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Lawrence of Arabia, Paul Atreides, and the roots of Frank Herbert's Dune (2021)
- alabastervlog 2y agoWhen I finally got around to reading Seven Pillars, I wasn't too far in before I was convinced Herbert had the book on his desk the whole time he was writing Dune. So many minor similarities, little scenes that don't quite match up but if you squint they do. Even the arc toward eventually committing war crimes, while seeking some great end for the people he's leading, feels like a connection. But also little stuff like the early travel scenes in Pillars reminded me of early scenes among the Caladanians(?) in Dune. I think the part where I went "OK yeah this was the reference when he was coming up with the core plot and character of Paul" was when I came across the part where Lawrence comes up with his novel guerrilla war strategy: he's sick, feverish, possibly dying, in a tent in the desert, tended by a few companions. When he comes out of it, he's got his Path. It's too perfect. [edit] Incidentally, it's not clear to me this author has a good picture of Lawrence's background. Lines like this: > In terms of clothing, Lawrence comes to accept the Arab dress as “convenient in such a climate” and blends in with his Arab companions by wearing it instead of the British officer uniform. make me think the author isn't aware that Lawrence had already spent a lot of time in the Middle East (especially, IIRC, modern Syria—so, near Damascus) very shortly before the war broke out, and that was a big part of why he was recruited by British intelligence for the mission(s) in Seven Pillars. It was on an earlier, pre-war trip that he'd adopted Arab dress—unlike what's suggested (if not quite stated) in the film Lawrence of Arabia, he was already quite familiar with and comfortable in it.
- softwaredoug 2y agoWhat's ironic is how people often point to plot points in many franchises (Star Wars, GoT, etc) as being derivative of Dune... Yet Dune itself is fairly derivative of other works
- stevenwoo 2y agoThe first book I concur but the series goes in directions I would never have predicted in multiple places in later books, off the top of my head - books four and five stand out in memory, though he laid the groundwork in the first book.
- Talanes 2y agoSure, but when was the last time anyone claimed a major franchise was ripping off God-Emperor?
- ViktorRay 2y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Fac... A tale as old as time
- UberFly 2y agoThis is the final answer.
- tsimionescu 2y agoThis has relatively little relevance to Dune, which is basically the story of how the worse dictator in history rose to power (only to be surpassed by his son's 1200 year reign of tyranny).
- npodbielski 2y agoVery interesting point of view, considering how Baron Harkonnen was depicted in Dune. I mean, was the life in Empire better or worse after he took power? Did life of common citizen changed much? My view was that he basically just replaced Emperor by himself and most of things was still the same. He even married the princess just for pretence. My view was that Herbert was trying to show how we could try to direct human progress and evolution if we would have ability to see the future. Both Paul and Leto II have such ability and they tried to do it with mediocre success. Tides of history were largely operating by forces they could not change but slightly skew. My though was that they were both just trying to do good for the mankind, kind of succeeded, but not much - Leto was by intention so bad that when he finally fall - people scattered through galaxy with those new ships that did not need spice. Was not this the real moral of the story? Resist stagnant empire and explore the universe? Basically the same as Foundation that is book from the same era?
- ViktorRay 2y agoIf you really wanted to you could say even George RR Martin was influenced by it. (Game of Thrones spoilers below) Look at the character arc of Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones. You will find some similarities there too both with Dune and with Lawrence of Arabia. But with a female character rather than a male.
- SJC_Hacker 2y agoAlot more parallels than that Starks = Atreides, Ned = Leto, Catelyn / Sansa = Lady Jessica, Paul = Jon/Robb, Duncan Idaho = Benjen, Gurney = Aemon Targaryen / Jorah Mormont, Chani = Ygritte / Arya, Jamis = Tormund, Dr. Yueh = Littlefinger Lannisters = Harkonnens, Tywin = Baron Vladimir, Joffrey / Jaime = Feyd / Rabban (to some degree, traits are mixed between these characters)
- bongoman42 2y agoAt some level you can map any epic to any epic.
- supportengineer 2y agoAre you saying he knew their ways as if he was born to them?
