Ahira's Hangar

Quote:The Fremen were experts in that quality that the ancients called spanningsbogen, the self-imposed delay between desiring an object, and reaching out for the object.

That's probably a misquote there, but it's close enough from memory. (And I think it needs an umlaut.)

Spanningsbogen. Literally, IIRC, the moment at which the drawn bow is at full tension.

I've always had a fondness for races/nationalities in fiction (and reality) that, by dint of training, environment, breeding, whatever, have abilities beyond what we consider normal.

I'm not sure where it started. It might even have been Donaldson's Haruchai. But them, the Fremen, and Jordan's Aiel have always struck a chord in me.

The moment in Dune where we realise how completely the Fremen can master their environment is always a great one for me. It's in Chapter 9 or 10 IIRC, as Leto evacuates the crawler they're inspecting, and, flying away, Paul looks down and sees two men gliding across the sand where, moments before, a huge worm had taken the factory.

And then later in battle, the shock that everybody shows at how easily the Fremen defeat, even capture alive, the Sardukar.

The theme of Fremen ability is strong through the book. At the end, Shaddam expresses amazement, even admiration, that a strike force of his personal troops barely managed to escape from a Fremen defensive carried out by old men, women and children.

A formidable people indeed.

And yet the Fremen were not always so. The adab tells us that once they were soft city dwellers, on Bela Teguese (Betelgeuse no doubt). And as the series progresses, even in the very next book, we see the Fremen slowly become shadows of their former selves, down to the lowly Museum Fremen of Leto II, mockeries of a once proud and strong culture.

And this decline brings another Donaldson quote to mind...where FoamFollower says "Privation refines the soul."

Take away that privation, take away the need for struggle, and in a generation or two, people soften.

I'd like to know what you all think about them.

--A ____________________________________

A sense of the sardonic preserves a man from believing in his own pretensions. -The Sayings Of Maud'Dib<i></i>

I think they are a fascinating people.

Are they not sometimes referred to as Zen Sunni? Would this be some sort of mix of Tao and Muslin beliefs? And then Bene Gesserit Missionaria Protectiva things also melded in there somewhere?

I have always wondered about how they saw/foresaw Paul - was it prophecies planted by the Bene Gesserit - or was it prescience brought on by the spice saturation they all lived with? Or some mixture of the two?

I found Leto I's thought process about them to be fascinating...well...if the infamous hell hole planet Salusa Secundis can produce the Sardauker what sort of fighter would the even worse Arakis produce???

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Our lives are the songs that sing the universe into existence.~David Zindell
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IIRC, the Fremen were not Zen Sunni. They were a band of wandering philosophers in whose teachings the first Idaho mentat was trained.

However, the Muslim roots of the Fremen are evident...the memory of Bela Teguese I mentioned earlier also contains a reference to being denied the haj, a ritual Muslim pilgrimage which should be undertaken at least once in a lifetime.

Interesting question about Paul though. I've always assumed that their expectation of him was based soley on the Bene Gesserit meddling. Never thought they may have "seen" the future, (although it doesn't seems as though such prediction was a part of their normal reactions...even of their Reverend Mothers).

--A ____________________________________

A sense of the sardonic preserves a man from believing in his own pretensions. -The Sayings Of Maud'Dib<i></i>

If you recall Paul couldn't see the future,too many dips and valleys,he saw the available paths,but not the complete outcome. Muad'Dib was a prophecy,in essence, a prediction to it's core. The BG did in fact have their implanted "escape holes" present;however the BG could not have seen the Mahdi being Paul,otherwise the BG would have paid greater attention to the Atreides line and/or Arrakis waiting for the Kwisatz Haderach.So, really somewhere within the melange addiction they grew the latent powers of future sight guided by the Reverend Mothers.Between the Mothers and Melange they did in fact (somewhat) see the future where others couldn't.............. <i></i>

Well, yes, he was a prophecy...but whose prophecy was he? I think it's pretty clear that the prophecy was a "fake" by the BG. It is even mentioned that the prophecy was unclear about whether the BG "Reverend Mother" would bring the saviour with her, or produce him on the scene.

Maud'Dib fulfilled the prophecy, but he was never intended to. It was a safety feature of the Missionaria Protectiva.

Another example of religious manipulation. It was only the fact that he was the BG Kwisatz Haderach that enabled him to fulfill it so completely, I'm sure.

The Mahdi could have been anyone as far as either BG or Fremen were concerned I think.

--A ____________________________________

A sense of the sardonic preserves a man from believing in his own pretensions. -The Sayings Of Maud'Dib<i></i>

Spacemonkey: The BG do not have prescience. (Atleast, the BG do not all have it. At the end of the series, a notable few (one?) have developed it, in a horribly weakened form, like a Guild Navigator, due to their Atreides Genes.) What makes the BG appear so damned frightening and mind-reader like, are the three things that really seperate them from the rest of humanity:

1) Other Memory: This gives them a near-infinite wealth of human experience to make comparisons to, and to use to detect patterns in human behaviour.

2) Petit Perception: Through Training (which can be given to anyone), a BG becomes able to notice horribly slight, otherwise imperceptable physical signs (which are often the outward expression of inward emotions,) which others cannot see. A BG could just look at you (or hear really hard,) and know how fast your heart is beating. They do this, several times, particularly in Chapterhouse and Heretics.

3) Simulflow: The ability to have multiple trains of thought going at once, none of them interfering with, or subtracting from, the other. A reverend mother could be holding one (or a hundred) conversations with other memory, using Petit Perception on a huge crowd, and at the same time carrying on one conversation verbally, and one conversation with her hands, all using this ability.

Combine these three things together: The ability to have multiple trains of thought, the ability to know (even without Truthsay) to a very high degree when you lie, conceal, or tell the truth, when you're nervous, horny, excited, sad, tired, etc, and the wealth of other memory to make billions of billions of comparisons of human behaviour to. Common actions humans make which are indicative of certain things a BG will identify instantly, and know what it means after a few minutes of interacting with you, because they can compare your responses and personality to a multitude of ones observed via other memory.

Unfortunately Space Monkey hasn't been around for a good long while. *sigh* Interesting post though.

I think you're essentially agreeing with my position that the BG weren't actually prophecising anybody when that "prophecy" was given to the Fremen?

--A

Always interested me how the BG used / thought of religion. In...whatever it was...heretics or Chapter house when the BG discover the secret of the Bene Tleilax...that they are Muslim...and she thinks something like "Gotcha."

And then uses it to effectively manipulate him.

--A

Or he just didn't want to be manipulated himself. (Although he was.)

--A