Thread: Foucaullt's Pendulum Board: The Da Vinci Code / Ship of Fools.


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Posted by Calindreams (# 9147) on :
 
To me, any discussion about books like 'The Davinci Code' isn't complete without some reference to the book by Umberto Eco 'Foucaullt's Pendulum'. It serves as an interesting critique to these type of conspiracy theories and contains a fairly direct reference to 'The Holy blood and the Holy Grail'.

I know it can seem heavy going at times but as you get further in the book it really does seem to be worth the effort. Has anyone read it?
 

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Posted by koffshun (# 11227) on :
 
I completely agree and have already mentioned Foucault's Pendulum in a previous post - as a far superior book on the subject.

It is, however, far less readable. I couldn't imagine people on poolsides across the holiday-making world settling down to enjoy Eco, wonderful as he is!

I love the part in the first few chapter when one of the publishers/academics (can't remember their names, something forn!) says that every month a pile of papers on the Knights Templar and some new take on the conspiracy - mostly unprintable - arrives in the mail. Kind of reminds me of all the tables in bookshops advertising TDVC and spin-offs!
 

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Posted by Jolly Jape (# 3296) on :
 
Yep, I've read it, and it's just as you described it, calindreams. The first twenty or so pages are so impenetrable, that I had to restart it about ten times before I got past the first chapter, but after that, it's a cracking read, a bit worldly-wise but, as you say, a real pointer to the power of circular logic, and just how dangerous ideas can become in the hands of "true believers". May have something to say to discussions currently proceeding in warmer climes as well!
 

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Posted by Calindreams (# 9147) on :
 
The difficulty of the book (the long tracts of historical detail and speculation, references to all manner of obscure esoterica) is actually a joke/satire on book that are similarly dense but much more earnest (and probably just as wrong as the conpiracy theorists of Eco's novel).

I remember read the Baigent/Leigh book about 12 years ago and remeber struggling with it, trying to follow the various histories. But because of the referencing and detail it was all the more convincing.

At least Dan Brown's book is more consistent - a pulp-fiction novel to deliver a pulp-fiction conspiracy theory. It's just a shame that so much 'serious' writing about it has followed in its wake. Otherwise I may have assumed that Brown and Eco shared the same satirical intention.
 

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Posted by dj_ordinaire (# 4643) on :
 
"How can it all be true... We made it up, didn't we? Didn't we?"

... or something like that.

A wonderful book. I seem to recall somebody saying that it was the ideal book to be seen reading in an art gallery.
 

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Posted by A Feminine Force (# 7812) on :
 
I loved it, but I hated the ending. I though he ran out of really clever, funny esoteric puns and digs, and just threw together a sloppy vulgar lampoon of Blavatsky and theosophists.

Other that that, I thought it was brilliantly done. If you ever spent any time actually reading his reference material, the satire is actually quite ferociously funny. But it's so much of an "insider's joke" it's not really that entertaining.

FF
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 
Foucould's Pendulum is far more clever and has more literary merit than the other books mentioned on this board, in my opinion.

It has more and deeper philosophy and its theme of who has access to knowledge is particularly good.

One of the best books I have ever read.
 

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Posted by agrgurich (# 5724) on :
 
This book is really excellent. By the way, I saw Eco on a program about The Da Vinci Code, He said he has a special room for books like Brown's.
He was hilarious.
 

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Posted by Firenze (# 619) on :
 
I agree, FC is a splendid and acute commentary on conspiracy theories.

Like you, FF, I didn't care for the ending. I was - and still am - genuinely unsure whether They really are coming to get him, or whether he has gone mad, and is now completely delusional.
 

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Posted by A Feminine Force (# 7812) on :
 
One of the themes I love about the book is the question "To what extent are we responsible for creating our own reality?"

It seems like the experiment begun as a joke becomes more real as they begin to take it more seriously, and the mortality of the joke increases with the depth of their seriousness. If there's a cautionary tale in the ending, it's one that says "beware taking your own ideas too seriously", or "Seriousness is a killer (kill-joy?)".

It's hard to tell which comes first, but the joke starts the ball rolling, and pretty soon they forget it was just a silly exercise and are drawn into a "reality" that is made in a funhouse-upside-down image of the original pun.

FF
 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
From my past experience on the boards, this will be an unpopular opinion.


I loathed it. FP was possibly the worst reading experience of my life...and certainly the most thoroughly depressing book I've ever read.

I interpreted it as a sometimes funny commentary on conspiracy theorists, which became a conspiracy theory of its own, and the characters were ultimately trapped by their own creation.

