Dune Messiah Quotes & Sayings

There was a man so wise,
He jumped into
A sandy place
And burnt out both his eyes!
And when he knew his eyes were gone,
He offered no complaint.
He summoned up a vision
And made himself a saint.
-Children's Verse
from History of Muad'dib — Frank Herbert

I succumbed to the lure of the oracle, he thought.
And he sensed that succumbing to this lure might be to fix himself upon a single-track life. Could it be, he wondered, that the oracle didn't tell the future? Could it be that the oracle made the future? — Frank Herbert

Dune Messiah is the most misunderstood of Frank Herbert's novels. The reasons for this are as fascinating and complex as the renowned author himself. — Brian Herbert

In Dune and Dune Messiah, he [Frank Herbert] was cautioning against pride and overconfidence, that form of narcissism described in Greek tragedies that invariably led to the great fall. — Brian Herbert

Heroic leaders often made mistakes ... mistakes that were amplified by the number of followers who were held in thrall by charisma. (Introduction to Dune Messiah) — Brian Herbert

Among my father's most important messages were that governments lie to protect themselves and they make incredibly stupid decisions. — Brian Herbert

Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert's first sequel to Dune, was published in 1969. In that book, he flipped over what he called the "myth of the hero" and showed the dark side of Paul Atreides. Some readers didn't understand it. Why would the author do that to his great hero? In interviews, Dad spent years afterward explaining why, and his reasons were sound. He believed that charismatic leaders could be dangerous because they could lead their followers off the edge of a cliff. — Frank Herbert