Dune Messiah questions?

[Hotdoghands2]

Hello, I'm new to the forum and I am very happy to have found it!

I just finished Dune Messiah and have a few questions. I may have missed a couple parts in the book. I was reading a post on Reddit saying that Korba was planning to kill Paul and blame it on Chani. Where was this located in the book? I don't remember reading details of Korba's plan.

Why did Paul not stay by Chani's side during her final moments? This really made me upset.

Why didn't Paul choose to live when his son was aware? Couldn't he of just used his children's vison like when he killed the facdancer?

It's been a long time since I got choked up reading a book. The final two chapters were very moving.

Thanks!

[Cpt. Aramsham]

Welcome!

I just finished Dune Messiah and have a few questions. I may have missed a couple parts in the book. I was reading a post on Reddit saying that Korba was planning to kill Paul and blame it on Chani. Where was this located in the book? I don't remember reading details of Korba's plan.

The Quizarate's plan is actually explained already in one of the intros, "Analysis of History: Muad'Dib" by Bronso of Ix:

Yet, they delineate the Qizarate cabal guided by Korba the Panegyrist. They take us step by step through Korba's plan to make a martyr of Muad'dib and place the blame on Chani, the Fremen concubine.

The magazine version of Dune Messiah had a different version of this "Analysis of History" where the explanation is a bit more extensive, quoted here in its entirety:

Precede
They had forced godhead on Muad’Dib. Now they fought to destroy him. And in all the plethora of futures he saw no place for Paul Atreides, the man!

The leaders of the Qizarate, whose church was founded in Muad'Dib's name, saw their Jihad ending. In just twelve standard years, the religious war of the Jihad had created an enormous wave of passive hate and active opposition. There was the obvious fact, as well, that religious colonialism, having annexed planet after planet in that short span of years, was running out of new real estate to subdue.

Into this downward spiral came the ancient quasi-religious sisterhood of the Bene Gesserit, the Spacing Guild with its virtual monopoly on interstellar transport, and the scientific amoralists of the Bene Tleilax, all united in a plot to overthrow the Emperor Paul-Muad'Dib, ne-Atreides.

The Qizarate cabal, led by Korba the Panegyrist, fastened upon this plot as an ideal opportunity to stir up the sort of chaos from which they might gain new impetus. This was eminently practical a move of Judgment Strategy which might have originated in the old training manual written by Paul-Muad'Dib's father, the Duke Leto. It called first for the creation of a martyr, Muad'dib himself. Next, it sought a universal object of hate, choosing Muad'Dib's concubine, the Lady Chani. The plan was to saddle her with blame for Muad'Dib's death.

Taken as a whole, this was a much better plan than that of the Guild-Tleilaxu-Bene Gesserit plotters and their allies among the Great Families of the Landsraad. This analysis, therefore, will examine in some detail where the Qizarate's plan succeeded and where it fell short.

—Analysis of History: Muad'dib by Bronso of Ix

In the main narrative itself it is only revealed indirectly, as in this passage after Chani's death:

Chani, Chani, he thought. There was no other way. Chani, beloved, believe me that this death was quicker for you … and kinder. They'd have held our children hostage, displayed you in a cage and slave pits, reviled you with the blame for my death. This way … this way we destroy them and save our children.

Why didn't Paul choose to live when his son was aware? Couldn't he of just used his children's vison like when he killed the facdancer?

Multiple reasons. First of all, it was his way of escaping the trap of prescience, to live and die as a free man. Second, by showing himself submitting to the ancient Fremen custom and making the ultimate sacrifice, he buys the tribes' loyalty to his dynasty, totally destroying any other seeds of conspiracy against them, and (he may hope) in part restores the traditional honor of Fremen culture by his example, reversing some of the rot and corruption. Thirdly, the total dependency on his son would rankle a proud man like Paul, and be hardly any more acceptable to him than Tleilaxu eyes; he might worry that he would end up either his son's puppet or his puppet master.

Finally, he has just lost the love of his life, and may not wish to live without Chani.

[Hotdoghands2]

Thanks! I knew I read it somewhere in the book. That's why I couldn't find it, it was at the very beginning of the book lol.

That totally makes sense on why Paul didn't want to live through his kids. I think he was fed up with his entire empire anyways.

Thank you so much for that very informative response!

[georgiedenbro]

Finally, he has just lost the love of his life, and may not wish to live without Chani.

Great answers overall. On this particular point I think it's made fairly clear in Messiah that the only real reason Paul didn't commit himself to the future where he averted the jihad was because this future was the one where he had Chani. In Dune he looks for every out and finds none, but there are parameters:

1) He insists on remaining Atreides.
2) He insists that House Atreides not be allowed to die.
3) He insists on being together with Chani.

For these three to happen the jihad had to happen, and in DM he basically says that he was selfish and that's why things are the way they are. It seems pretty natural that at the moment of Chani's death, and now having heirs to House Atreides who will be safe, there is no reason for him to go on with this torture any more.