- mtillman 2y agoRelated Herbert audio interview on the origins of Dune. Sorry it’s a YouTube link. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=A-mLVVJkH7I https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=A-mLVVJkH7I
- cyost 2y agoThis should be the transcribed copy of that interview http://www.sinanvural.com/seksek/inien/tvd/tvd2.htm http://www.sinanvural.com/seksek/inien/tvd/tvd2.htm The part relevant to the OP: FH: Well, one of the threads in the story is to trace a possible way a messiah is created in our society, and I hope I was successful in making it believable. Here we have the entire process, or at least the large and some of the subtle elements of the construction of this, both from the individual standpoint, and from the way society demands this of you. It’s the references in there, you know, that the man must recognize the myth he is living in, because the creation of an avatar is a mythmaking process. We’ve done it in our…in recent times. Look at what’s happening to John F. Kennedy. WM: O, sure. FH: Who was a very earthy, real, and not totally holy man…so here we have a likeable person, now, you see… WM: Yes. FH: But real in the flesh and blood sense who by the process of emulation becomes something larger than life, far larger than life, and I’ve just explored all of as many permutations as I could recognize in the process. WM: Oh, I-I caught overtones of Lawrence of Arabia in the thing, for example. FH: He could very well become an avatar for the…for the Arabs. WM: Right. FH: If Lawrence of Arabia had died at the crucial moment of the British… WM: Say, when Allenby walked into Jerusalem. FH: Yes. If he had died…if, for example, he had gone up and killed the people who were destroying his breed, walked into that conference and said, Gentlemen, I have here under my javala a surprise, Bang! Bang! Bang! and he had been killed… WM: He’d have been deified. FH: He would have been deified. And it would have been the most terrifying thing the British had ever encountered, because the Arabs would have swept that entire peninsula with that sort of force, because one of the things we’ve done in our society is exploited this power…Western man has exploited this avatar power.
- DavidVoid 2y agoThe part of that interview that's stuck with me after I listened to this last year was his comments about the feudal system (at around 38:30 [1]). So, tribal organisation is a natural organisation of humankind. We tend to fall into it, given any chance at all, given the proper stresses, or given the proper lack of stresses. [1]: https://youtu.be/A-mLVVJkH7I?t=2314 https://youtu.be/A-mLVVJkH7I?t=2314
- inopinatus 2y agoThe discrepancy is easy to explain; Frank Herbert never owned a copy of Seven Pillars but was instead inspired by a manuscript of desert adventures that he’d found on a train as a boy whilst holidaying in the UK.
- alabastervlog 2y agoI see what you did there. (those who don't follow: you can catch up on the Seven Pillars wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Pillars_of_Wisdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Pillars_of_Wisdom or like basically any biography of Lawrence, various forwards, et c.)
- pjmorris 2y agoClever.
- gostsamo 2y ago> make me think the author isn't aware that Lawrence had already spent a lot of time in the Middle East it is actually mentioned in the article. you misread here, with the point being that knowing how to do something is not the same as accepting it for a normal activity.
- rozab 2y agoI do think it's unfair when people claim Dune is a straight retelling of T.E. Lawrence's story. For instance I think the messianic aspects are drawn from other episodes in history, like the Mahdist War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahdist_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahdist_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Rebellion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Rebellion
- TeaBrain 2y ago>unlike what's suggested (if not quite stated) in the film Lawrence of Arabia The scene from the movie is based on this passage from chapter 20 of Seven Pillars, which suggests that while he was familiar with Arab clothing before the war, there was a period of time when he was in British army uniform during the Arab conflict, until he was asked by Feisal to change into Arab clothes: "Suddenly Feisal asked me if I would wear Arab clothes like his own while in the camp. I should find it better for my own part, since it was a comfortable dress in which to live Arab-fashion as we must do. Besides, the tribesmen would then understand how to take me. The only wearers of khaki in their experience had been Turkish officers, before whom they took up an instinctive defence. If I wore Meccan clothes, they would behave to me as though I were really one of the leaders; and I might slip in and out of Feisal’s tent without making a sensation which he had to explain away each time to strangers. I agreed at once, very gladly; for army uniform was abominable when camel-riding or when sitting about on the ground; and the Arab things, which I had learned to manage before the war, were cleaner and more decent in the desert." Also, the below quote is from the introduction, which I might add is perhaps the most beautiful introduction I've ever read. I sometimes go back just to read it: "In my case, the effort for these years to live in the dress of Arabs, and to imitate their mental foundation, quitted me of my English self, and let me look at the West and its conventions with new eyes: they destroyed it all for me, At the same time I could not sincerely take on the Arab skin: it was an affectation only. Easily was a man made an infidel, but hardly might he be converted to another faith. I had dropped one form and not taken on the other, and was become like Mohammed’s coffin in our legend, with a resultant feeling of intense loneliness in life, and a contempt, not for other men, but for all they do."
