it) The Dali-Lamai has said something similar before – and he is no friend of science really. More on them as we move forward – but I was struck that the missovnia protectiva was a thing this early as I remembered that as something reveled later.
The mix of outright environmentalism and becoming one with nature – even in the bennia gesserit. Was also interesting and I had forgotten. Dune has always been held up as an environmental novel – I never saw this (especially given the ending which is really environmental devastation even if it does increase life overall)
Using the glossary in the back and reading up on the Fremmen and where they came from I am also amazed I missed/didn’t remember the almost one to one correlation between Fremmen and Jews. A sect that separated from some main religion of the day (the fourth Muhammad surely being intentional irony) slaves on a planet for nine years – then wandering in the desert waiting for a messiah. It really is almost one to one. I can now see more way reading it in Hebrew as a fellow commentator mentioned would be possibly quite moving. I am not sure what to think of this totally but I find myself wondering if a germ of the novel didn’t come from wondering what if Jesus was a war leader rather than a prince of peace? Obviously with many other things added on later.
I also found interesting how even though I read the book before seeing the (I hope we can all agree awful 80s movie) so much of what I remember is from the movie and not the book. The book doesn’t show the guild navigators or their ships in face we skip right past it, and the fatness of Harkonnen along with the effeminate nature of his son is really only a couple lines of description – when Baron Harkonen laughing gleefully while floating through the air grotesquely is a vivid memory – that isn’t in the book. Harkonen and his mentat are actually a good study in the differences between lawful/self help evil – and chaotic evil. Harkonen’s interest is power – he wants to take out the Atredies and gain power for himself and will do so by any means – but as he says he doesn’t like much of it (the movie really seemed to skip this). His mentat would do it even if there was no gain – he simply enjoys seeing things burn and people suffer. (He is a pure sadist no switch here to my mind). Harkonen is much more nuanced and subtle and insidious and thus much more dangerous than I remembered.
Can’t wait until we get farther along as when they land on Arakis is when we get quickly into meat. How much of what happens was actual “real” messiah and how much was benne gesserit manipulation and usage of what the situation gave them? This will be a hard but very important question to answer – and is where later books may go wrong for me. Even in what I have read so far though it was much greyer than I remembered.
The version I have also has an afterward written by his son – this should be fun to read. I like the sons more than many here but even I didn’t find the later works they wrote to hold a candle to the father.
I think the vision Paul has in his dream is just before he takes the Sandworm test.
Dune is (or was) very popular in the Middle-East because the Fremen are Muslim Arab (Bedouin, really) descended. I’m fairly sure that’s presented in the text somewhere in Herbert’s books. The “Zen-Sunni” faith is an interesting bit of world building, as is “Bud-Islamic Christianity”. Later, in the post God Emperor books, (mostly) orthodox Jews turn up as well.
The society is textually presented as being feudal, which has an impact on women’s place in it. I suspect the return to hand-to-hand combat has a large effect on the place of women as well, since men tend to be much more physically capable of that sort of thing. Certainly women, today, can train themselves to be physically strong enough for that, but it tends to have unfortunate physical side-effects. Later in the series we get the Fish Speakers and Honored Matres who are physically capable of heavy hand to hand combat, but they’re also evolved for it. All that said, women do have power in this universe, it’s just a different type of power than that which the men wield. Heck, the Bene Gesserit and the fremen Reverend Mothers are arguably the most powerful people (after Paul and Leto II) in the series.
The Baron being a pedophile, and fat, and Totally Evil Muhahaha is very problematic. But Feyd Rautha is in perfect physical condition and as straight white male as I am, and also Totally Evil Muahahaha. Although he does have respect for the Atreides trooper he kills in the arena later, and some self-awareness. And of course we later find out that Paul is a Harkonnen.
Re: the less egalitarian role of women in the society. I believe that Herbert was also trying to set up a contrast between this and the much more equal Fremen society. Whether he succeeded is of course debatable but there are instances of this scattered throughout the series.
Herbert was also very clever in the quotes at the beginning of each section in the way the biases of the speaker are meant to illustrate one of the points he was trying to make: that the Atredies approach was noble but flawed in its own way and the exposure to the Fremen life helped shape it into something better
Again the Baron with the Russian sounding last name who has plots within plots within plots—classic Cold War early 60’s depiction of Russians. As for Piter deVries I cannot find references to this but I have some memory of a real person (a literary person of some sort) by this name before Dune was published (there is actually a reference to this in DOON where the Baron asks why his Mentat is named after a French impressionist, or something like that).
