DUNE BOOK CLUB :: Week 07!
November 30th, 2009 — 09:11 am
The second to last week! Exciting! Let’s splash in. Oh, and if you are just tuning in, you can click on the “Dune Book Club” tag at the bottom to see all the Dune posts by themselves and catch up. And please, feel free to join the conversation!
OH THOSE HARKONNENS!
You know, I spend all this time reading and thinking about all the symbolic and thematic stuff going on with Paul and his mom and his dead dad and sandworms and blah-blah-blah, but it has killed me for anything to do with the Harkonnens. As Paul moves toward his big chrysalis-emergence, the Harkonnens just seem to get more stupid, cackling and rubbing their hands together at each other.
The addition of Thufir Hawat doesn’t help at all–if anything, having him present in their scenes just emphasizes their utter ineffectuality as antagonists. I’m beginning to think that this is the main weakness of the novel–you really know from page 1 that gross old pederast Baron Harkonnen is not going to win, am I right? He’s set up as the bad guy, floating around on his tippie-toes because he’s too obese to support his own weight; meanwhile Paul has a cadre of brilliant trainers turning him into Kung Fu Jesus. I mean really.
Speaking of Hawat, it’s strange how he is built up as a potential instrument in the climax of the book, which idea (spoiler alert) sort of fizzles in the end. I can never decide if this is just a little misdirection on Herbert’s part, or one of several plot points that got away from him over time. Much of the book’s finish seems sudden and not at all depending on the events before it, but I am undecided in this. I like being surpised in books, so it doesn’t bother me overmuch–but I like to be surprised on purpose, not by accident.
THEY DENIED US THE HAJJ!
One thing Frank Herbert does well, possibly best, in Dune is to wrap the Fremen in a deep tribal mystique. They are at once mysterious and simple–without devolving into long expositional descriptions of their ways, we are given enough information to construct our OWN mystique for them. I suspect that, more than any other single element, this sense of mystique is what binds the novel together and makes the whole larger than the sum of its parts.
One of the ways Herbert handles this is to tap into EXISTING “real world” tribal traditions, most obviously Islamic and Bedouin cultures. As you probably know, the hajj is a religious pilgrimage a devotee makes once in their lifetimes. As mentioned in a past post, Herbert liberally uses Middle-Eastern lexicons to give the Fremen verisimilitude. In later books there seems to be more Hebrew culture sort of retrofitted onto things, not always gracefully. Especially in the last two books, where Herbert was, frankly, not at the top of his powers–or maybe more correctly was too big for an editor to rein in some of his narrative excesses. But again, those are other books.
TODAY I AM A SANDRIDER
This penultimate section of our reading is one of my favorites, it’s packed with little tidbits. I love to see all the little seeds Herbert planted in the earlier chapters bearing fruit now; it’s like watching children grow up.
But the scene where Paul mounts and rides the sandworm is my favorite scene in the book, and for my money the beginning of the climax of the book. This is the end of Paul Atreides the man and the beginning of Muad’Dib, the legend. For me everything changes when Paul plants his maker hooks and rides up the side of the sandworm, the symbolic and elemental heart of Dune. When he stands on the back of the worm, with Stilgar and the Fremen arranged along it with their robes flapping, he is not only a leader of men but a leader of Fremen.
And look at the other characters after this point: everyone changes. Jessica settles into her role as Reverend Mother, remote, chilly, with her own spies and agents among the Fremen already. Stilgar becomes a satellite of Paul’s, somewhat emasculated by his own semi-religious devotion to the former boy. Even Gurney Halleck, rediscovered by this newly powerful Muad’Dib, is a more silent version of the old raconteur, reverent but suspicious of the change in his old master.
But Paul’s change to me is the most important, and in some ways the most subtle. Gurney Halleck points it out best when they are reunited after some bloodshed, and Paul wishes aloud they could have saved the vehicles. “Your father would have been more concerned for the men he couldn’t save.”
And of course the final change is to come in the next and final piece of the book for us!
YOUR RUGS ARE VERY DIRTY IN HERE.
This is one of my favorite passages in the book, emblematic as it is of the strange subtextual dialogue that Herbert does so well. It resonates with the change in Jessica, with the change in Paul, and with the coming end to the existing order of the Fremen:
“Your rugs are very dirty in here,” Harah said. She swept her glance around the floor, avoiding Jessica’s eyes. “So many people tramping through here all the time. You really should have them cleaned more often.”
