Rereading Dune

[swing_voter]

Been a while since I read the first 3 Dune books and with the new movie coming out, I decided to give them a reread.


The first thing that hit me is that Star Wars borrowed heavily from Dune, with the Empire and the feudal themes. The Dune Emperor has his elite guard, the Saurdukar and in Star Wars it's the Storm Troopers.

Also Warhammer 40K borrowed a lot from Dune. The Saurdukar are similar to the Astartes, elite 40K space marines. Navigators in 40K remind me a lot of the Space Guild in Dune.

Nobody is going to get sued for plagiarism but you can see how Dune spawned a lot of ideas behind modern intellectual properties.

Dune came out in '65 so it's a little dated, but not bad. Some of the tech that's supposed to wow audiences is common place today, like online learning.

But there's still plenty of awesome stuff, like the spice, how they made sword combat relevant in the future, etc.

It's not very politically correct in that the villain is a fat, gay guy. Not a spoiler since you meet him in the 2nd chapter or so. Women are thought of as women back in '65 which is a little condescending to a modern audience.


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[Court Jester]

Been a while since I read the first 3 Dune books and with the new movie coming out, I decided to give them a reread.


The first thing that hit me is that Star Wars borrowed heavily from Dune, with the Empire and the feudal themes. The Dune Emperor has his elite guard, the Saurdukar and in Star Wars it's the Storm Troopers.

"Borrowed" is a pretty tame term for what George Lucas did. Lucas pretty much used Dune as a outline for his entire Star Wars theme. I would use the word STOLE over borrowed.

 

[swing_voter]

"Borrowed" is a pretty tame term for what George Lucas did. Lucas pretty much used Dune as a outline for his entire Star Wars theme. I would use the word STOLE over borrowed.

Wow! That's impressive.


Another guy who borrowed from Dune is Robert Jordan for his Wheel of Time series. The Bene Gesserit from Dune are basically the Aes Sedai in Wheel of Time.

I plan on rereading Wheel of Time soon, too.

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[calamity]

Been a while since I read the first 3 Dune books and with the new movie coming out, I decided to give them a reread.


The first thing that hit me is that Star Wars borrowed heavily from Dune, with the Empire and the feudal themes. The Dune Emperor has his elite guard, the Saurdukar and in Star Wars it's the Storm Troopers.

Also Warhammer 40K borrowed a lot from Dune. The Saurdukar are similar to the Astartes, elite 40K space marines. Navigators in 40K remind me a lot of the Space Guild in Dune.

Nobody is going to get sued for plagiarism but you can see how Dune spawned a lot of ideas behind modern intellectual properties.

Dune came out in '65 so it's a little dated, but not bad. Some of the tech that's supposed to wow audiences is common place today, like online learning.

But there's still plenty of awesome stuff, like the spice, how they made sword combat relevant in the future, etc.

It's not very politically correct in that the villain is a fat, gay guy. Not a spoiler since you meet him in the 2nd chapter or so. Women are thought of as women back in '65 which is a little condescending to a modern audience.


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Dune and the Foundation series are the best sci fi books in the history of man. I read both as a pre-teen. I read them again around age 15. But it took me until driving age to pronounce Asimov correctly. I kept wanting to start his name with “ass.”

Honorable mention to Clark’s 2001 & 2010.

 

[calamity]

"Borrowed" is a pretty tame term for what George Lucas did. Lucas pretty much used Dune as a outline for his entire Star Wars theme. I would use the word STOLE over borrowed.

I always perceived the Wookiee as something stolen from Brian Aldiss’s Helliconia series, where Brian introduced the “Phagor.”

Helliconia - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[swing_voter]

I bet the author of Dune, Herbert, got a lot of his inspiration from "Laurence of Arabia." You have the Saudi's in the desert fighting the Turks and Lawrence there as an agent. You have colonialism. You have the Saudi's being promised that they'll get to have their own country.



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[HK.227]

I bet the author of Dune, Herbert, got a lot of his inspiration from "Laurence of Arabia." You have the Saudi's in the desert fighting the Turks and Lawrence there as an agent. You have colonialism. You have the Saudi's being promised that they'll get to have their own country.
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You also have oil, the French foreign legion and a holy leader named the Mahdi.
Sorry. I meant "spice", "Sardaukar" and "Muad-Dib" of course....

 

[EdwinWillers]

I need to get that trilogy and read it again. Been a long time since I last read it - and like you, with the new movie coming out, I'm feeling "prompted" to do so.

 

[PoS]

Been a while since I read the first 3 Dune books and with the new movie coming out, I decided to give them a reread.


The first thing that hit me is that Star Wars borrowed heavily from Dune, with the Empire and the feudal themes. The Dune Emperor has his elite guard, the Saurdukar and in Star Wars it's the Storm Troopers.

Also Warhammer 40K borrowed a lot from Dune. The Saurdukar are similar to the Astartes, elite 40K space marines. Navigators in 40K remind me a lot of the Space Guild in Dune.

Nobody is going to get sued for plagiarism but you can see how Dune spawned a lot of ideas behind modern intellectual properties.

Dune came out in '65 so it's a little dated, but not bad. Some of the tech that's supposed to wow audiences is common place today, like online learning.

But there's still plenty of awesome stuff, like the spice, how they made sword combat relevant in the future, etc.

It's not very politically correct in that the villain is a fat, gay guy. Not a spoiler since you meet him in the 2nd chapter or so. Women are thought of as women back in '65 which is a little condescending to a modern audience.


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Many of these tropes youve mentioned were around in the science fiction genre long before Dune.

Asimov's first Foundation book that came out in 1950 described a Human Empire that was modeled on the Romans. Gordon Dickson's Dorsai books which came out in 1959 were about human splinter races, and one of them was a race of ultimate soldiers. And Paul Anderson's The High Crusade which came out in 1960 tells the story of medieval English adventurers teaching swordfighting to advanced aliens because the latter had forgotten how to fight with blades.

But then again, these are universal tropes that extend even further into the past. Joseph Campbell retraces them all the way back to ancient Greek mythology, which is about a hero's journey of discovery for oneself. So yeah, all the Dune stuff are many of the same age old stories told in many different ways.

 

[natman]

Dune and the Foundation series are the best sci fi books in the history of man. I read both as a pre-teen. I read them again around age 15. But it took me until driving age to pronounce Asimov correctly. I kept wanting to start his name with “ass.”

Honorable mention to Clark’s 2001 & 2010.

I never thought I'd say this, but I agree with you completely. Asimov's I, Robot and especially his short story The Last Question deserve mention as well.

 

[screenwriter]

I never thought I'd say this, but I agree with you completely. Asimov's I, Robot and especially his short story The Last Question deserve mention as well.

Oh, The Last Question - Yes! I LOVE that story.