Dune

Dune, science fiction novel by American author Frank Herbert, serialized in Analog from 1963 to 1965 and then published in book form later in 1965. Dune follows young nobleman Paul Atreides through adversity to his destiny as a messianic leader on the arid desert planet Arrakis. With its rich background and an epic story arising from the ecology, religion, and politics of its setting, Dune is regarded as one of the greatest science fiction novels and is one of the most popular, having sold almost 20 million copies and been translated into more than 20 languages.

Summary

In the far future, manipulation of the equations necessary for interstellar travel can only be accomplished through the aid of the narcotic “spice” or “melange,” which can only be found on one planet, Arrakis—also called Dune. The galaxy is divided into aristocratic houses under the leadership of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV. Fearing the rise of House Atreides of the oceanic planet Caladan, Shaddam IV orders House Atreides to take over Arrakis and spice mining from their longtime enemies House Harkonnen but plans to help the Harkonnens destroy the Atreides after their arrival on Arrakis.

Duke Leto, leader of House Atreides, suspects a trap. His concubine Lady Jessica is a member of the Bene Gesserit, an entirely female religious group that through its manipulation of aristocratic bloodlines over millennia hopes to produce a superbeing, the Kwisatz Haderach. Jessica was to have given birth to a daughter who would have married a Harkonnen and would have likely produced the Kwisatz Haderach as their son. Instead, because of her love for Leto, who desired a son, she bore Paul, trained him in the ways of the Bene Gesserit, and hopes that he could be the Kwisatz Haderach. Paul already shows signs of extraordinary capabilities with his prophetic dreams of life on Arrakis.

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Once on Arrakis, Leto proves himself a benevolent ruler, a contrast to the harsh ruler Baron Vladimir Harkonnen. He saves the crew of a spice harvester from being swallowed by a giant sandworm and reaches out to Stilgar, a leader of the Fremen, the human inhabitants of the desert. However, the Harkonnens, aided by the emperor’s Sardaukar troops, launch their attack. Duke Leto is betrayed to the Harkonnens by his doctor, Wellington Yueh, who seeks to free his wife from Harkonnen captivity, but Yueh also arranges for Paul and Jessica to escape their captors and flee into the desert. Yueh delivers Leto to Baron Harkonnen but not before putting in his mouth a false tooth that will release a lethal vapor when bitten. Leto crushes the tooth and dies but fails to kill the baron.

Exposed to the spice-filled desert, Paul’s latent abilities to discern both the past and the future begin to awaken. He reveals to Jessica her origins as a daughter of Baron Harkonnen, and he sees visions of the future in which the Fremen unleash a jihad on the galaxy in his name. He and Jessica join the “sietch” (Fremen community) led by Stilgar, and Paul meets a young woman, Chani, whom he recognizes from his earlier visions. Among the Fremen, Paul assumes the name “Paul-Muad’Dib.” Paul and Jessica discover that Stilgar and the Fremen have large underground caches of water in order to change Arrakis from a desert world to one rich in water.

The Fremen’s religion was influenced by the Bene Gesserit, and Jessica agrees to replace the old reverend mother at Stilgar’s sietch. She drinks the Water of Life, which grants her the memories of previous reverend mothers going back millennia. The Water of Life also grants the same awareness to her unborn daughter, Alia.

Paul trains the Fremen in the Weirding Way, the Bene Gesserit technique of hand-to-hand combat, and he and the Fremen throttle spice production through their raids. He and Chani have a son, Leto II. Paul fully embraces the Fremen culture and is regarded by them as their promised messiah. Paul and Stilgar have a skirmish with a band of spice smugglers in the desert and discover that they are led by Gurney Halleck, an adviser of Duke Leto who instructed Paul in the use of weapons. Gurney attempts to kill Jessica, believing that it was she who betrayed Duke Leto to the Harkonnens. Paul and Jessica convince him of the truth, but Paul is concerned that he did not foresee Gurney’s attack. He takes a drop of the Water of Life to increase his clairvoyant power.

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After three weeks in a coma, Paul awakens with the awareness that he is indeed the Kwisatz Haderach long planned by the Bene Gesserit and that the emperor and Baron Harkonnen have come to Arrakis to attack the Fremen and restart spice production. As Paul is preparing to attack the capital, Arrakeen, Sardaukar troops raid a sietch where they believe Paul to be. The Sardaukar capture Alia and kill Paul’s son. Brought before the emperor and the baron as Paul begins his attack, Alia kills the baron with a poison needle. Paul and the Fremen capture Arrakeen. The baron’s nephew, Feyd-Rautha, challenges Paul to single combat and loses. Paul threatens the emperor with planetwide destruction of the spice unless he abdicates in favor of Paul. The emperor does so and grants Paul his daughter Irulan’s hand in marriage. Paul restores House Atreides to its rightful place and destroys the Harkonnens but must live knowing that the Fremen’s zealous worship of him will lead to a jihad that will rage across the universe.

Publication and adaptations

In 1957 Herbert visited Florence, Oregon, to write a story about how the U.S. Department of Agriculture stopped the advance of sand dunes by introducing European beach grass. He was further inspired to study the ecology of deserts and began thinking about how religions, particularly Islam, had arisen in a desert background. Much of the Fremen culture was based on that of the Bedouin, and Paul’s journey was inspired by the story of T.E. Lawrence (“Lawrence of Arabia”).

Dune was first serialized in Analog; the first part, “Dune World,” appeared from December 1963 to February 1964, and the second part, “The Prophet of Dune,” appeared from January to May 1965. Many publishers rejected the novel. Editor Sterling Lanier at Chilton, a company best known for its automobile repair manuals, felt that Dune would be a good choice for the company to branch out into fiction. Early sales of Dune were poor, and Lanier was fired. However, Dune received the first Nebula Award for best novel and shared the Hugo Award with Roger Zelazny’s This Immortal, and Dune became a popular novel among young people in the late 1960s and ’70s.

Herbert continued the story of Paul, House Atreides, and the future history of humanity in five novels: Dune Messiah (1969), Children of Dune (1976), God Emperor of Dune (1981), Heretics of Dune (1984), and Chapterhouse: Dune (1985). Herbert died in 1986, and in 1999 his son Brian Herbert and author Kevin J. Anderson began writing novels set in the world of Dune.

In the 1970s Chilean-French filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky tried to film Dune and assembled a cast that would have included Salvador Dalí as the emperor and Orson Welles as Baron Harkonnen. The project became one of cinema’s tantalizing unfilmed projects (chronicled in the documentary Jodorowsky’s Dune [2013]), and some film historians contend that, through its extensive and widely circulated preproduction design, it influenced later science fiction movies.

Dino De Laurentiis purchased the rights in 1976, and a poorly received adaptation was filmed by David Lynch (1984), with Kyle MacLachlan (in his film debut) as Paul. A television miniseries aired in 2000, followed by another miniseries (2003) that covered the events in the second and third Dune books.

In 2021 French Canadian director Denis Villeneuve released another film adaptation, based on the first half of Dune and starring Timothée Chalamet as Paul. It was nominated for 10 Academy Awards, including for best picture, and won 6. Villeneuve adapted the second half of the novel as Dune: Part Two (2024), and an adaptation of Dune Messiah is planned.