Okay! One more week to go. For next week, read to the end of the book! I might do an epilogue post the week after, dealing with the appendix and an overview of everything.
Category: BLOG 9 comments »
November 30th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
Not gonna lie, I really wish everyone had finished the book so I could talk about what goes on in this part as it relates to the end. But I won’t do that. That said, I totally agree that the Harkonnens as rivals and villains are pretty silly. I don’t fault Herbert as much for that because I think that the point is the Harkonnens aren’t the main opponents, but I’ll comment on that once the book is finished.
The Islamic/Bedouin roots of Fremen culture is possibly one of my favorite elements of the book. I remember watching the mini-series, and I had just taken a semester of Arabic, and I could understand the Fremen speaking to each other. It was really trippy. The first time I read Dune, it struck me as incredibly similar to the story of Laurence of Arabia, probably because I had just seen the movie before reading the book. This time around, however, I had just read several historical fiction books about Europe in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and so the parts of Dune I found most interesting were the inter-house rivalries and politics. It just makes me like Dune even more as I realize that it’s multi-faceted in a way that you can get something new from it every time you read it.
Paul is definitely different. I’d say the shock that Gurney gets from Paul’s attitude change is caused mostly by Paul being completely immersed in Fremen culture. We’ve seen how Fremen treat killing as simply a part of life, so for Paul to assume that attitude as well isn’t too surprising for the reader, but for characters who knew him before and didn’t see the change, it would definitely be jarring.
Also, just wanted to point out how, again, I’d not read Dune since seeing the mini-series, in which Alia is played by a girl of at least 5 or 6, and so I forgot that she is actually 2 when she’s speaking and understanding like an adult. Really messed with my head.
November 30th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
When the Harkonnens try to recruit Thufir Hawat it underscores how ineffectual they are, trying to fight a new threat with the old ways. It makes perfect sense for thematic reasons, but as you note, it does tend to undercut the dramatic structure of the novel a bit.
In general the existing power structures in this book fail spectacularly. They’re all extraordinarly powerful but have fatal flaws – the Bene Gesserit have confused ends and means, the mentats have boxed themselves into a very particular way of thinking, the Guild are horrible addicts, the Fremen are inward-looking and insular, the Empire is so dependent on personal loyalty and petty politics that it’s vulnerable to someone who can transcend those bonds. It takes a figure like Paul who combines all their disciplines to actually get things done. He’s like a mystical Bruce Lee.
It’s interesting that you choose the moment when Paul rides the sandworm as the apex of the novel. It’s certainly the most iconic image you come away with, but I think the real climax comes a few pages later when he refuses to fight and kill Stilgar. Up to this point Paul’s spent the novel jumping through hoops to prove his manhood – withstanding the gom jabbar, moving to the next step of his swordmaster and mentat training, riding the sandworm, etc. By refusing to fight Stilgar he asserts his own manhood by refusing to jump through hoops any longer, and that’s the moment where he moves from man to god.
November 30th, 2009 at 1:06 pm
Well, I consider the sequence from riding the sandworm through his taking of the “Waters of Life” to be almost the same test. While the Stilgar thing is important, I’m not sure that we ever wonder what the outcome will be, you know? Paul himself is never actually afraid–but with the sandworm, even he is nervous in the face of the worm. The moment lies outside of his prescience, and he knows that the jihad will erupt whether he lives or dies at this point. His final real test (the Kwisatz Haderach test) in the next chapter is the last change in him, he emerges as Messiah.
November 30th, 2009 at 2:42 pm
I think it’s interesting to think about the sudden surprises you mentioned in the context of the Paul’s prescient vision. There are so many avenues open to him in the timeline, sometimes changed by the slightest movement. Maybe certain things seeming sudden and not dependent on the events prior is Herbert’s way of giving the reader a bit of an idea of how Paul’s feels on the gnarly waves and troughs of time.
