Hayt


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Omphalos
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Re: Hayt

Post by Omphalos »

Looks like we got another one. Let the games begin, yeah?
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SandChigger
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Re: Hayt

Post by SandChigger »

Idwal Brugh wrote:
a well-known and often-cited example is that the word for 'bad' in modern Persian sounds very close to the English word "bad", although there is no relation between the two words whatsoever),
Please provide your reference as that is wholly false. Both Farsi and English are indo-european languages and have more in common with each other than Farsi does with Arabic. Many cognates exist.
Ooh, you speak Farsi, too. That's so hawt.

Not sure how authoritative this is, but...

http://www.linguanaut.com/english_farsi.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Search page for "bad". The transliterations conform to the Farsi script so far as I can tell... :roll:
MrFlibble
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Re: Hayt

Post by MrFlibble »

A Thing of Eternity wrote:Don't forget option D, which I mentioned - that the BT deliberately chose a word from a dead language that they knew only people with OM would recognise.
Right. Sorry I missed that.
Idwal Brugh wrote:
I, too, have always assumed that the significance of the name "Hayt" lies in the fact that it sounds like "hate" (otherwise Paul's comment makes little sense).
Are you that lacking in imagination? He DOES have command of full OM, and that would provide access to nearly every human language.
That was not very polite, was it? Besides, I don't see any immediate contradiction between what you quoted and your own words.
Idwal Brugh wrote:
a well-known and often-cited example is that the word for 'bad' in modern Persian sounds very close to the English word "bad", although there is no relation between the two words whatsoever),
Please provide your reference as that is wholly false. Both Farsi and English are indo-european languages and have more in common with each other than Farsi does with Arabic. Many cognates exist.
I myself do not know Farsi (I've only attended Andrey Zaliznyak's seminar on Old Persian a few years ago; we were reading the Behistun inscription :)), but the example I provided is indeed often cited (which, of course, is not proof enough that is is correct), including a work by Zaliznyak himself, whose authority I trust. I learned of this example at my first year of study in the university, at the introductory course to Linguistics (I suppose you'd call it General Linguistics 101, eh? ;))

As for the claim that the two words may be cognates simply because the languages are related, every linguist knows that the similarity in sounds of two words in two languages is insufficient to establish that they are cognates - only regular phonological similarities are important in this respect.

Some info on the subject matter I found here:
bad
c.1200, a mystery word with no apparent relatives in other languages.* Possibly from O.E. derogatory term bæddel and its dim. bædling "effeminate man, hermaphrodite, pederast," probably related to bædan "to defile." Originally "defective, inferior;" sense of "evil, morally depraved" is first recorded c.1300. A rare word before 1400, and evil was more common in this sense until c.1700. Comparable words in the other I.E. languages tend to have grown from descriptions of specific qualities, such as "ugly," "defective," "weak," "faithless," "impudent," "crooked," "filthy" (e.g. Gk. kakos , probably from the word for "excrement;" Rus. plochoj , related to O.C.S. plachu "wavering, timid;" Pers. gast , O.Pers. gasta- , related to gand "stench;" Ger. schlecht , originally "level, straight, smooth," whence "simple, ordinary," then "bad"). Comparative and superlative forms badder, baddest were common 14c.-18c. and used as recently as Defoe (but not by Shakespeare), but yielded to comp. worse and superl. worst (which had belonged to evil and ill ). In U.S. place names, sometimes translating native terms meaning "supernaturally dangerous." Ironic use as a word of approval is said to be at least since 1890s orally, originally in Black Eng., emerging in print 1928 in a jazz context. It might have emerged from the ambivalence of expressions like bad nigger , used as a term of reproach by whites, but among blacks sometimes representing one who stood up to injustice, but in the U.S. West bad man also had a certain ambivalence:
"These are the men who do most of the killing in frontier communities, yet it is a noteworthy fact that the men who are killed generally deserve their fate." [Farmer & Henley]
*Farsi has bad in more or less the same sense as the English word, but this is regarded by linguists as a coincidence. The forms of the words diverge as they are traced back in time (Farsi bad comes from M.Pers. vat ), and such accidental convergences exist across many languages, given the vast number of words in each and the limited range of sounds humans can make to signify them. Among other coincidental matches with English are Korean mani "many," Chinese pei "pay," Nahuatl (Aztecan) huel "well," Maya hol "hole."
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SandChigger
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Re: Hayt

Post by SandChigger »

:clap: :clap: :clap: again...

