5 ms·

I loved Dune, and while I don't think all the original sequels were as strong, I enjoyed them all and have reread them several times over the years. I slogged

I loved Dune, and while I don't think all the original sequels were as strong, I enjoyed them all and have reread them several times over the years. I slogged my way through the first couple of his son's work, but I read the first page of Butlerian Jihad and, for the first time in my life, threw the book against the wall and tossed it in the garbage. Inside his pyramid-shaped vessel, the cymek general Agamemnon led the attack. Logical thinking machines did not care about glory or revenge. But Agamemnon certainly did. Fully alert inside his preservation cannister, his human brain watched the plans unfold. If you're a fan of Dune and made it all the way through this paragraph without feeling ill, then you're a stronger person than I.

themadturk 4y ago
I so wanted the Bulterian Jihad story to be good, or at least decent, because it was always the most intriguing part of the prehistory to me. Oh well.
- int_19h 4y ago
  There are strong indicators that "Jihad" was used not in a sense of armed struggle there, but more akin to a social revolution; "thinking machines" were declared a problem not because they were a physical threat a la Saberhagen's Berserkers, but because their influence on society was deemed overly negative. Given that, a book that would cover the Jihad would probably be another philosophical treatise in the vein of God-Emperor of Dune.
  - duskwuff 4y ago
    The Dune Encyclopedia had a couple of articles on the Butlerian Jihad. All of the material was invented for that work -- Frank Herbert's novels only had the barest shred of explanation of what it was -- but their theory was fairly reasonable, and were consistent with the spirit of his writing. (In summary, a hospital's "self-programming computer" terminated a Bene Gesserit woman's pregnancy; her protests ignited existing tensions against computers and high technology.)
kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
Sounds like the hackneyed portrayal of Harkonnen as a super villain who has to refer to himself in the third person while exposition dumping his plan to a nephew who already knows who he is.

themadturk 4y ago

I so wanted the Bulterian Jihad story to be good, or at least decent, because it was always the most intriguing part of the prehistory to me. Oh well.

int_19h 4y ago
There are strong indicators that "Jihad" was used not in a sense of armed struggle there, but more akin to a social revolution; "thinking machines" were declared a problem not because they were a physical threat a la Saberhagen's Berserkers, but because their influence on society was deemed overly negative. Given that, a book that would cover the Jihad would probably be another philosophical treatise in the vein of God-Emperor of Dune.
- duskwuff 4y ago
  The Dune Encyclopedia had a couple of articles on the Butlerian Jihad. All of the material was invented for that work -- Frank Herbert's novels only had the barest shred of explanation of what it was -- but their theory was fairly reasonable, and were consistent with the spirit of his writing. (In summary, a hospital's "self-programming computer" terminated a Bene Gesserit woman's pregnancy; her protests ignited existing tensions against computers and high technology.)

kevin_thibedeau 4y ago

Sounds like the hackneyed portrayal of Harkonnen as a super villain who has to refer to himself in the third person while exposition dumping his plan to a nephew who already knows who he is.