Aha! I knew it!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_De_Vries
Fatness does not suggest generic “Evil”, it suggests greed and lack of self-control. Conversely, thinness suggests asectism, and possession of self-control. How else could it work?
It is perhaps more interesting that Piter is discribed as effeminate. That naturally suggests a physically weak and unthreatening charater. Not the way you would want to introduce the Big Bad – but Piter is merely the Big Bads servant and adviser.
@27 you forget that here “greed” or even capitalism is seen as “evil”. Otherwise i agree with everything you said.
Re the plan and where it falls apart:
House Atreides -> Arakeen. Check
Occupy Fenrig house. Check
Attempt on Paul’s life (to fail). Check (I think????)
Thufir Hawat suspect Yueh, but discounts it. Check
Hawat suspects Lady Jessica. Check
Further uprisings destabilize Duke (I don’t remember???)
Sardaukar attack. Check
Duke or his family will try to flee out to where the Fremen live, but the planetary ecologist Kynes is in position to prevent that.
House Harkonnen will control Arrakis and all the wealth that comes with it (again). Check (for a time)
So it looks like the spanner in the works for the Harks was Liet Kynes, secret Fremen revolutionary. The Fremen who _saved_ Paul & Jessica were supposed to be there, but the plan called for them to kill them or hand them back to the Harks. Everything went according to plan excep that (and Leto killed Piter, but everyone on both sides was ok with that)
My 40th Anniversary eBook has tons of typos. Anyone have a clean ebook copy?
On the names: I was reading online that Harkonnen could come from the Finnish name Härkönen. Feyd-Ruatha could be a combined Swedish-Finnish name, and Vladimir is Russian. They’re portrayed as redheads in the movie, which would all go with a strong strain of Northern European influence.
Paul’s name could reflect Paul in the Bible (prophet figure involved in the early stages of a new religion who also changed his name), but I’d say there’s a better case to made for Apollo. Apollo was the god of prophecy who spent a childhood in exile before claiming his place among the gods. One of his first heroic acts was the slaying of the Python, a dragon that is sometimes depicted as serpent-like, a great stand-in for a worm. One of his parents was a god but the other, Leto, was mortal (although there’s been a gender reversal, here. Leto is “mortal” or untrained in the semi-supernatural powers some of the characters have, though he may possess some).
Jessica’s name associates her with Jupiter, the father of Apollo and Artemis, and with Jessica, from The Merchant of Venice. In the play, Jessica abandons her family and religion for a Gentile husband, just as Jessica in Dune chooses Leto over the Sisterhood. In the play, Jessica is also the daughter of the play’s bad guy (which is a terrible oversimplification of Shylock but not of the Baron).
Alia seems to be Artemis, huntress and goddess of wild creatures. Her name means “another one,” a literal enough choice for the second child, but it also implies she is alien in some ways Paul is not.
On the issue of women in Dune: Cultures change and they don’t always change in ways we would consider for the better. While it’s not entirely clear why, the dominant culture in Dune values male heirs over female ones. It may be one of the deeply ingrained cultural things like not making thinking machines backed up with terrible stories of what happens if you don’t respect this rule or it may just be something that happened. I don’t think we’re ever told.
@31. Ellynne
Finally! After I learnt elementary Finnish (and Estonian) the name Harkonnen leapt out at me as Finnish. I’ve been waiting for someone to recognize that for ages! And Rautha is also Finnish (with the “h” borrowed from Medieval High German – modern Finnish wouldn’t use it. Much like Neanderthal/Neandertal).
And yes, the evil old Baron does use his nephews sexually. That is one of things that Paul recognizes when he recognizes the Harkonnen ancestry in his mother. Frank Herbert uses it to twist the knife oh so expertly when Duke Leto muses on the regal beauty of his concubine (Latin for bedfellow) and thinks it wonderful that Paul takes after her.
Seventy percent of the non English-language words in Dune are Arabic, there’s some Farsi (Padishah), some French, and some of the names are Russian and Finnish.
@22. dwcole
(as this part comes when Paul is talking to Gunnery I almost wondered if it was unreliable narration but I doubt it)
Wonderful tyop! :) Gunnery is to Gurney as rifle is to …?
31. Ellynne
I interpreted her name as a reference to Ali ibn Abi Talib, cousin and son-in-law of Muhammad, founder of the Islamic faith.
