Irulan Corrino
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Princess Irulan Corrino is a fictional character and member of House Corrino in the Dune universe created by Frank Herbert.
Irulan was the eldest daughter of the 81st Padishah Emperor Shaddam Corrino IV and the Lady Anirul Sadow-Tonkin Corrino, the most famous Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother Proctor Superior of the Hidden Noble Rank and Kwisatz Mother. Irulan had four younger sisters named Chalice, Wensicia, Josifa and Rugi, and no brothers.
In Dune, Irulan is described through Paul Atreides' eyes:
Paul's attention came at last to a tall blonde woman, green-eyed, a face of patrician beauty, classic in its hauteur, untouched by tears, completely undefeated. Without being told it, Paul knew her — Princess Royal, Bene Gesserit-trained, a face that time vision had shown him in many aspects: Irulan. There's my key, he thought.
Baron Vladimir Harkonnen later notes that Irulan had eyes "that looked past and through him." In Dune Messiah, the Tlielaxu Face Dancer Scytale refers to Irulan as "a tall blond beauty ... she carried herself with an aristocrat's hauteur, but something in the absorbed smoothness of her features betrayed the controls of her Bene Gesserit background."
Excerpts from Irulan's later writings appear in the form of epigraphs [1] in Dune, as well as (to a lesser extent) other novels in the series.
Irulan was played by Virginia Madsen in the 1984 film Dune, and by Julie Cox in the 2000 TV miniseries Frank Herbert's Dune (and its 2003 sequel, Children of Dune).
The non-canon Dune Encyclopedia (1984) by Dr. Willis McNelly invents an extensive, alternate biography for Irulan.
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[edit] Upbringing
Irulan was born in 10,162 A.G. and raised among the intrigues and politics of her father's Imperial Court upon Kaitain, where she received the finest of education and conditioning to make her a young lady of refinement and elegance suitable to be the eldest daughter of an Padishah Emperor of the Known Universe. She grew up to be just such, described as willowy of appearance with fair skin, platinum-blonde hair and bright jade-green eyes.
She was also the youngest member of the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood just like her mother before her, and she received training from them and instruction to follow their ways. In anticipation for the conception of the Kwisatz Haderach, the Sisterhood had conspired so that her Bene Gesserit mother would only bear daughters, making Irulan's father the last Padishah Emperor of House Corrino. The resultant vacuum of power would provide the perfect opportunity for the Kwisatz Haderach to seize the imperial throne, effectively giving control to the Bene Gesserit.
Irulan's Bene Gesserit teachers realized the girl's important position as the key to the throne, and her training was sufficient enough (through her mother and the Imperial Truthsayer, Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam) to hopefully make her coercible at some point in the future when she would find herself in a position of power. But despite all the manipulations and expectations of others, Irulan retained a strong sense of personal identity and ambition, qualities that would cause tensions especially with her strong-willed father and Bene Gesserit would-be masters. Her teachers also found her to be lazy. She rarely tried harder than necessary because of her priviledged upbringing and rank, and so her powers and skills never reached their full potential.
Meanwhile, Irulan's father, Shaddam IV, expected the girl to participate in his schemes to keep House Corrino's power concentrated by either making her succeed him as Empress or at the very least marrying her to a husband that would allow some retention of House Corrino's influence over the Imperium.
[edit] The Plot against House Atreides
As Duke Leto Atreides' power and influence grew in the Landsraad, there was wide speculation that Irulan could be married to either Leto or his son Paul to symbolize Shaddam's selection of House Atreides to peacefully assume the Imperial throne after his death; but the Emperor's jealousy of the "Red Duke" Leto instead led him to orchestrate a plot to destroy him. Irulan wrote:
My father, the Padishah Emperor, took me by the hand one day and I sensed in the ways my mother had taught me that he was disturbed. He led me down the Hall of Portraits to the ego-likeness of the Duke Leto Atreides. I marked the strong resemblance between them — my father and this man in the portrait--both with thin, elegant faces and sharp features dominated by cold eyes. Princess-daughter, my father said, I would that you'd been older when it came time for this man to choose a woman. My father was 71 at the time and looking no older than the man in the portrait, and I was but 14, yet I remember deducing in that instant that my father secretly wished the Duke had been his son, and disliked the political necessities that made them enemies. — In My Father's House by the Princess Irulan
To get House Harkonnen to assist with this scheme, the Emperor offered to potentially give Irulan in marriage to the Harkonnen heir apparent, na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, along with the riches of the fief of Arrakis. Baron Vladimir Harkonnen favored this arrangement, as he believed such a union and plan would greatly assist in the establishment of a Harkonnen Empire. Irulan was so ensnared, and would oppose being used as such a pawn.
The plot against the Atreides was executed: lured to Arrakis on the pretense of taking over the valuable melange operation there, the Atreides were soon attacked by Harkonnen forces (secretly supplemented by the seemingly unstoppable Imperial Sardaukar). Leto was killed, and Paul and his Bene Gesserit mother Jessica fled into the desert and were presumed dead. A crisis on Arrakis began when the mysterious Muad'Dib emerged as an effective leader of the native Fremen tribes against the rule of the Harkonnens. He was, of course, a very-much-alive Paul Atreides.
[edit] The Downfall of the Corrino Empire
In the events of Dune, the situation finally broke on Arrakis and Shaddam was forced to personally intervene. Irulan went with her father and his army of Sardaukar shock troops to the desert planet as he sought to restore order and the disrupted production of the all-important spice melange. After Shaddam's armies were disastrously defeated by the Fremen assault, Paul set his terms: the Imperial armada would leave Arrakis and Paul would marry Irulan — or he would destroy all spice production.
