Why Tolkien Despised the World of Dune

Comments · 1.1K

• CH

  @chocolatebunnies6376 · 3 months ago · pinned

  It was too spicy, so he de-spiced it

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• AL

  @allenandrews2380 · 3 months ago

  I understand why we originally made a distinction between fantasy and science fiction.

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• KA

  @katpar6647 · 3 months ago

  Yes. It is a complete clash of values. <br>In LotR and the Silmarillion, one of the greatest virtues is hope, to the point that Tolkien invented an elvish word for doomed hope, the hope against all odds.<br>Denethors story arc is a warning against the sin of despair.<br><br>By contrast, the worldbuilding of dune precludes hope. There is only a choice between terrible futures.

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• GO

  @GothTradeUnionist · 3 months ago

  “The empire created the emperors – not the other way round.” <br>― Mary Beard, SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome

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• CS

  @CSGraves · 3 months ago (edited)

  And it wasn&apos;t merely Paul&apos;s ascent to power, but the systems that enabled him to become Muad&apos;dib. Long before he was even born, the Fremen were pre-conditioned by Bene Gesserit machinations to be receptive to a messianic figure. Add the years of cruelty under the Harkonnen, and the stage was set for the jihad that even Paul feared, and couldn&apos;t stop.

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• LO

  @lordcrunk4790 · 3 months ago (edited)

  Frank Herbert: &quot;Power attracts the corruptible&quot; <br><br>and.. heres some Dune/Frank Herbert lore for more context, (slight spoilers) for anyone who cares, its a lot of reading...<br><br>[ Dune began with a concept whose mostly unfleshed images took shape across about six years of research and one and a half years of writing. The story was all in my head until it appeared on paper as I typed it. How did it evolve? I conceived of a long novel, the whole trilogy as one book about the messianic convulsions that that periodically overtake us. Of course there are other themes and fugal interplays in Dune and throughout the trilogy. Dune Messiah performs a classic inversion of the theme. Children of Dune expands the number of themes interplaying. – Frank Herbert (1980) ]<br><br>~ and ~<br><br>excerpt from Chapter 9 of Frank Herbert (1981), by Timothy O’Reilly:<br><br>[ T.O.: it is necessary to understand that the second and third books were an essential part of Herbert&apos;s original conception. The Dune trilogy is really a single novel that grew so comprehensive that it took twenty years and three volumes to write. Herbert recalls his dilemma while writing Dune. <br><br>F. HERBERT: I had the place, and the characters, and the thrust, for a monumental story, with a lot of action, people, evolutionary processes displayed. And it kept getting bigger. Of necessity. There were all kinds of things happening... Finally, I just took out how long it should be, and started building from the back. Where does it have to go? So parts of Children of Dune and Dune Messiah were already written before I completed Dune.<br><br>T.O.: The Dune trilogy was very carefully structured to build up Paul as a hero in the reader&apos;s eyes, so that his failure, when it came, would reach across with full intensity as a lesson on the danger of hero worship. Herbert has repeatedly confirmed this intention. <br><br>F. HERBERT: Dune was set up to imprint on you, the reader, a superhero. I wanted you so totally involved with that superhero in all his really fine qualities. And then I wanted to show what happens, in a natural, evolutionary process. And not betray reason or process. ]<br><br>~ and ~<br><br>excerpt from Jean Marie Stine interviews Frank Herbert, (1984) L.A. Reader<br><br>[ JMS: … But in the second book you question a number of assumptions you led the reader to make in the first book and you reveal a much more complex and meaningful design than was apparent in the first book alone.<br><br>HERBERT: The first three books were one book in my head. I wrote parts of the second two before I completed the first. In fact I wrote the last chapter of the first one before I finished it. I did develop the other two a bit more because I thought of new stuff. But... &nbsp;(a small paragraph about Earth’s charismatic leaders) &nbsp;so I wanted to create a charismatic leader, a Messiah you would follow for all the right reasons. Every characteristic that you could possibly think of, including the prince in search of the Grail, is there in that character — you would follow him right into Camelot. And there is the power structure that grows up around him; that’s what we deal with in the second book. That shook a lot of people. Here was a hero who didn’t make everything alright. He created a power structure. He did it just by being there. ]

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• KE

  @ketamu5946 · 3 months ago

  Lotr is about Saurons bad intentions <br>Dune is about how good intentions created Sauron

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• DA

  @dajanavidakovic5757 · 3 months ago

  He hated The Chronicles of Narnia, too - although he and Lewis were buddies. ;)

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• MO

  @Mono_Lithicc · 3 months ago

  The idea of Tolkien leaving a 1-star Goodreads review for Dune with no comment is hilarious. Just “1 star” and absolute silence. The ultimate troll.

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• SA

  @sandal_thong · 3 months ago (edited)

  I just re-read from the point when Paul comes out of the three-week trance it took to convert The Water of Life, giving him prescience as well as awareness of the present. His Fremen believe he has super-powers like the religious figure they were led to believe would one day come to them. During his revenge and takedown of the Emperor, his Sardaukar and the Harkonnens, he gets glimpses of a Fremen jihad across the galaxy of human worlds. But he thinks he can stop it when he takes over. Then realizes dead or alive it will continue without him, once the Fremen know that threatening the Guild with the destruction of all spice on Dune puts them under their control.<br><br>However, this is just a few sentences at the end of the book. We see his arc from a prince to refugee to warrior-leader to about to become emperor, getting his revenge against those who wronged his family and his people. He offers rewards to all surviving members of House Atreides. What&apos;s not to like? If there had never been any sequels, we wouldn&apos;t know much about the jihad conquering and destroying worlds in his name. <br><br>There&apos;s a final meeting between Paul and his second son, also named Leto II in <i>Children of Dune.</i> They talk about Kralizec and how Paul wouldn&apos;t choose that path. Leto justifies becoming like a sandworm for three thousand years which will bring on Kralizec (a kind of Armageddon or Ragnarok) upon his death, by saying he envisioned the extinction of humanity if he didn&apos;t, and they will survive the conflict.

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• GR

  @greak7116 · 3 months ago

  Tolkien wrote a new British mythology. Herbert wrote a political warning.<br><br>Two authors. Two aims. Two successes.

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• TH

  @The_Wandering_Mist · 3 months ago

  For Tolkien myth was central to his story, it was inspiring and contained morality, duty, chivalry and much more. <br><br>Herbert saw myth can be manipulated and directed to capture emotional energy for insidious and mundane purposes. But, that it can be created too.

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