- languagehacker 2y agoA comment mentions it, but Sabres of Paradise is another key component to understanding Dune as a referential text as it pertains to imperialism and religious fervor as an insurrectionist response.
- romaaeterna 2y agoLol. More like Dune lifts wholesale from Sabres of Paradise, translating the stories about Imam Shamyl into space, only adding some bits of LSD inspired trippiness. If anything, Herbert toned down the historical accounts. On the other hand, Lesley Blanch went for the dramatic over the historical in Sabres. The story about the Sultan that drowned his son's mistress, for example, was from a Greek movie version.
- languagehacker 2y agoYeah, it can't be understated how much was lifted. Chakobsa, the Kindjal, etc. Shamyl even acts like Atreides with regards to how he uses "visions" to drive important political decisions.
- mhh__ 2y agoI was surprised how much more subtle in many ways Lawrence of Arabia was compared to dune
- Animats 2y agoReality is more subtle than fiction. Dune is desert warfare of the WWI era. Modern desert warfare is rather different.
- softwaredoug 2y agoThere’s even a part at the beginning of Lawrence of Arabia film where he puts out a match with his fingers, and throughout, Lawrence proves his ability to overcome pain. Very reminiscent of the Gom Jabar.
- user982 2y agoSuperficially, there is a sequence in the film where Peter O'Toole's very blue eyes appear to glow: https://youtu.be/nBiZu5C6lCo?t=12219 https://youtu.be/nBiZu5C6lCo?t=12219
- softwaredoug 2y agoInsane the full movie is just there on YouTube.
- afdslfslkfdsk 2y ago[flagged]
- felipeerias 2y agoThe parallels with Lawrence are obvious, but I find that the character of Paul Atreides follows some older models as well. Towards the end of the first book of Dune he has become an almost mythical figure, a Moses using his divine insight to lead his people to freedom, or a Mohammed throwing them into a global war of conquest. That ambiguity is perhaps the book's greatest achievement: Paul's actions are only justifiable if the reader believes in him completely (he has really seen all possible futures and picked the best one) or not at all (he just wanted revenge and could not have foreseen the consequences).
- itishappy 2y agoThat's what makes the rest of the series so fun!
- krige 2y agoInteresting to note that the recent Villeneuve adaptation seems to lean heavily into the latter interpretation (Paul and Jessica especially are ruthless and want revenge/power) while the Lynch adaptation was probably more of the former (Paul really wants to do good).
- lazide 2y agoEh, that isn’t how I saw the movie at all. They didn’t want revenge/power, they had no choice but take it or die. It’s even said explicitly in numerous places in the movie.
- greenheadedduck 2y ago[flagged]
- zabzonk 2y agoCompared with what, for god's sake? Explosions, mad Arabs, trekking across the horrible desert, dim British superiors doing the dim British thing, dubious Turkish sexual practices, etc. This is boring??? Though I must admit O'Toole does camp it up a bit too much.
- alabastervlog 2y agoCamps it up too much?! Exactly the right amount. Except the negotiation scene with Auda. He always seemed a touch too sarcastic in his delivery there, and it makes Auda seem foolish, which makes the scene worse. Like that one awkward cut in the middle of Jaws, this bugs me every time I watch it. Made even worse because the scene’s also wonderful, but that flaw… frustrating. But god, the rest? It makes him otherworldly, magnetic. In a movie full of larger than life characters (omg, the real life bio of Auda!) you can see how so many mark him early as someone to be wary of, and others underestimate him (he’s clownish!) and others follow him.
- zabzonk 2y agoWell, I did say "a bit" - and it is obviously a brilliant non-boring film. Actually, this has made me put "Pillars of Wisdom", which I never read before, on my Kindle to-read list.
