Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Dune Messiah, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power
Religion
Guilt and Longing
Fate and Choice
Summary
Analysis
On the planet Wallach IX, the members of the conspiracy Guild meet to plot to overthrow Muad’Dib. Though Scytale (from the Tleilaxu sect of the Imperium) plots to destroy Muad’Dib, he privately feels that he will regret causing Muad’Dib misery and death. Scytale listens to the others talk about psychic poison. Wallach IX’s ruler—the Reverend Mother of the Bene Gesserit, Gaius Helen Mohiam—makes a cautionary statement. The Guild Steersman Edric—a human with the hands and feet of a fish who floats in a container of orange melange gas—gives a sneering reply. Princess Irulan—the enemy and wife (but not “mate”) of Muad’Dib—exclaims that they are getting nowhere.
The conspiracy Guild is comprised of members from various homelands in the Imperium, revealing that there is general dissatisfaction with the Muad’Dib across the board. However, despite their various causes for revolt against Muad’Dib, their conspiracy relies on melange, just as the Muad’Dib does. The fact that the Guild Steersman is extremely addicted to melange foreshadows that the Guild possesses the same weaknesses of power that the Muad’Dib does.
Themes
Scytale reflects that the Bene Gesserit chose the setting—a spacious dome on a snowy planet—so as not to inhibit Edric’s space-loving psyche. He wonders if the Bene Gesserit are appealing to any of Edric’s weaknesses, too. The Reverend Mother demands Scytale’s opinion, and Scytale says that it would be foolish to attack a potential messiah. Scytale—as a Face Dancer who can mimic appearances and psyches—chose a jolly appearance for the meeting. While the Reverend Mother tries to assess him, Scytale insinuates that poison is a bad idea. Edric shifts uneasily and reminds Scytale that they are discussing psychic poison. Scytale laughs.
Scytale’s subtly derogatory thoughts about Edric reveal that the Guild Steersman is not an impressive or powerful figure. In Scytale’s assessment, Edric is a character with many weaknesses. Furthermore, although Scytale belongs to the conspiracy, he mocks its members and challenges their plans. In this way being a disjointed and incompatible group of members with different ideas and beliefs further weakens the conspiracy.
Themes
Scytale insinuates that, despite their training, the Bene Gesserit do not know about deception. The Reverend Mother looks away in contemplation, and Edric confronts Scytale about his allegiance. Ignoring this, Scytale asks Princess Irulan if she is wondering why she came all this way. Stepping away from Edric’s putrid container of orange gas, Princess Irulan says it was a mistake to come. Edric takes a melange pill. Scytale knows that Edric disgusts Princess Irulan, and he reminds her that it is only thanks to Edric’s presence that Muad’Dib powers of sight cannot see their meeting.
Edric is a vital part of the conspiracy, but he is also the figure most disruptive to the conspiracy’s unity as a group. The power that Edric brings to the group—the melange-induced foresight that blocks Muad’Dib’s foresight—is also the conspiracy’s downfall because it makes Edric repulse the other members of the group. In this way, Edric holds a power similar to the Muad’Dib’s: a power that will also be his downfall.
Themes
Princess Irulan asks how far Edric’s influence extends. Edric explains that he can see Muad’Dib’s effects but not Muad’Dib himself. The conspiracy against Muad’Dib can only take place in Edric’s presence. Scytale says that the Guild can shape the future. He and the Reverend Mother agree that the Princess sees the trap the Guild set for her. Edric says that Irulan wants to mother a dynasty, but that Muad’Dib married her for political reasons, and they don’t have sex. Annoyed at Edric’s voyeurism, Irulan says that she secretly gives Muad’Dib’s concubine birth control so she won’t bear the dynasty either.
The Guild is more concerned with controlling the future of Muad’Dib’s dynasty than they are with Muad’Dib’s current rule. Although Muad’Dib married Princess Irulan to graft political peace, this action did not assuage Irulan or the Bene Gesserit’s desire for the ensured future in the shape of a child. In this way, Muad’Dib separated political and personal matters, but this separation weakened his sway over many people, namely the Bene Gesserit.
Themes
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Pleased at her confession, Edric says Muad’Dib must not find out. He reminds Princess Irulan that Muad’Dib has never shown her warmth. Scytale indicates to the Princess that Edric holds sway in their conspiracy; he knows that the only way Muad’Dib won’t find out about their plot is if Edric can persuade the Princess to commit to the Guild.
Because Irulan lives with Muad’Dib, she is a weak link in the conspiracy in that, away from Edric’s concealing presence, she could reveal the Guild to Muad’Dib. Therefore, the Guild relies on obtaining Irulan’s trust by tempting her with the possibility of mothering a dynasty.