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:01 am
I was flipping channels the other night and caught this thing on one of the ESPNs about what happens in the last few seconds of critical NBA basketball games. They interviewed a lot of elite players. LeBron James etc. They were talking about being “in the zone”. Almost all of them said the same things. “Everything slows down.” “It’s like slow motion.” “I can see three or four moves ahead before they happen.” “I can see the open shot before it is there.” They are all describing a sort of short term prescience. There was one segment about Tracy McGrady. He scored more than a dozen points in about half a minute at the end of one game. It was honestly creepy. He had this glazed over look in his eyes. It was like he was not even looking at the other players or the goal. He was like some really fast zombie or robot going through mechanical motions without thinking about them or looking at what he was doing and the ball was just magically swishing through the net. It was crazy.
On the surface it seems like these guys have some magical talent that makes them able to see the future in this situation. (They used to say Dale Earnhardt Sr. could see the air flow.) But, having read Dune– 1) I really do think they see the moves ahead of time. But, 2) I see it more as a result of years and years of playing and training. A guy has been on the court so long long and shot so many shots that he can hit the goal without looking at it. All the information around him- like where his feet are in relation to the 3 point line, the sound of the crowd, the shadows and lights off other players… all of that and his understanding of it adds up to that “in the zone” state where muscle memory takes over and the player can act with seemingly super human speed and accuracy. Their minds and bodies have processed these situations over and over and in that millisecond of time they can see the most likely series of upcoming events. So, for just a second they CAN see the future.
So. With our pal Paul. It’s that times a thousand or so. But what is special about Paul and what I think is one of Herbert’s best ideas (or perhaps best realizations) is this genetic memory we carry. Paul is drawing on generations of knowledge to calculate the most likely series of upcoming events. Both on a small personal scale like when he’s in physical confilct but also on a global and universal scale.
Call me crazy but I actually think this stuff is possible. Maybe it’s in our DNA/genes/etc. or maybe it’s in our souls but I do believe we can carry information from generation to generation.
I heard this news story a while back about how they were doing research on caterpillars and butterflies and they discovered that what you taught the caterpilliar they would still remember in butterfly stage. Right now, mankind is still a caterpillar. Not to get into the next books but– Paul, worms etc.
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:09 am
You’re on the beam, Shannon. One of the most profound ways Dune has affected my life has been in this idea of the “human computer.” Not so much in a Mentat sense, but just the idea of the mind in general being a computational device, one which collects millions–trillions–of bits of data throughout its life.
When I make a “gut” decision–which are without exception my best decisions–I’m trusting my mind to access this accreted information and produce a result. It’s most useful in social settings, when (in a very Bene Gesserit way) a person’s posture, subtle facial cues, eye focus, etc., can say a lot about what they’re thinking without you realizing it. But this restless brain computer is always on, always collecting data, always producing computations.
December 3rd, 2009 at 11:24 am
Oh yeah totally. At my last job I was management and I did a lot of interviewing and hiring and stuff. Dune always came to mind. Especially the Bene Gesserit stuff. The applicant’s resume really meant very little to me. I knew if I liked the person or not mainly from visual/audio clues they gave me while walking in, shaking hands, sitting down and making introductions. Without thinking about it, your mind and body can “see” the truth in a person or situation and we often over think it and miss that truth.
And, I’m not saying that first impressions are always right or anything. People can prove you wrong and people can change. But yeah, that gut instinct is usually the best and it’s not just some hunch, it’s your body and mind processing years of data. Were all untrained junior Mentats.
As a parent I learn a lot from watching my kids and it is amazing how kids often know when a situation is turning bad long before the parents do. Kids often know when It’s time to leave a room before things go down hill. (Kids know crazy when they see it.) They don’t over think it or try to apologize it away. They just see it for what it is and react.
December 5th, 2009 at 10:16 pm
You guys are right about gut-smarts. My wife is a doctor and there’s times when she has to just trust her gut that something isn’t right with a patient even though there isn’t a clear diagnosis. I guess part of her medical training was that BG way reading subtle things.
This section of the book is where I started to not like Paul as much – where he turns less sympathetic and more scary. Not bad or evil like his opponents but just not human somehow. I suppose this is what Herbert wants – as Paul changes he becomes more distant and alien to us too.
December 8th, 2009 at 9:52 am
Yeah. The totally becomes a jerk. It’s an interesting lesson Herbert is giving there. If you think Paul is a Jerk though, (SPOILER) just wait til you see how his kid turns out.