- alabastervlog 2y agoYeah, I wasn't really trying to push back too hard, just taking it as a chance to banter about a movie I really like :-) Some of it's acting styles, too. You can see it in lots of the characters, a bit of what reads as over-acting today. More stage influence. Having watched a lot of older movies, I get the sense both that film acting styles developed (not necessarily improved, but, maybe) over time, and that for a long while more styles were within the range of "normal" that an audience might not be surprised or put-off by, while today the range of normal styles is much narrower and you rarely see other approaches outside of really niche films or some foreign film markets (Indian cinema!) Pillars is great, highly recommended. It's extremely different from the film, too—where the film presents a practically mythic figure (and his fall) and is bent entirely toward that purpose, the book is (perhaps contrary to what one might expect) relatively humble, even self-deprecating, and grounded. And Lawrence's writing is outstanding, clear and full of beautiful sentences, phrases, and passages—his fancy education really paid off in that department. He also penned a translation of the Odyssey (but not the Iliad) which happens to be a personal favorite. I stumbled on and read it well before I realized it was him, since he published that one under the pen name "TE Shaw", which I didn't recognize. Not a tightly-faithful translation, not a verse translation either, but reads very modern in the telling, without feeling anachronistic or losing the sense that you're reading an ancient epic, if that makes sense, and also not far enough away from the original text to be a retelling rather than a translation.
- btilly 2y agoThe article makes reference to Tim O'Reilly's excellent Frank Herbert. That book is well worth reading by anybody who wants to better understand Frank Herbert, and is available for free at https://www.oreilly.com/tim/herbert/ https://www.oreilly.com/tim/herbert/.
- karaterobot 2y ago> The 1962 film based on a romanticized version of Lawrence’s journey... rested on the idea of the ‘white savior,’ whose role was to lend a sympathetic ear to oppressed peoples and provide assistance to improve their lot in life. I really think this is the wrong interpretation of the end of that movie.
- Animats 2y agoIt's very much the British Empire view of the world. Read Kipling's India tales.
- karaterobot 2y agoDone. It's got nothing to do with this movie, though.
- Neonlicht 2y agoConsidering the British supplied weapons, explosives and tactics to the Saudi uprising "white man saviour" is not far from the truth no? I don't know why it is considered politically incorrect nowadays to say that the world as we know it was shaped by white people. Deng Xiaoping himself constantly told his own comrades how fucking pathetic China had become. And nobody could argue with him.
- dkarl 2y agoThis didn't sit well with me either. In the movie, Lawrence tries to resolve his apparent split loyalties by bringing the Arab and British interests into alignment and has a couple of initial exhilarating successes, but he ultimately fails, badly. Neither the Arabs nor the British live up to his idealistic expectations. The British use him in ways contrary to his intentions. He also discovers that his own idealism is compromised by his egotism and sadism. The beautiful, dramatic desert landscape, the danger of Lawrence's mission, the high political stakes for the Arab tribes, and the historical context of war all help create an illusion of the possibility of heroic transcendence that is deeply inspiring, but in the end, it is all human and mundane: human vices at the small scale and human politics at the large scale. There is no transcendence. I can see how some people walking out of the theater might have only remembered the feelings stirred up by the beautiful cinematography and the epic score, and forgotten absolutely everything else, but I think it's a better movie for sweeping the viewer up into that feeling before dropping them down into the political squabbling, betrayal, disappointment, and tragedy.
- twilo 2y agoMostly based on The Sabres of Paradise... Paul is based on Shamyl 3rd Imam of Dagestan from that book
- theturtletalks 2y agoFrank Herbert said him self in an interview that Dune was inspired from Sabres of Paradise by Lesley Blanch and that book is the story of Imam Shamil of the north caucasus.
- larodi 2y agoWas looking for this comment, thanks. There was also a very lengthy article by s.o. about the fact which traces the origins of many details. The presently discussed article ‘Paul Lawrence of Dune’ sound as if written for political goals, rather than actual understanding of the origins of Dune.
