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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 7763079" data-attributes="member: 42582">I don't agree. Nietzsche's most famous work is called Beyond Good and Evil.The judge whom Conan has killed at the start of Queen of the Black Coast wasn't evil. The serpent that Conan kills in The God in the Bowl (? I think I've got the right title) isn't evil. Conan isn't defeating an evil civilisation. He's revitalising it!As I've said, I think this is a shallow reading of Conan. I'm personally not a big fan of Beyond the Black River, but the Picts in that story are the antagonists and not civilised. (One reason I'm not a big fan is that it's clearly a Western, but I don't think it counts as a Western under your criterion.)This isn't true even of most of the stories. Hour of the Dragon is a Conan-esque retelling of the grail quest. It also involves political machination, as does The Scarlet Citadel. People of the Black Circle begins with Conan capturing the Queen of Vindhya to try and ransom his men who have been taken prisoner - that's not fighting because good and evil fight.I don't see how these are necessarily different questions, but maybe that's a side issue.By coincidence, I started reading Dune (the novel) yesterday after not having looked at it for over 30 years. (Back then I think I read the first three. Never read God Emperor.) So far it's not about What it means to be human anymore than LotR is. In fact I'm struck by how reactionary it is - at least as much as JRRT. And the Bene Gesserit seem to me no different from the trope of the "evil vizier" except with a slightly misogynist streak and sci-fi tropes involving breeding programs among noble houses.I can't remember the nuances of the plot, but have a vague memory of the general unfolding. Fate and providence are clearly important themes, just as they are in LotR. Also related ideas of loyalty, kinship, etc. (Against as in LotR.) Nothing in what I've read or what I recall makes me think that Dune (the novel) is sci-fi in anything but its tropes.EDIT: LotR isn't about what counts as good? or what counts as evil? That is taken for granted throughout the story - Sauron and Saruman and Wormtongue are all unequivocally evil. It is about (among other things) what causes people to succumb to evil. The most important answers it offers are despair and pride. It also asserts that these are linked - that pride leads to despair and hence evil, whereas humility/submission permits hope and hence good. The interesting antagonistic characters are not Sauron and Saruman but Smeagol/Gollum and Denethor; and in both these characters we see how an unwillingness to humbly submit leads to despair and hence evil.Compared to modernist ideas (found in REH's Conan and much sci-fi) that's a reactionary reflection on the moral life - but it's undoubtedly a reflection on the place and role of humanity in the world.And it's one that Dune echoes to a signficant degree! My memory is hazy for what I haven't re-read yet, but ideas of hope vs despair, and of submission vs pride, seem to me to loom pretty large. Even in the opening chapter we see Duke Leto is good in part because he submits to his reassignment to the planet Dune, whereas the Harkonnen Baron is evil because motivated by pride.</blockquote>

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