Talk:Chapterhouse: Dune/Archive 1

Archive 1

Honoured Matres

Edit (Sorry if these pages aren't supposed to be modified): I'm pretty sure that the Bene Tlexiau of the scattering are what chased the Honoured Matres back into the old empire. Notice how the two old people at the end are face dancers. That's the only thing left that I'm really interested in, what exactly happened in the scattering, who are those two old people and how are they so powerful, and what exactly can duncan do now?

The other stuff is interesting but doesn't seem quite as important nor as intriguing to me. --Anonymous

It is never established who chased the Honoured Matres back to the Old Empire. We do know they were chased back because they had no immunity to biological weapons which suggests some sort of connection to Tleilaxu who scattered. It is not at all clear that the two old people Duncan met in the 'web' are the people who chased them back. Indeed it seeems to be that they have perhaps too much power to be bothered.

Can't comment about the two old people or about the Scattering because we can't know. However, it does seem likely that at one level the old couple are Frank Herbert and Beverly his wife and partner. They had a very close relationship.

BTW to the user who left these comments. Feel free to edit the article as you see fit. But comment and discussion should go here on the talk pages. --ChrisG 14:57, 2 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Funny, Chris G., you say that comment and discussion should go here yet you paste your own highly speculative quotables to the wiki as though you are some Frank Herbert Readership Histographer, and go so far as attribute it to 'some readers.'

Specifically I refer to your ideas regarding the 'old couple,' it is clear you simply pasted them straight into the wiki after you thought the idea up. Work on it, ok? --Yeago 04:49, 16 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Yeago, I actually read that idea somewhere else, but I can't attribute it, so I was actually 'stealing' someone else's idea in that instance. I have absolutely no issue with you amending any POV on my part. re my comment above regard the use of comments was actually to explain to a user that the talk page existed, as it was a comment about the page, not a comment in the page. --ChrisG 11:42, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

By 'biological weapons', you mean the futars, right ChrisG? But they were also pushed back because their no-devices didn't work so well against their enemy. -- Maru Dubshinki 05:50 PM Friday, 11 March 2005

As I recall, there's a line in the book referring to a biological weapon that leaves Honored Matres in a vegetative state, which implies some sort of disease or organic effect, not the futars who simply kill and eat them. JJ 01:21, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I wanted to respond to this line here, with a quote from the book that effectively solves it (at least for me).

It is never established who chased the Honoured Matres back to the Old Empire

On page 415 in Chapterhouse: Dune, Murbella says this while talking to some honored matres "Would you return defenseless to face the ones of many faces?" This line seems to be a pretty clear indication that the enemy they were chased by were face dancers, and I'd say it's likely that these face dancers are of the type seen in the last chapter. These face dancers are ones that are not controlled by Tleilaxu masters as evidenced by Daniel's line of "They have such a hard time accepting that Face Dancers can be independent of them."

What happed in the Scattering?

Yeah, I took this section out. It's speculative at best--besides the honoured matres fleeing from an unknown enemy's biological weapon, which is already covered in the synop. If this topic needs a section about the Scattering, it should be 'What does the Scattering represent,' but are such questions to be encyclopedia'ed or are they for the reader to decide?

Duncan's 'new ability' involving visions?

Could you be more clear about that? I don't recall what it was, and your earlier description wasn't very helpful... 'to see something new'? --Yeago 21:11, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Remember, Duncan several times has visions of some empire out in the Scattering that was 'unmoveable'. It is implied that they've no-globed their planet, and despatched the futars after the Honored Matres. Remember also towards the end, where Duncan sees all sorts of blueprints of novel weapons and devices. Remember how Teg could see the no-ship he stole in earlier books, or how when Duncan was escaping, he could see the old couple, and remember how the old couple was absolutely shocked that Duncan could see them as well as they could see him? That's the vision thingwe're talking about. -- Maru Dubshinki 05:49 PM Friday, 11 March 2005

Analysis section

The analysis section contains material that needs to be cited. Parts read as if it is this encyclopedia's analysis, but analysis here should simply be a presentation of what others have analyzed, otherwise it's original research.