- etc-hosts 2y agohttps://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-secret-history-of-dune/ https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/the-secret-history-of-du... tl;dr: http://www.jacurutu.com/viewtopic.php?t=4054 http://www.jacurutu.com/viewtopic.php?t=4054
- int_19h 2y agoWhile we're on this subject Imam Shamil had an interesting contemporary counterpart figure that I think deserves more recognition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunta-Hajji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunta-Hajji
- unholyguy001 2y agoI read Sabres of Paradise and it absolutely had a lot of parallels with Dune, and was a major source. Good book too
- sans_souse 2y agoI have to ask does anyone know why the site asks "Are you between 13 and 15 years old?" Rather odd both the question and the specificity.. Would this not be the same as asking; "Are you 14 years old?" Not to mention I almost clicked "Yes" thinking it was asking the more common "Are you at least this many years or older?"
- fells 2y ago> Would this not be the same as asking; "Are you 14 years old?" "between x and y" normally includes the endpoints. For example, if someone asks you to pick a number between 1 and 10, everyone would pretty much agree that 1 and 10 are acceptable choices.
- Terr_ 2y agoThe ambiguity of such questions drove me up the wall as a child. My mother has a story about how I would ask about future events as "the day after the day after the day after the day after the day after today", which in my mind was much clearer than "in X days" why it wasn't clear how rounding occurred. Clearly, this set me up for a career involving off-by-one errors.
- haraball 2y agoNorwegian has the phrases "fra og med" and "til og med", where the "og med" means "including". So "from and including Monday" removes the ambiguity.
- MrMcCall 2y agoHa! That's truly funny and obeys some kind of comedy rule about taking the story one way and then veering in a different direction. Well done, indeed. Our daughter used to say "yesterday's yesterday" when she was 4ish and I really liked it.
- mock-possum 2y agoThey would be technically acceptable yet they would feel exceptional
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- superkuh 2y agoSamuel Butler's 1872 "Erewhon" fiction book which features a society which banned all complex machines because of a prior machine intelligence uprising is the direct, and directly referenced, inspiration for the "Butlerian Jihad" in the Dune book series.
- WeylandYutani 2y agoLawrence of Arabia was also a story about how superpowers abuse people and use them as chess pieces stabbing them in the back. But at least the Saudis had the last laugh.
- bookofjoe 2y agoI saw "Lawrence of Arabia" at the Riverside Theatre on Wisconsin Avenue in Milwaukee in 70mm in the summer of 1962, the year it was released. I was overwhelmed ("blown away" as a term of art didn't exist back then but would be an apt description). I was SO thrilled when, after nearly two hours, the screen said "There will now be an intermission." Never heard of such a thing back then for a movie! I note that the film is now available for rent in 4k. I'm gonna take a flutter and watch it on Vision Pro.
- UberFly 2y agoToo cool. I've always wanted to watch this and you've inspired me.
- nicolas_t 2y ago20 years ago when I was living in Shanghai, my girlfriend was a member of the communist party (meritocratic she was enrolled because she had great grades). She had regular meetings with a small group of members of the party and they had regular discussions after being told to watch certain movies. Lawrence of Arabia was one of those movies she had to watch to later discuss with other members... So we watched it together, had great discussion about it. Later when she went to meet with the other party members, they discussed the cult of personality surrounding the character and the use of guerrilla tactics. (Another movie they all watched like this was 7 years in Tibet)
- foldr 2y agoA minor point, but it was hardly the first epic movie to have an intermission. Gone With the Wind has one, for example, and is a similar length.
- pjmorris 2y agoA friend raving about it got me to go see the 1989 reissue, and I was similarly overwhelmed/blown-away. The intermission only added to the sense of it being an event. Last year, I dragged friends of mine to see it in the theater. They, too, were amazed. Now, we've been reading up on those times. The reading list, so far: 'Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East', Soctt Anderson 'Seven Pillars of Wisdom', T.E. Lawrence 'A Peace to End All Peace', David Fromkin
- ggm 2y agoOther people have documented Herbert's obsession with the californian ecology movement and dune re-establishment. I think he took things happening in small scale and used them as filler/detail to a story he wanted to tell in large scale.
- ggm 2y agoOregon not California. https://niche-canada.org/2020/04/24/frank-herberts-ecology-and-the-science-of-soil-conservation/ https://niche-canada.org/2020/04/24/frank-herberts-ecology-a...
- variaga 2y agoThe Oregon dunes are a great place to visit (at least, I enjoyed them) - not like anything else you'll find in North America. And you can tell people you've been to the dunes that inspired "Dune" :) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Dunes_National_Recreation_Area https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Dunes_National_Recrea...