But I do think you're giving this one a bit more of your time than he/she/it deserves. Me, I got stairs to pour. ;)
Shakkad the Wise
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Re: Hayt

Post by Shakkad the Wise »

Getting back to the subject of Hayt’s eyes, I think they fit into a theme that FH repeats often in the Dune books, that of the physical differences of the eyes mirroring the change of their metaphorical sense of vision. This is inserted into DM right at the beginning, during the Bronso of Ix interview:
FH wrote in DM:

“Sacred! As with all things sacred, it gives with one hand and takes with the
other. It extends life and allows the adept to foresee his future, but it ties
him to a cruel addiction and marks his eyes as yours are marked: total blue
without any white. Your eyes, your organs of sight, become one thing without
contrast, a single view.
He’s talking about the Eyes of Ibad there but, again, it’s a recurring theme, especially since Hayt’s eyes are described as “featureless” and “blank.” He’s a tool of the conspiracy, and as such has a specific purpose, a single goal (of sorts) to achieve, and I think the eyes are meant to represent that, in part.

As far as an “in-universe” reasoning for it, I think that it serves the creep factor/BT sense of humor to a degree, but also to remind everyone (particularly Paul) that Hayt is a “Tleilaxu thing,” as Paul thinks when he first meets him. This may serve a twofold purpose—if Hayt kills the Emperor, then Paul will know who has done him in, but if Duncan is restored, it will be clear that it’s the BT who have the key to restoring Chani to him. Hayt was the tool of a conspiracy, after all, but it was the BT who were in charge, and they wanted to make sure Paul knew that. This goes back to the stated belief that Tleilaxu eyes enslaved the souls of the wearers. Duncan was their toy, at that point.

Related to this, I think, is the fact that many characters are quick to question Hayt’s “sight” throughout the book, with the question of “what do his metal eyes see?” being repeated a few times. This could also relate to the line about how the Fremen don’t trust people without the Eyes of Ibad, and how they are “unfocused eyes which saw things they were not supposed to see.”

That’s just how I see it, and I could probably develop the argument better if I wanted to take the time :) . Personally, I always thought the metal eyes were a neat little detail, and I was always really annoyed that the CoD miniseries pussed out on it.
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Freakzilla
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Re: Hayt

Post by Freakzilla »

Shakkad the Wise wrote:...especially since Hayt’s eyes are described as “featureless” and “blank.”
She studied his artificial eyes, wondering what they saw. Observed closely,
they betrayed tiny black pockmarks, little wells of darkness in the glittering
metal. Facets! The universe shimmered around her and lurched. She steadied
herself with a hand on the sun-warmed surface of the balustrade. Ahhh, the
melange moved swiftly.

~DM
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Shakkad the Wise
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Re: Hayt

Post by Shakkad the Wise »

FH in DM wrote:

"The blank surfaces of the ghola's eyes came up to center on Paul with a
pressing intensity. "Yes!""
I should have taken out "featureless," I think I was thinking about the way that Hayt's expression is often referred to as passive (and also that his eyes are referred to as lacking human expression), and stream of consciousness thinking took care of the rest.

There's also a couple of parts where Hayt's eyes cause burning pains, such as when Bijaz is brow-beating him (p. 105 in my PDF, and again on p. 119). Maybe they weren't just to remind others that he was a Tleilaxu creation, but also to remind him, as well--part of that soul-enslaving idea?
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