He’s the one whose murder split Islam into Sunni and Shiite factions (Shiite is short for Shia’t Ali – the faction of Ali).
Please keep the discussion on topic. If you would like to see more focus on specific aspects of the novel, please start a discussion about them rather than complaining about other topics’ prevalence.
I’ve noticed that many people complain about the decadently evil Baron being homosexual, but no one ever seems to complain about his being a pedophile. Feyd-Rautha’s harem is composed of slaves, and eventually he is obliged to slaughter every last woman (and child?) in it with his own hands, as though the people in it were toys that he can be punished by being forced to replace. Is that any less evil than raping and murdering male child-slaves? If the Baron raped and murdered girls, I hardly see that it would be an improvement. Their living sex toys are just objects, and aesthetic preferences as to their features pall in comparison to the negation of their humanity.
The specific sexual orientations of the Harkonnens is irrelevant. What matters is that they showcase the utter contempt and predatory views they have towards others. And as #10 recollects, it’s very strongly suggested that the Baron is using Feyd-Rautha as a catamite, so we can add incest to the list of atrocities. I rather suspect that this case is an example of thinking more along the lines of ancient Rome from the Baron – as a form of dominance. And it suggests that part of the reason the Harkonnens are so monstrous is that they’re intentionally psychologically damaged by each preceding generation – propagation not by genes alone, but by environment and teaching. They’re supposed to be utterly foul and offensive, and if they’re now offputting in a way Herbert didn’t intend, that’s an unexpected feature rather than a bug, to use a software metaphor.
Brad Dourif always seems to be perving after the women: Jessica, and later Eowyn.
I don’t think Piter is meant to be Dutch or Belgian: it’s over ten thousand years in the future, and Herbert is randomising words to indicate confusion of languages. Sire et Cher Cousin would not be his formulation anyway, but a conventional noble salutation we (American English readers) are supposed to recognise as the future equivalent of aristocratic Norman French. Note this only works in post-1066 English history. The French don’t see French as archaic, and other European countries don’t associate French with aristocracy at all. It’s probably a translation of actual AD10000 language.
Alia or Aliyah is just a common Arabic girl’s name.
A future book canonically establishes that French is an extinct language in the Dune universe. Probably not even the Bene Gesserit remember it. (Keep in mind that the nature of Bene Gesserit memory changes between the first and second novels, when we get to the point of Dune where it’s relevant.)
Enjoying this reread a lot, Emily!
If memory serves, one of the prequel novels by Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson contained a chapter revealing that the Atreides and Harkonnen families were directly related.
I don’t know what it is, but something about the simple phrases the Fremen use makes me tear up. Here’s a prime example:
Arrakis teaches the attitude of the knife — chopping off what’s incomplete and saying: “Now it’s complete because it’s ended here.” – from Collected Sayings of Muad’Dib by the Princess Irulan
The phrase that Chani says, “Tell me about the waters of your home world,” is achingly sad to me, though I don’t know why. I’m over here getting all emotional about it.
@@@@@briar_rose01, I totally agree, I just love the Fremen.
@Emily: “She calls him by the name Usul, which is a Fremen word that means “the strength at the base of the pillar.” It is also an Arabic term that means “fundamental principles.””
Usul means “foundation” in Arabic. So “strength at the base of the pillar” is just a very poetic way of describing/translating that.
@Jason_UmmaMacabre – There are many hints that the Fremen are Muslim Arabs, based on their language and cultural use, and a later reference to being denied the hajj pilgrimage that all capable Muslims should attempt to do once in their lives.
@wiredog My Islamic Studies teacher had his son turn him onto Dune. Interesting to hear it was also popular in the wider Middle East, but aside from the Friendlies in Dickson’s Dorsai series and the Arabs in Robinson’s Mars trilogy, I can’t think of many Muslim characters in scifi. Any more comments on what its reception was?
I found the usage of obesity and effeminacy as markers for evil a bit… uncomfortable, especially in the Year of our Lord 2017, but you have to make allowances for the day and age this novel was written in.
However, I too got the sense that the Baron chose to be seen as obese. Perhaps to display false weakness to his enemies or perhaps an ostenstatious show of much wealth he has?
I always understood the role of women in this society as part and parcel of the feudal context. Besides, the women have different avenues for power in this universe.
This reread came at an oppurtune time! I never realized how much I had forgotten…