- radarsat1 2y ago> I think he took things happening in small scale and used them as filler/detail to a story he wanted to tell in large scale. I think this must be a common thing that good scifi authors do. I saw a talk by William Gibson many years ago where he mentioned something very similar, he called it "part of his science fiction toolkit".
- ggm 2y agoKim Stanley Robinson is carrying the story forward.
- sunami-ai 2y agoThis showing up here at the same time articles about the push for tourism in Saudi Arabia showing on major news outlets.
- hayst4ck 2y agoWith recent events I’ve been thinking about Dune lately. Once you start to compare what happens in dune to what is happening now, it's rather unpleasant. Prescience allows for the complete domination of humanity, but to some degree we already working on pre-prescience. Privatized intelligence companies have grown as part of our corporate surveillance state. These companies, like palantir, act as “truthsayers,” divining the state of reality from incredible amounts of information for those with the money to buy it. America has companies that rival countries in terms of power, and these intelligence companies that service them can act as king maker and influence, subtly or directly, with some very giant levers. The US government is closer to the Landsraad, each house is a corporation, each CEO a duke or baron. Peter Thiel is likely the reverend mother architect of a recent messianic rise to power. I am not 100% sure exactly what the Bene Gesserit were supposed to represent, but on a deep level I think they represent intelligence agencies like the CIA. Social Media has a lot of overlap with “the voice.” With A/B testing various groups with divisive messages, to see what divides most effectively, it creates a means of control. Nobody was commanded to show up on jan 6, but the “command” to do so was heard. This is very in line with frank Herbert’s idea of what the voice was. A/B testing messages on humans at scale is like learning the voice. We now have Cameras, RF Receivers (blue tooth/driver's license detection), phone backups, website logs, and a host of other surveillance all centralized, maybe not directly, into the hands of private intelligence. With all these sources of information we are getting closer and closer and closer to prescience. We are still limited by computing power to make sense of all the data, but the god emperor of dune was not. With the rise of AI, we now have the potential for a thinking/processing agent with no sense of morality to be assigned to every single individual, in order to carry out the absolute crushing of any nascent dissent before it can become cohesive enough to threaten those in power. We are dangerously close to uncheckable totalitarian rule. When our rulers do something we don't like, they will laugh and say "what are you going to do about it?" Every potential weapon purchased will be fed into their "prescient" machine, so will every communication with another individual, and every use of transportation. When your personal AI agent determines you are at risk of "doing something about it," an example will be made of you.
- tsimionescu 2y ago> We are dangerously close to uncheckable totalitarian rule. I'm not sure we need to look to the future for that. North Korea has really shown that modern weapons and 80s era intelligence and propaganda methods, applied brutally enough, are enough to keep ~20 million people under extreme poverty and deep obedience for 80+ years now, with no signs of stopping (at least not from internal pressures) any time soon.
- gunian 2y ago[flagged]
- 6stringronin 2y agoThe whole concept of Paul atreides seemed entirely orientalist, in Edward Said's coinage of the term.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- keepamovin 2y agoI'm convinced Herbert had some deep knowledge of psi phenomena. His descriptions of truthsayers reading people, timelines, race consciousness, and prescience are very similar to real experiences. His emphasis that it emerges through a combination of genetics and training of subtle awareness, plus the suggestion compounds could provide access to a state that could be sustained without them - also ring very true. The exploration of its paradoxes (destructiveness and utility of prophecy), and the contrast of those intuitive skills with the pure analytical ones of the mentat (or even of thinking machines) are also very deep. I think the idea that humanity's future involves a deeper engagement with and interplay of all these forces is also super likely. Perhaps he was friends, through his naval service, with people in the UK's version of Stargate (US psi and remote viewing programs). Surely there was such a program, tho I'm not aware of any releases of information about it.
- zabzonk 2y agoi just got downvoted for saying elsewhere that this "needs an /s" - but this either does, or you need some help.
- Havoc 2y ago> you need some help That seems a bit strong given all the wild stuff believe in a religious context.
- keepamovin 2y agoDon’t even need religion to see wild stuff, or to know that your intuition has something to it beyond calculation from experience.
- balamatom 2y agoI was walking by the sea the other day and saw a man drowning. "You need help," I said helpfully. Mercifully, even!
