DUNE BOOK CLUB :: Week 02
Okay, Round Two! Crazy amount of discussion for Round One, and that was for what I think is the least awesome part of the book, so that bodes well. Let's jump right in, shall we?
I chose to break our reading up between last week and this week because of the big event that happens BETWEEN chapters--the Atreides arrive on Arrakis ("Dune" if you're nasty). Note that the arrival happens 100% "offscreen;" there's no discussion of spaceports or ships landing, firing their retro-rockets or whatever space-age science was in vogue. I point this out less to poke at sci-fi tropes and more to comment again on how odd this is--the book was published in 1965, at the height of the space race--it seems enormously counterintuitive for that time period to NOT highlight all this stuff.
Which I love. BECAUSE the important thing here is NOT that the spaceship has set down, smoke and dust shooting in all directions as C-3PO and R2-D2 standby to secure moorings or something. The important thing is the shift in locale--we are now on Dune. We have moved from safety to menace immediately--now that we are on Dune, life is desperate and close to its end at all times, even for these wealthy people, the nominal ruling class of the planet.
Again, I just want to underline that I think of Dune as an ecological novel. Not so much as a cautionary tale, although there's surely some of that in there; but again, SYSTEMS. Ecology is just a system of systems acting on a macro scale. And now we have entered Arrakis' planetary ecology. I really cannot stress this enough--my glasses may be a little rose-tinted on this book, but as we get really into the big meaty ideas of the book, most of which will begin in Round 3, I will be returning to this idea again and again.
Okay, you guys OBVIOUSLY don't need much help getting a conversation started, so I'll keep my remarks brief. I would like to point out:
1) These chapters are some of the final expository chapters, so soon we won't have to endure these conversations where characters remind each other of the political and governmental structures of this or that. I don't mind it, but I know it can be dreary for some of you new readers.
2) I love love love the way the Shadout Mapes is introduced into the story, this is a primo introduction to the Fremen themselves--note the tension between her and Jessica. Within minutes there is nearly violence between them, and the entire time both are straining to discern clues in their conversation to indicate whether to attack or wait. It's like Herbert has poked up one seemingly innocuous Fremen--we really don't know anything about them yet, right?--a housekeeper, a servant, and then suddenly she is posing a real threat to one of the main characters. I love it.
3) What does the Shadout Mapes mean when she calls Jessica "the One?" No spoilers here guys--I'm asking you to read this with a certain amount of naivete. What does it mean that Mapes--and by extension the unseen Fremen society--has ascribed this quasi-religious significance to Jessica, who as far as we know is just some royal guy's hot concubine? If you've read the book before try to pretend you have ONLY the info we've gotten up to this point.
4) Dr. Yueh. I'm not a fan of this character, and that's probably the most boring chapter in the book, where he and Jessica talk and he spends the whole time thinking nervously. BUT note that this chapter gives us more insight into Jessica's world: we see her using some of these vaunted "Sisterhood" practices that allow her to examine minutiae to make judgments about a person's motives or plans or whatever. Not mystical: science. Ditto for Yueh's description of "his" Wanna; he's picked up enough of this skill to be able to defend himself from Jessica's apparently razor-sharp senses.
above, the Lady Jessica by Thomas "Smo" Smolenski
5) This is repeated in the chapter with the conservatory--we see the Bene Gesserit system in action, in the person of the Lady Margot Fenring, sending her coded message in a form designed to bring Jessica to it. When we talk about "feminine" magic in the book, this is it--the Bene Gesserit are (to me) by far the most powerful groups in the book, or at least the most INFORMED. This idea of Bene Gesserit teaching soaks the book from cover to cover, so pay attention to it wherever you see it!
6) What does the assassination attempt on Paul show us (again) about the science of the Dune world? Note again how this idea of shield technology exists (as Todd pointed out last week) as a "singularity" that shapes everything technologically from that point forward. In a world where projectiles are useless, all martial technology must work around this idea, thereby shifting the focus of the entire society from open warfare to secret, from snipers and bombs and missiles to poisons and slow knives.
7) Also regarding Paul--his interaction with the Shadout Mapes also is an intro to the Fremen. "You've put a water burden on me." I love that wherever Fremen enter the story, that place is dangerous; whether they are drawn to the violence or it is created by them is rarely clear, but already the Fremen are tinged with danger--just the word is code for "danger" in the story now.
Okay that's enough, I talked too much. You guys pick it up. What did YOU notice in these chapters? Next week's reading--I'll pick a place to stop later today--is really going to step things up; this is the last of the purely introductory parts this week.
FOR NEXT WEEK: Read up to the end of the chapter with the long dinner party description. It ends, "No person who'll be sleeping far below ground level tonight as a precaution against lasguns has the right to boast." Somewhere around page 150 or so, depending on your edition. Also: I love this chapter, it is chock full of good stuff, lots of interplay/info/exposition without being boring. This is the point where the book starts to really fire up for me, and the NEXT chapter is where it EXPLODES!!
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