Shaddam was furious; Irulan said: "But here's a man fit to be your son." Once Paul defeated the treacherous Feyd-Rautha in single combat, and Count Fenring refused the Emperor's order to kill Paul, it was done — Paul would ascend the throne in Shaddam's place, assuming power of the Empire in Irulan's name. Jessica summed it up thus:
"See that princess standing there, so haughty and confident. They say she has pretensions of a literary nature. Let us hope she finds solace in such things; she'll have little else." A bitter laugh escaped Jessica. "Think on it, Chani: that princess will have the name, yet she'll live as less than a concubine — never to know a moment of tenderness from the man to whom she's bound. While we, Chani, we who carry the name of concubine — history will call us wives."
[edit] An Unhappy Marriage to Paul Atreides
Irulan was not originally unhappy with her position as Imperial Consort, as she desired to be the mother of a new Atreides-Corrino royal bloodline with Paul and hopefully retain the Imperial House Corrino's influence in some form. However, she would quickly discover that she was to be Paul's wife in name and title only, as he intended his beloved concubine Chani to bear his children and heirs apparent, essentially writing Irulan out of her desired place in history.
In Dune Messiah it is revealed that this resentment, coupled with Bene Gesserit orders that Paul not be allowed to father an heir with Chani, drove Irulan to secretly drug the Fremen woman with dangerous contraceptives. As a result, the new Emperor and his concubine were without children for twelve years. When Chani began taking large quantities of the spice melange to counter the effects of the contraceptives, Irulan was urged by Reverend Mother Mohiam to chemically abort any potential fetus, but she protested. Irulan did, however, become part of a conspiracy against the Emperor involving the Bene Gesserit, Tleilaxu, and Spacing Guild. Irulan's skills as a court player would never match her scholarship, as her double-crossing and drugging of Chani were both found out. Paul threatened her banishment to the hellworld of Salusa Secundus with the rest of the Corrinos, but she was never so directly punished.
She was productive during this time in her role as historian, writing at least twenty works on Muad'Dib and related events. In addition, she never indulged Paul's offer to discreetly cuckold him for her own pleasures.
[edit] The Later Years
Chani died after giving birth to Paul's twin children, Leto II and Ghanima, and Paul (now blind) soon thereafter wandered alone into the desert to die. Irulan was intensely grieved by these deaths (Chani's death being caused by her druggings, and Paul's being a subsequent result), at this time first feeling a deep love for her husband that she had never realized she had.
Irulan subsequently devoted herself to House Atreides and Paul and Chani's two orphaned children by deserting the Bene Gesserit to raise and train the twins as their foster mother. During the events of Children of Dune, Irulan attempted to serve as a guide and confidant to Ghanima, but was often flustered by the child's near-infinite wit and experience gained from her genetic memories. Irulan also served as a chief advisor to Paul's sister, Alia, during her reign as Holy Regent. Alia never trusted Irulan because of her Corrino heritage and Alia's increasing paranoia; this distrust proved to be well-placed, as Irulan followed Ghanima and Stilgar into the desert during the Fremen rebellion against Alia's tyranny. Though the other rebels were massacred, Irulan was imprisoned upon her capture.
Later, after the rise of Leto II as the God Emperor of the Known Universe, Irulan spent her remaining years continuing her study and documentation of historical and contemporary events. Irulan eventually died in 10,248 A.G.
[edit] Works attributed to Irulan
Excerpts from the following works appear in the form of epigraphs in Dune, as well as (to a lesser extent) other novels in the series:
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[edit] Irulan in adaptations
Irulan is essentially the narrator of the novel Dune, via the epigraphs from her later writings which opened each chapter. The 1984 film preserved this version; as in the novel, Irulan only appeared in person at the very end of the story but narrated an introduction to the Dune universe.
The 2000 miniseries, however, invented an extensive subplot for Irulan. Director John Harrison has said that he felt the need to expand Irulan's role because she played such an important part in later books, and her epigraphs made her a significant presence in the novel. Additionally, the character gave him a window into House Corrino. [2] In the miniseries, Irulan is sent to Arrakis to confirm Duke Leto's position, and there strikes up a friendship with his son, Paul. After the attack on the Atreides, she immediately realizes that her father is the only one who could have possibly helped the Harkonnens. Irulan proceeds to send spies (loyal to her and not the Emperor) to the Harkonnen homeworld of Giedi Prime to gather information on the massacre. Irulan herself then spies on Mohiam's clandestine meeting with a Spacing Guild operative. Realizing that something big is afoot, she heads for Giedi Prime herself and coyly gains the needed information from Feyd. As the Fremen uprising grows worse, Irulan joins her father's planning councils and offers valuable advice. She is the only one to realize the connection between Muad'Dib and Paul Atreides (which she dramatically reveals after Alia's capture), and she sees the unavoidable end to the situation before she even arrives on Arrakis.
Besides the final scene in which Irulan is betrothed to Paul, the only of her appearances in the miniseries based on an actual excerpt from the novel is her visit to Feyd. However, in the book it is a different Bene Gesserit, Margot Fenring, who visits the Harkonnen heir, on assignment from the Sisterhood to retrieve his genetic material (through conception) for their breeding program. The miniseries does not suggest this as Irulan's motive. After the apparent death of Paul, Irulan also prophetically recounts a Bene Gesserit saying (quoted by Margot in the novel): Do not count a human dead until you've seen his body. And even then you can make a mistake.
[edit] References
- ^ Herbert, F. Eye, 1985, pg. 206, ISBN 0-7434-3479-X (2001 US reprint) "This authentic visage of the Princess Irulan, Muad'Dib's virgin consort, should be committed to memory before your walking tour of Arrakis. The pilgrim should beware of false images. You will be beset by tradesmen hawking such mementoes. Irulan authorized only this portrait for official sale to pilgrims."