- zabzonk 2y ago
- cess11 2y agoRobert Evans did an introduction to the life and deeds of Lawrence a while back, which I thought was interesting. First episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o77rpNge5Uw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o77rpNge5Uw
- iamacyborg 2y agoSo 40k is Lawrence of Arabia, neat.
- wdbm 2y agoThe trick, Muad'Dib, is not minding that it hurts.
- corry 2y agoI'm 100% onboard with the 'Lawrence of Arabia inspired Dune' theory but I think one of the cleverest things Herbert did with Dune is to introduce a 'visionary substance' (spice) into the otherwise austere Islamic-adjacent motif. He not only shrouded the spice in ritual and religion (which isn't THAT suprising considering many human societies used visionary substsances, and Herbert was a child of the 1960s psychedelic culture too) but also give it a central place in the economy and functioning of the empire. What if a visionary substance was the real deal that gave you insight and precognition? What a rebel leader took full advantage of such a substance? What if that was combined with religious fervour? Dune is basically space war + outsider Messiah + Islam + psychedelics
- ldbooth 2y agoPlus oil geopolitics
- keepamovin 2y agoYeah, that's smart too. And how the "Spacefaring Guild" requires spice to navigate the best routes between the stars. Oil for transport. Everyone brought to their needs by Pauls' threat to switch off the oil supply. It's all so smart, Herbert was a hypergenius I think.
- inanutshellus 2y ago> Herbert was a hypergenius I think. DUNE is (one of?) my favorite fiction reads and I have to resist turning all "fanboy" over it sometimes. I love the sensation in DUNE that I'm inside a fully fleshed-out universe where the vision is so large I can't even see the edges, but here's one thread you might find interesting. ...that said... I never really "got" the rest of the series. Never felt like Paul and his actions were acceptably justified beyond "yeah we would've all died out, trust me". Separately, the whole, uh, female superpower thing came off as eye-rolling simp-nerd fantasy that wasn't up to the standard of the first book. It wasn't even spice-induced, it was just /muscles/ taking over mens' minds.
- magwa101 2y ago[dead]
- johnklos 2y agoIt's an interesting article with some contrasts I hadn't considered, but as a tangent, why does the site think it needs 200% CPU constantly, even when not scrolling, just to show me a wall of text?
- throw4847285 2y agoMany writers of genre fiction rely on their audience having read fewer history books than they have. I saw people online calling George Lucas a prophet for depicting the decline of the Republic in the Prequels, but he really just read a couple of books about Ancient Rome. And dragons and zombies make the premise of "what if the Mongols invaded during the War of the Roses" a lot more exciting. Originality is overrated though, so I don't mind. One of my favorite science fiction novels, The Stars my Destination by Alfred Bester, is transparently based on The Count of Monte Cristo.
- newsclues 2y agoLawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East Book by Scott Anderson One of my favourite books on the topic
- danielskogly 2y agoInteresting to see that Isaac Asimov's Foundation isn't mentioned anywhere. The Wikipedia-article says the following[0] > Tim O'Reilly suggests that Herbert also wrote Dune as a counterpoint to Isaac Asimov's Foundation series [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_(novel)#Asimov's_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_(novel)#Asimov's_Foundati...
- renjimen 2y agoLawrence of Arabia may be the influence of the character, but the Nabataeans, of Petra fame, are surely the main influence of the Fremen. (excuse the LLM summary) Economic Foundation - Nabataeans controlled lucrative frankincense and myrrh trade routes - Fremen controlled the essential spice melange on Arrakis - Both commodities were incredibly valuable and strategic resources - Trade of these rare substances provided economic and political leverage Desert Survival - Both expertly adapted to harsh desert environments - Developed advanced water conservation techniques - Created hidden settlements (Fremen seeches/Nabataean rock-carved cities like Petra) Social Structure - Egalitarian approach to gender roles - Women in significant leadership positions - Tribal hierarchies based on skill and contribution - Strong communal survival ethos Trade and Resistance - Controlled strategic resources in challenging terrain - Maintained independence through economic and military strength - Used desert environment as defensive advantage - Resisted external imperial powers Technological Adaptation - Innovative survival technologies - Deep understanding of ecological context - Specialized equipment for desert survival - Advanced navigational and trading skills