It would be pretty easy to cite; a good deal of the stuff refers to the books or something by BH, and the rest is citable from the external link or the Yahoo Dune ML. --maru (talk) contribs 18:31, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

Having examined the external link, I'd say that it isn't really a source worth citing. Don't get me wrong, most of that information could be found elsewhere in notable sources, but a random person's opinion (though I mean no disrespect to Frans Faase) is simply not notable, leading the analysis section to become more or less a one-step extension of original research. (Wikipedia:Reliable sources says, "Personal websites and blogs should not be used as secondary sources.") It would be a shame to simply delete the section, but we basically need to go to the library, read up on literary criticism of Chapterhouse: Dune, and replace the current analysis section with that material (hopefully salvaging much by finding valid citations in published works). -rasd

Unfortunately, all the serious literary criticism I've read (like O'Reilly's) have focussed largely on Dune itself, and to a lesser extent on the Leto II duology (giving short shrift to Dune Messiah. :(). I think perhaps the best we can do is an original research section which atones for its original sin by being very well-referenced with text from the books. --maru (talk) contribs 23:20, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

The "Analysis" section contains little worthy of the name. The part about the novel ending on a cliffhanger should be incorporated into the synopsis. This article is about Chapterhouse: Dune. Material concerning the Hunters of Dune sequel (and about the other books written by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson) should be moved to the article concerning that novel. SandChigger 01:42, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Since the Analysis section now only contains a blurb about the ending of the book, I believe it should be removed altogether. The "unanswered questions" presented are obvious if one reads the plot synopsis. Or, if preferred, the material can be re-worded and moved to the end of the "Conclusion" section as a one-sentence wrap-up. Mcr29 18:23, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

I've just taken a preliminary stab at it. Please change as you see fit. SandChigger 19:52, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Year of publication

Is this included anywhere in the article? I found it nowhere in a quick glance. I didn't read it because I want to read the book and don't want it to be spoiled.

Now there is. Scroll down to the Reference section (past the endspoiler tag). --maru (talk) contribs 22:33, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Thoughts on Daniel and Marty

One of the primary themes running through the Dune series is Frank Herbert's thoughts on the problems of prescience: (If it is foreseen then it is predestined) this is the trap that Leto II says his father Paul fell into - he fell into paths of fate by choosing safe futures. Likewise, his Leto II had a similar approach - but for him he understood the dilemma of prescience, and so he worked on his breeding program to create individuals that could not be foreseen:- these people would be truly free, in that they could not be trapped by predestination inherent in prescience.

Daniel and Marty provide us with a different answer: (we know that the Tleilaxu had already experimented with Kwisatz Haderach, possibly as a part of their quest for immortality) D&M are prescient - BUT most importantly they are disinterested in manipulating history (possibly by design) and therefore pre-emptively serve the function of preventing another prescient being from taking over the skein of the future; they are a Tleilaxu alternative to the breeding programme of Leto II - but serve the same purpose - to free the universe from the prison of a prescient mind.

As Duncan develops strong prescience he is faced with those who hold the vision of the future, and so he cannot choose the paths to manipulate history as did Paul or Leto (or, in a very limited sense, the guild navigators).

I also agree that on another level, FH used D&M to represent himself and his wife as an (not-so-inside) inside joke. (20040302 23:54, 28 June 2006 (UTC))

Why do you think the two Facedancers were disinterested in controlling history? They certainly seem to be manipulating things as they please- defeating the HMs and sending them back to the old Padishah Empire, trying to trap and control Duncan (which is an interesting point suggesting that the old measures for balking prescience have failed- one is not supposed to be able to detect or manipulate a power-up no-ship, and they certainly seem to have predicted the actions of Duncan (who has Siona-cells)), etc. --maru (talk) contribs 18:51, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

heheh - well, I confess it's been a while since I read CD - though I've read Dune well over 30 times. I was not persuaded that it was D&M who had been defeating the HM- though I saw there was some facedancer threat for the HM, I imagined that D&M were unique among facedancers and distinct from the HM threat.

