Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Dune, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Power and Violence
Free Will and Fate
Environment and Human Culture
Human Cognitive Advances
Summary
Analysis
In the epigraph from Princess Irulan’s text “Arrakis Awakening,” Irulan describes a scene in which the Muad’Dib stands before an audience and proclaims that a captive who seems dead is in fact alive. He claims a close relationship to the captive and knows that because of his influence, she can now see into the future.
Princess Irulan’s record of this event is another example of Paul’s gift of foresight and his commanding ability to persuade audiences of his power.
Themes
Inside an Imperial ship, Emperor Shaddam IV interrogates Baron Harkonnen with the aid of his Bene Gesserit truthsayer, who is Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam. Also present are two Guild members and the Princess Irulan. The Baron has not met the Princess before but knows she is an adept study in Bene Gesserit ways and can also see that she is a great beauty.
Baron Harkonnen is in dire trouble—no longer is it the Padishah Emperor’s messenger Count Fenring who interrogates the Baron, but the Emperor himself who communicates his displeasure at House Harkonnen’s actions.
Themes
The Reverend Mother Mohiam’s presence demonstrates the significance of this meeting, with the Baron Harkonnen frightened at the implications for his House’s prosperity. The Emperor wants to know the truth about Thufir Hawat, who has gone missing; the whereabouts of Harkonnen brothers Rabban and Feyd-Rautha; and, most importantly, any information about the powerful Fremen figure Muad’Dib.
The Padishah Emperor knows that he has severely misjudged the situation on Arrakis and within House Harkonnen, trying to gain as much knowledge as possible to strategize for the imminent battle. He is still unaware of Muad’Dib’s identity as Paul Atreides, which will come at a great shock and political blow.
Themes
Baron Harkonnen reveals that Hawat has been missing for five days since going on a mission to infiltrate an Arrakeen smuggling ring. The Baron believes that the Mentat will perish shortly, as he has not been receiving the daily antidote administered by House Harkonnen to counteract the residual poison they have infected him with. The Baron’s nephews, Rabban and Feyd-Rautha, are currently running a perimeter check. And Baron Harkonnen downplays the Muad’Dib’s authority as well by repeating his earlier assurances to the Emperor that there is nothing in the Arrakeen southern desert regions; he claims they are uninhabitable and certainly do not hold Fremen strongholds as has been implied.
Baron Harkonnen attempts to save face—and stay alive—by answering the Padishah Emperor’s questions in detail. He still completely underestimates the Fremen threat to Imperial rule, believing the Arrakeen deserts to be “uninhabitable.” The Emperor knows that the hostile Arrakeen environments actually have the possibility to train Fremen into powerful soldiers who can rival the abilities of Imperial Sardaukar forces.
Themes
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The Padishah Emperor has the captive Alia Atreides brought in. After hearing of the battle between Sardaukar and Fremen in which she was captured, the Emperor makes clear his anger at Baron Harkonnen for misleading him about Fremen military threat, numbers, and locations. The Emperor is furious that the Fremen forces are far more powerful than reported on—he is enraged that few of his Sardaukar soldiers were able to escape the Fremen women, children, and elderly, who defended their sitech and revealed themselves as ferocious fighters.
Just as she enjoyed causing mayhem within her Fremen community, Alia is only too happy to use her intelligence and ancestral knowledge to sow seeds of discord between the Padishah Emperor and Baron Harkonnen. The Emperor’s fury suggests that he fears the Fremen soldiers will triumph over his Sardaukar forces—and the Sardaukar are the political tool that he has relied on to enforce his rule throughout his time as Emperor.
Themes
Alia, who looks merely four years of age, astonishes the room by announcing articulately that she is Duke Leto and Lady Jessica’s daughter and sister of Duke Paul-Muad’Dib. She is completely unafraid in countenance and approaches Baron Harkonnen boldly, addressing him as a “frightened old fat man too weak to support his own flesh without the help of suspensors.” The Baron is flabbergasted. Alia also makes entertainment of the high and mighty around her, refusing the Emperor’s demands and referring to him as “Shaddam.”
Alia continues to cause trouble by announcing her heritage. Her fierce courage and strangeness is evident in her appearance and countenance, as well as her brutal insult at Baron Harkonnen criticizing his age and obesity. The Baron isn’t used to such insubordinance and cannot respond. Alia similarly treats the Padishah Emperor with irreverence.
Themes
Meanwhile, the Reverend Mother Mohiam is appalled when she recognizes Alia’s strange way of being and demands that they kill the girl. She views Alia as an “abomination” because the young girl is cursed with the ability to access Bene Gesserit ancestral memories. Through the collective memory pool, Alia can stand in the Reverend Mother’s mind as a living memory of sorts.
In her fear of Alia’s knowledge and control over her, the Reverend Mother considers the child an evil creature—despite the fact that Alia never had any choice in the Bene Gesserit collective memory she was forced into.
Themes
Attacking Fremen interrupt the Imperial negotiations, and the Shield Wall is breached. In the resulting confusion, Alia feigns fear to back into Baron Harkonnen’s imprisoning arms before stabbing the Baron—whom she knows is her grandfather—with the “Atreides gom jabbar” and escaping Imperial forces under the cover of the sandstorm’s dust.
Alia’s actions are clever, skilful and ruthless in murdering her grandfather and escaping the Imperial soldiers. She claims her maternal and Bene Gesserit heritage by choosing the gom jabbar as her weapon, but imbues it with new power by naming it after her paternal heritage.
Themes
The Emperor is shocked that the Fremen have also incapacitated his spaceships. Even more staggering is the sight of Fremen troops riding to attack Imperial forces on a wall of giant desert sandworms. He and the Sardaukar “stand awed for the first time in their history by an onslaught their minds found difficult to accept.”
The Sardaukar have spent reigning terror over the Imperium due to their fanatical fighting abilities. However they cannot comprehend the Fremen forces that confront them. The Sardaukar suffer a devastating defeat because the Fremen have been exposed to even harsher environments and more brutal training than the Sardaukar have experienced on the terrible prison planet Salusa Secundus.
Themes
Emperor Shaddam IV retreats into a damaged ship with Princess Irulan, Reverend Mother Mohiam, two Guildsmen, and a guard of Sardaukar soldiers. The Emperor and the Reverend Mother have seen the battle outside and know that the Fremen have the upper hand. They see that there is only one way forward for their triumph—treachery. The Reverend Mother summons Count Fenring from his quarters.
By summoning Count Fenring as their final desperate act to escape Paul and his Fremen’s destruction, the Padishah Emperor and Reverend Mother suggest that the humble-looking Fenring is actually their greatest weapon.
Themes
