I am a
self-proclaimed nerd. And yet, at 45,
this is my first time reading Frank Herbert’s classic science fiction novel Dune. I have watched (and enjoyed and been confused
by) the Lynch film several times, but I had not read the book. I am delighted to have finally done so.
About
half-way through the novel, I understood pretty clearly why Dune had not
made the top 100 novels that I read over the last 7 years. Dune is competently written and the
world is beautifully imagined, but there is nothing remarkable about Herbert’s language
or his ability to lay bare the human soul.
The sexism that pervades the novel is disappointing, but better books have
displayed worse politics. There are a
number of dramatic build-ups whose payoffs are wanting. The clearest example I can think of is Gurney’s
plan to kill Jessica believing her to have betrayed the duke. It’s a great setup, but the scene of
confrontation is weak, and worse, pointless.
And there are a few cool ideas that are effectively abandoned when it’s
convenient for the plot. Here I’m
thinking of Paul and Jessica’s ability to read the motives and intentions of
others due to the Bene Gesserit training.
Paul’s abilities are utterly awesome when Jessica and Paul spend their
first night in the desert after the duke’s death. Then . . . well, they just sort of shrivel up
and are barely accessed among the Fremen.
But for all
that, Dune is deservedly revered and loved. Herbert does an amazing job conceptualizing
the world and playing out the cultural ramifications of the physical
world. It satisfies every itch of the imagination. Herbert is also skilled at dishing out just
the right amount of information. We
never learn the details of Dr. Yueh and his ilk’s conditioning, but then we don’t
need to. We know enough to know that his
betrayal should have been impossible. The
excerpts from Irulan’s body of work are super cool in the way the suggest the
ramifications of the tale we are hearing.
They tease us with information that affects the way we read the chapter,
and they frame the story as both history and myth to the people of the novel’s
world. I also really love the way
Herbert regularly gives us individual characters’ thoughts in the middle of
conversations and actions. The inner
life of the characters and the unspoken subtext of their conversations become
something of a theme in the book—to great effect, I think.
And speaking
of themes, let me give my brief reading of what’s going on in the book. My first impulse was to say, “there’s nothing
deeper going on here than the tale of a reluctant messiah.” But of course I was just being lazy. As soon as I started making notes, the
connections and observations came hard and fast.
I think that
Dune is about our desires to control our environment, ourselves, and each
other. The Bene Gesserit seek control
via a breeding program and by planting religions on all the planets to presage
the messiah they are manufacturing. Issues
of leadership and rule are prevalent throughout the novel in the differences
between the ways of the Atreides and the Harkonnens, as well as between Paul’s
traditional ways and the Fremen’s traditional ways. Everyone wants to control the spice, its
harvesting and its use. Jessica proves she can be the Reverend Mother of the
Fremen by exerting control over the Water of Life, converting it from poison to
potable water. The Fremen themselves
want to change the very nature of Arrakis and turn it from a desert into an
Eden. While Herbert never tells us (at
least not in this book) how the Mentats and the Bene Gesserit achieve their
super human feats, it is suggested that it is a matter of training; through
them we see that the limits of humanity can be overcome through determination
and skill.
But. In all these controlling relationships there
exists a tension between the controller and the controlled. The Guild might have learned how to make the
spice do its bidding to bring about folded space, but the spice has exerted its
own control on them, mutating them over the years. The Harkonnens may control the planet of
Arrakis and its inhabitants, but the Fremen are exerting their own control over
the Harkonnens. The harshness of Arrakis
exerts a control over the Fremen, but the Fremen have only become stronger in
the face of that harshness and are now planning on changing the planet. Again and again in the novel we see the
arrogance of people who think they can control a thing being themselves
controlled or changed.
The central
exemplar of this tension is of course Paul.
As he walks his path, he is haunted by the possible futures before
him. To avenge his father’s death and to
help the Fremen, he must assume the mantle of messiah and lead them all to
victory. But Paul always worries about
the images of jihad that would mean a lot of death and cruelty. The dangers of his position, his place as a
ruler, are made tangible by his working constantly to avoid a bloody end. Perhaps what separates Paul from all the
others is that he lacks the arrogance of those who think they can control
without consequences.
I keep
thinking about Paul’s declaration that “he who can destroy a thing controls a
thing.” His threat that he can kill the
worms and end spice production is his greatest weapon in getting the larger
powers-that-be to listen to him. He who
can destroy a thing controls a thing. Yes,
but I think the novel is exploring the inverse as well: he who controls a thing
can destroy a thing. Control and
destruction are two sides of the same coin in Dune, and that destruction
can come to the controller, the controlled, or both.
There’s so
much more to explore in the novel, so throw them out if you have them!