Themes
After thinking about the tempting prize of mothering a dynasty, Princess Irulan asks Scytale if he always gives his victims a possible escape, and Scytale assents. Edric says that the Princess is already on their side: she spies on Muad’Dib for the Bene Gesserit. Irulan says she is not convinced that they can defeat Muad’Dib. Edric lists the ways Muad’Dib is all-powerful, but the Reverend Mother says that Muad’Dib is still human and has weaknesses. Scytale mentions Muad’Dib’s mother, Lady Jessica, and the Reverend Mother calls her a “traitorous bitch.” The Reverend Mother asserts that they are more than conspirators, and Scytale mocks her certainty that they are humanity’s salvation.
In the same way that Dune presents power as something that inevitably brings along its own weakness, Scytale asserts that every trap laid for a person contains an escape. While Muad’Dib’s power contains a downfall, his trap also contains an escape, and therefore his future is still undetermined. In this view of an open-ended future, the Reverend Mother’s certainty that she is in the right and that Paul’s family’s traitorousness dooms them to failure appears as a flawed outlook.
Themes
Edric says that every religious and political question boils down to who will exercise power. Scytale and the Reverend Mother silently agree that Edric is their weakness. Edric tells Princess Irulan to choose whether she wants to be an instrument of destiny. At Princess Irulan’s request, Edric explains that they plan to revive the ghost of Duncan Idaho—Muad’Dib’s beloved sword-master whom Princess Irulan’s father’s army killed. Scytale changes into a slender man to show what this revived ghost would look like.
While the Reverend Mother’s case is religious— believing that the universe must be saved from Paul—and Irulan desires political control over the universe in the shape of a child with Paul, Scytale insists that both these cases are a question of power. In this way, although religion may seem virtuous and politics may seem practical, both are ultimately about the exercise of power.
Themes
With maddening long-windedness, Edric explains that Princess Irulan’s father’s army had preserved Duncan Idaho’s body and then sent it to the Tleilaxu—Scytale’s people. the Tleilaxu sold the revived corpse—now named Hayt—to Edric because they already had their own kwisatz haderach. Scytale explains that the Tleilaxu’s kwisatz haderach was bred to die before becoming the antithesis of his original representation, and so he killed himself. Scytale makes sure that the Reverend Mother—as one of the kwisatz haderach breeders—is offended by this.
Although the kwisatz haderachs are bred to be all-powerful, their breeding contains a glitch that can lead them to destroy themselves. As a former kwisatz haderach, the Muad’Dib likely contains this same peculiar downfall. Also as a potential kwisatz haderach, Hayt contains a similar glitch as well: as a revived former man, Hayt will die before he truly sheds his whole nature. This suggests that it is unlikely that Hayt is more than Duncan Idaho.
Themes
Scytale says that emotions cloud the mutual fear that prompted this meeting; they cannot pass beyond Edric’s understanding, or they will lose their shield. Ignoring his warning, the Reverend Mother questions Scytale about the Tleilaxu’s failed kwisatz haderach. Edric loses his temper. He says he wants to discuss how sending Hayt (who reflects Muad’Dib’s education) to Muad’Dib will enlarge Muad’Dib’s “moral nature.” Irulan clarifies that Hayt is intended to poison Muad’Dib’s psyche. She asks about the Qizarate (the religious civil servants of Muad’Dib) and CHOAM (the organization of economic affairs), but Scytale assures her that they will force these less powerful groups to join their cause.
The Guild talks vaguely about their plans to overthrow Muad’Dib. Edric says that Hayt will make Muad’Dib a more moral person, possibly suggesting that Hayt will make Muad’Dib feel guilty and recognize his moral duty to Irulan to give her a child, or to the Bene Gesserit to give them and heir. Irulan is similarly vague when she says that Hayt will poison Muad’Dib’s psyche, possibly insinuating the same changes but in negative terms. Either way, Hayt is intended to affect an internal rather than external change in the Muad’Dib.
Themes
Scytale says that Hayt will also make Alia attracted to him. Scytale says that if Muad’Dib asks Hayt his purpose, Hayt will tell him the truth, leaving Muad’Dib an escape route. Edric submits to the judgment of his colleagues and then says the Bene Gesserit’s melange stock is low. Scytale hints that he plans to steal the recipe for melange from the Muad’Dib’s army, the Fremen, whose genetic tendency to believe can be manipulated. Princess Irulan asks if she will be left with someone with whom to father a royal dynasty, and the others recognize commitment in her voice. Scytale thinks that Irulan is beautiful and smart and decides he might make a copy of her since he can’t have her.
It is unclear why the Guild might want Hayt to make Alia attracted to him, except that it will solidify Paul’s trust of Hayt. It also suggests that Alia, as an Atreides herself, might be an object of the Guild’s desire for an Atreides’ heir. Beyond the internal control over Paul that the Guild hopes to obtain with Hayt, they also hope to gain full possession of melange—the tool that is most directly giving Paul power in the universe. In this way, the Guild hopes to dethrone Paul both psychologically and materially.
Themes
