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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

Dune

16:29 / 08.12.03

Who here has read the entire series of Dune? The prequels? I read Dune back in college and even though I enjoyed it a great deal but never read any of the sequels. My interest has been resparked by my brother who really got into the Dune/Children of Dune SciFi series as well as my purchase of Dune: The Butlerian Jihad for $0.25.

17:07 / 08.12.03

I've read the six Frank Herbert books, but not the prequels. Any use, anyone?

Keith, like a scientist

19:43 / 08.12.03

I re-read the entire 6 book original series after I read the "House" trilogy, which I thought was pretty interesting.

I haven't read the Butlerian Jihad stuff yet, but I'm thinking about it.

Also, they are apparently going to finish the original series book 7 (which herbert had notes and an outline for), which is good cause that last chapter of Chapterhouse: Dune is pretty messed up, and needs some explaining.

20:22 / 08.12.03

yeah, i read all of the frank herbert dune series, as well as the 3 house (fill in house name) books by brian herbert and kevin anderson.

the prequals are somewhat lackluster. they lack the attention to detail, and great internal monologue that frank was able to give the characters. also lacking is the philosophical undertone that i enjoyed in the senior hebert's series.

the story is told competently. the characters are believable. they certainly did a better job of revisiting a much-loved universe than the star wars prequals. but they just lacked that certain, i don't know what.

to make a crude analogy, if the original dune series is really good sex, the dune prequals are oral sex performed by myself. i take part in it, i enjoy it while i'm doing
it, but no orgasm.

22:39 / 08.12.03

I read the first three together when I was much to young to fully understand them, then the subsequent books as they came out. A recent attempt at a reread sort of blew my favorable memories of the entire series. The first two books are fairly brilliant, considered as one story. The third begins to suffer from "comic booky" lapses of logic where the plot is concerned, and from there the series just plummets, IMO. I was deeply dissappointed with the fourth, made it only halfway through the fifth, as Herbert was just sort of hackishly recapitulating the earlier stuff by that point. Can't remember much about the sixth from reading it long ago--guess it didn't make much of an impression.

23:01 / 08.12.03

(some spoilers ahead)

I read the original series a few years back. The first one was great, the second one not bad, the third was a chore for the first half and pretty good for the last half.

Couldn't stand God-Emperor. From what I can tell, people either absolutely love that one or hate it. I wasn't a big fan of the pseudophilosophy and turning characters into Kevin Smith-esque mouthpieces, delivering spiels and viewpoint monologues. Plus I got sick of people "breaking their fast" in the morning. Arrrrrrgh, Worst Fantasy Novel Cliche Ever.

I liked the last two novels, though - maybe because they focused on the Bene Gesserit, whom I find much more interesting than most of the other characters. Lots of sneaky intrigue.

Haven't read the prequels, mainly out of lack of interest and negative feedback from friends. To me they kind of smacked of fanfiction and threatened to have that Sandman inbred universe thing going where everyone knows each other, everyone is related to each other, etc. I could just be pre-judging the books, but from my angle, I'd rather have the past remain a mystery. I liked the mythic proportions of the Butlerian Jihad - I don't want it explained to me.

at the scarwash

04:32 / 09.12.03

I love Frank Herbert. Probably SF's greatest world builder. One has to be amazed at the sheer scope of the six novels. I mean, what is it, 6,000 odd years of history, plus a vague decamilliniad of pre-story that he at least has sketched out vaguely. He's not a bad prose-stylist, at least not as bad as I remembered from the first time I threw Children across the room. He does tend to suffer from the SF "dirty old man"-syndrome that Heinlein and P. J. Farmer bore us all to tears with--Honored Maters, anyone? And I have no earthly idea why he insists on trying to convince us that Duncan Idaho is a particularly interesting character...again and again and again. But his universe is amazingly rife with awesomeness.

For those of you who haven't already seen this, one of the first directors to consider doing Dune was that Mexican lunatic genius (sometimes), Alexandro Jodorowsky. He brought on Dan O'Bannon as special effects guy, right after Dark Star, as well as Moebius as production designer. I wish that it had been made, as much as I like Lynch's noble failure.

05:37 / 09.12.03

i always liked Dune, but my appreciation went up a notch when i heard that Herbert intended it in many ways to be a critique of Foundation, since i hate Asimov, and i think his whole point that having super-enlightened secret societies manipulating society "for it's own good" is well-taken.

08:39 / 09.12.03

For those of you who haven't already seen this, one of the first directors to consider doing Dune was that Mexican lunatic genius (sometimes), Alexandro Jodorowsky. He brought on Dan O'Bannon as special effects guy, right after Dark Star, as well as Moebius as production designer. I wish that it had been made, as much as I like Lynch's noble failure.