Well, I think that assuming that D&M were not part of the unmoved empire to be an unsafe assumption; obviously the empire is made of perfected Face Dancers (Waft mentions that there was something wrong with the Face Dancers who returned from the Scatterings, among other things such as the HM evidence), and seriously technologically advanced, and can penetrate no-ships (which I've suggested implies a similar penetration of their anti-prescience properties) at will. D&M meet the criteria necessary for inclusion in the empire, DI was having all sorts of contacts with the empire, D&M then try to reel in DI... seems very suggestive to me.

I wasn't under the impression that D&M were attempting to trap or control duncan - merely that as his prescience became godlike - he found himself trapped by their prescience - the net being nothing more than their own predictive powers. It's true, I found it difficult to reconcile some of FH's own insights regarding prescience. Possibly D&M's ability to perceive DI indicates that the Siona immunity is a spectrum immunity, dependant upon the power of the prescient mind.

Nah. If the problem was one of being trapped by their prescience, then dumping the navigation computer's records wouldn't've done the trick. But it did, since it made the choice random and beyond both DI and D&M's control; I'm fairly confident it was beyond D&M's control since prescience consists of forcing/making futures and choices, and random choices are the very definition of unforced and unmade choices.

If the abilities of DI and D&M are not concerned with prescience, but rather with some other psychic ability, it is a bit disappointing - in first book(s) FH worked so hard not to even have TP (remember the question of the emperor on encountering Alia). Having said that, the whole thing about being invisible to a prescient mind is strange - as I understood it, prescience arose from being able to tune in to the underlying nature of things - and thereby laying causality to bare (albeit in an unconscious manner)- so for Siona to be completely invisible to prescience, she would have to be completely unpredictable, completely free of habits, mores, or penchants.. I'm not sure I ever did really reconcile all that.

Well, I don't think it's another psychic ability. One of DI's musings was that the Holtzmann equations were not completely understood, and that the unmoved empire's power came from radical extensions and new uses for the Holtzmann equations- what the equations giveth they can taketh away, and all that.

Regardless, I feel that D&M weren't particularly interested in controlling history - being fully prescient they already owned it - they seemed to be happy potting around in their garden - and merely their ownership of prescience could have felt like a trap to DI - he found that his entire world (and the world around him) was held by D&M - they were the puppet-masters of the universe after all. My point about being disinterested was that I felt that FH wanted to get a message across about the responsibilities of prescience - that if you use it to change history according to your vision then you inevitably fail. Hmm... something like: the more puppets you control, the more you must let puppets do what they will invariably do - an ultimate control over puppets requires an ultimate detachment from the games the puppets play.. Oh I don't know if I'm making any sense now! It's been a long week :)

(20040302)

Well, they were the "unmoved piece" after all, the force which moves all the others but is not itself affected. FH, I think, was making more of a point that prescience is about making and forcing a future of your own devising, and such devised futures are limiting and sterile. Re puppets: the more possessions you own, the more your possessions own your time and your mind. --maru (talk) contribs 04:09, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I think it was primarily a thing put in by FH. He knew he had cancer, & I think it was a nod to the ultimate irony of a man having god-like control writing about a group of people who are ending that possibility in their universe... when Duncan dumps the records, I think he's acknowledging that he's not going to control where the story goes anymore. That's just my "human" take on it... let's call it my Occam's Razor ;-) Also, I think that's the after-life he wants for himself & his wife. One last thought: it seems he did regard his own work as a "prediction"--"this effort at prediction is dedicated in humility and admiration." is taken from the dedication part of Dune. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.90.243.197 (talk • contribs) 22:35, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Well...Hunters clears this one up, but I don't want to spoil it for any of you. I'll only say that it's a real "mind killer". SandChigger 10:04, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Daniel and Marty Section