Hate to derail a books thread by talking about films, but I've got to mention..
Apparently Jodorowsky wanted to hire Salvador Dali to play the Emperor of the Galaxy, and starting building a 50 foot high golden throne for him to sit on.. Dali theoretically agreed to do the film, but only if they paid him $1 million per hour.. so Jodorowsky decided to hire him for one hour in order to do the close-ups and devised a plan to build a robotic Dali replica to use in the rest of the footage!

I'd imagine it was at around that point that somebody from the studio decided "actually.. let's not make this film".

I mean, Lynch's version is pretty mental, but the Jodorowsky one sounds like it would have been absolutely mind-destroying!

08:41 / 09.12.03

According tot he official Dune website (www.dunenovels.com), Dune 7 should be out by 2005:

"The last DUNE novel Frank Herbert wrote before his death, CHAPTERHOUSE: DUNE, ends on a cliffhanger, the story obviously unfinished. In the notes left behind at his death, Frank Herbert provided a complete outline for the grand climax of the "Dune Chronicles," a story he had not titled other than "Dune 7."

A great deal of vital information has been set up in the first two prequel trilogies, and now a large readership -- who had never before finished reading HERETICS OF DUNE and CHAPTERHOUSE: DUNE -- is ready for the rest of the story after the end of CHAPTERHOUSE.

During their recent lengthy tour for THE MACHINE CRUSADE, Brian and Kevin spent a great deal of time brainstorming and adding details to the outline Frank Herbert had left in a safety deposit box. The story is so large it is best told in two volumes, which are tentatively titled HUNTERS OF DUNE and SANDWORMS OF DUNE. Having already delivered the manuscript for the third book in their "Legends of Dune" trilogy, THE BATTLE OF CORRIN, they plan to begin full-fledged work on DUNE 7 early in 2004. If all goes as planned, the first half of the story could be published as early as September 2005, a year after THE BATTLE OF CORRIN is released."

Bit miffed that apparently I will have to read the prequels to get the last book. *sigh*

Our Lady of The Two Towers

15:46 / 09.12.03

Where's Cholister when you need her? I read as far as God-Emperor of Dune, I'd understood less and less of the books as time went on (I can tell you what happened in book three, but as to why? No idea), and I didn't understand anything in GEoD at all, supremely powerful being, sees the traps that other groups try to use to destroy him, goes along with it anyway...

Can anyone explain what the plot of the Dune books is, other than tyranny is the fairest form of society because then at least everyone except the tyrant are equally powerless?

19:11 / 09.12.03

Hmmm.. Tyranny is a bad thing. That's why God Emperor wants someone to kill him so much, but knows he has to have it done right and has a long time to sort it out, hence all the Idaho golas....

Doctor Singapore

23:20 / 09.12.03

Can anyone explain what the plot of the Dune books is, other than tyranny is the fairest form of society because then at least everyone except the tyrant are equally powerless?

I'd always thought that the point of the first 3 was that theocracy is a direct line to tyranny...and that all prophecy is essentially self-fulfilling.

Also, these days the original Dune is looking more and more like an extended parable about the geopolitics of oil...."the spice must flow", indeed...

Kiltartan Cross

09:29 / 11.07.06

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

12:59 / 11.07.06

these days the original Dune is looking more and more like an extended parable about the geopolitics of oil...."the spice must flow", indeed...

Let's not forget the spooky parallels with the young man from a rich spice-trading family running off into the desert, getting religion and calling for a jihad. And getting his men to fly an ornithopter into a spice refinery full of people. Interestingly, the translation of al-Qaeda as "the base" is, I think, "base" as in "the base of the pillar", or Usul.

(Before anyone thinks I'm a mentalist, I am fully aware that this is a coincidence, and that in a work of this size parallels can probably be found with TONS of things. I just think it's an interesting one).

Keith, like a scientist

14:04 / 11.07.06

an even bigger Hell Yes

15:26 / 11.07.06

I saw a Dune movie, years ago. It was some time before that, that I had read Dune, so I didn't really remember much.

I enjoyed the movie, though.

20:13 / 11.07.06

That's great.

Fungus of Consciousness

12:25 / 23.03.08

Personally I put myself through the torture f three of the prequels and finally threw one down (literally) in indignant anger.

I'm a massive fan of the "Frank" novels. I think the key to enjoying them was (for me) just reading them and letting the story wash over you. Personally I was enjoying them until the end and then they just kind of.... stopped (for obvious reasons). I'm really cranky with the Anderson/Herbert prequels as I find them to be in the tradition of ultra-trash, C grade sci-fi. And there is just so many holes you have to wonder whether they actually read the originals. Like Piter de Vried becoming "Piter de Vries".

And don't even start me on Rhombur "Er" Vernius. Honestly, if anyone can pick out a run of two sentences when he doesn't say "...er" I'll give you a tenner.

01:43 / 18.05.08

just plain genius