Now that the question of the identities of the old couple has been "answered" in Hunters, the continued inclusion of this section is rather pointless. If anyone feels it is important (as I do) from a historical perspective to include the fact that there was much speculation among fans over their identity, the section should be reworked. In its current form, however, it is unacceptable, in my opinion. SandChigger 01:47, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Done. edit: Actually, it's going in the article titled that as it seems somewhat unrelated to the story. Hadoren 05:02, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Next item for attention: the "Analysis" section, as per the section above on this page. (Does that material really belong in this article?) I'll do it if no one has any valid objections. SandChigger 05:36, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't believe material regarding Hunters is appropriate for this article as it is beyond its scope. Material from previous books would be relevant as the story is a continuation of those events, but any material dealing with events after this book are inappropriate. Mcr29 05:01, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Sorry, this one got put on the back burner and the fire must have gone out. :) What shall we do with it, then? Let's start by moving the parts about Hunters here, whatsay? SandChigger 16:34, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's necessary to move anything about Hunters here, removing it from the article is enough. I think people are confused by the fact that twenty years passed between Chapterhouse and Hunters, so there is a natural urge to answer some questions that were left at the end of Chapterhouse, however it's not proper to do so. For another example, look at the articles for The Phantom Menace and Attack Of The Clones. Neither reveals Palpatine to be Darth Sidious. Events that happen after Chapterhouse are beyond the scope of the article. The identity of the great Enemy is explained fully in the Hunters article (I assume there is one, I haven't looked since I'm currently reading it). Imagine if only six months had passed between the publishing of the two books...I don't think people would be editing this article. All references to events in Hunters should be removed. Mcr29 17:07, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Since no one has disagreed since my comment from 23 September, I'll move the material over to the Hunters talk page to see if there is anything the people working on that article might want to salvage. SandChigger 17:36, 29 October 2006 (UTC)

Foreshadowing plot points in Hunters and Sandworms?

i was recently rereading chapterhouse, and i came across this passage that had never really struck me as important. it's during the exchange between bellonda and duncan when bellonda visits him with the intent to kill him:

"Aren't you curious why the Tyrant never suppressed Ix?" he asked. And when she continued to stare at him: "He only bridled them. He was fascinated by the idea of human and machine inextricably bound to each other, each testing the limits of the other."

"Cyborgs?"

"Among other things."

knowing what happens between duncan and the thinking machines in the brian herbert books (i.e. the merging of erasmus and duncan), i think this is even more proof that some of the seemingly un-herbert portions of hunters and sandworms were actually ideas frank had penned down before his death. Betterlucknexttime (talk) 17:30, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

The Reference to Hunters of Dune in the Intro

Necessary, or just a legacy from an earlier version? It seems out of place. Mangajunglist (talk) 22:28, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Considering that one two-line paragraph—containing content not directly related to the book in question—requires six of the current seven footnotes ... yeah, I'd say something is out of place and unbalanced as well.

The info box on the right lists the sequel, as does the template at the bottom. I don't think the info is necessary in the intro. --SandChigger (talk) 01:16, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Behold the work of the TAnthony, who sees all and hears all. :D --SandChigger (talk) 12:45, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Article

This article appears to be nothing more than an extended plot summary of the book, which might be a fun read doesn't support the encyclopedia-format of Wikipedia.

There are plenty of things that can be included to make this article stand out. Most notably, there could be a section mentioning Frank Herbert's death and its relation to the book, since it was quite obviously finished at a cliffhanger. Even the final words of Frank Herbert written as a eulogy for his passed wife would be at least partially notable. 71.243.201.210 (talk) 09:20, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

No Criticism

Why has the negative reception been deleted this is where half if not then more then half of critics had last said anything positive about any Dune novel. No I am not a Dune fan I am an outsider but by just reading the majority of comments of the Expanded Dune I have concluded that the novels by his son and Kevin are both contradictory and inferior to Frank's Original Dune. I might be the only one but doesn't the ending to Chapter house reduce Frank's novels to an unfinished storyline. I don't mean to contradict Lynn H. Hough's line "its not the destination that matters but the journey" but readers not getting their reward at the end kind of defeats reading the series to begin with.--106.69.187.23 (talk) 09:11, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

You need to cite a reliable source. We can't publish your conclusions as that constitutes original research. DonQuixote (talk) 04:03, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

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