The ending is somewhat open to interpretation, though I tend to think that They really were coming for him.

I don't get on well with Eco's books, though he comes across very well and humorously in radio interviews. His writing style in FP (or the translator's style?) was to use 10 words where one would do, overwrite, bore the pants off readers with long, academic passages, and create an unnecessarily complicated story arc. Some of that was probably intentional, to echo the style of real-life conspiracy writing. IMHO, the story would be better served by a great deal of weeding and editing, and a rearrangement of the story.

If he meant the entire book as satire, then I missed it. I love satire along the lines of Mark Twain and Oscar Wilde--but I sometimes miss satire of the very dry, "no one could possibly write these ideas seriously so it must be satire" type. Andre' Codrescu's "Messi@h" (sic) comes to mind. I didn't know it was satire until I heard the author in an interview, long after I read it. Once I bought a British travel book about the US, supposedly a serious guide. I dipped into it without reading the introduction...which meant that I got deeply insulted, until I read the intro and found out it was meant as satire!

I think I'd only try FP again if I learned more about the Kabbalah and wanted to understand how that was woven into the structure of the story.

Ironically, FP is one reason I love DVC! When I finished FP, I was so disheartened and horribly depressed that I never wanted to read anything again. (And I'm a bookworm!) However, I'd previously reserved DVC at the library, based on radio comments about it, and I got the notice that it had arrived soon after I finished FP. So I jumped into DVC, and it was exactly what I needed.

 

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Posted by Calindreams (# 9147) on :
 
Goldenkey - I think I remember you referring to DVC as being of a satirical nature. Why do you think this? I just might be tempted to revisit it.

Certainly I think FP serves as a pointer not to get too hot under the collar about DVC.
 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
No, I never said DVC was satire. I love the book, but it's not satire.
 

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Posted by Nicolemrw (# 28) on :
 
Foucaullt's Pendulum is fantastic, so much better than the daVinci Code, which was really just a potboiler.

It taught me that great truth of all truth's:


It's not a proper conspiracy unless the Knight's Templar are involved somewhere. (That's not a perfect quote, but the idea is there.)
 

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Posted by koffshun (# 11227) on :
 
Watched a programme on BBC4 last night (think it must be a repeat because a shot of 'the pope' was John Paul II) called "Did Jesus Really Die?"

Did anyone else see it?

The reason I mention it - apart from the obvious that it was commissioned on the back of TDVC's success - is that half way through, after doing some pretty useful biblical/redactive style discussion (for TV!), it began talking about... ... The Knights Templar! My Dad and I laughed our heads off!

I particularly enjoyed all their discussions of "finding so-and-so's bones", since CSI followed straight after and it took DNA swabs, tissue analysis and some serious computer shenanigans to work out whose bones were left in an oil drum 11 days ago, let alone 1100 years!

Anyway, the conclusion of the programme was that Jesus was a Buddhist. This was on the strength of a community in Kasmir that revered a man called Issa, whose shrine showed scars on his feet. Strangely though, the final voice-over gave the conclusion that "Jesus was a Buddhist, he was not crucified..."

Hang on, wasn't a large part of their reasoning based on these scarred feet in Kashmir??

Sorry for the slight tangent there, basically wanted to echo (pun intended) Nicolemrw's comment that "it's not a proper conspiracy unless the Knights Templar are involved".
 

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Posted by Amethyst (# 11068) on :
 
Yes, I saw it and there are a couple of posts about it on the 'Explaining fact & fiction' thread.

It was a repeat, and for what it's worth I think it was a load of bollocks, but it was rather teasing of BBC4 to show it straight after the DVC programme.

What irritates me generally about all this conspiracy crap is the lack of proper research, the acceptance of complete garbage without any question. I have one or two particular historical interests and time and again stuff is repeated which has been shown to be inaccurate.

Louise's fine post, which has been cited many times, should be widely circulated!

[ 03. May 2006, 10:27: Message edited by: Amethyst ]
 

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Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :
 
If I remember the novel, which I read some time ago,
They are out to get him, but They are a merely bunch of charlatans and madmen whose inspiration is his own fantasy. i.e. he and his friend made up the fantasy as a joke, and then a group of people took it seriously.

I remember the day in the life of the Knights Templar passage, and of course, 'the Jesuits always know everything'.

Dafyd
 

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Posted by blake (# 11370) on :
 
I think the authors of The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail were a bit cheeky trying to sue Mr Brown for pinching their idea when any self-respecting conspiracy theorist knows this is one that has been around for much longer than any of those writers, and has had many other books and articles written about it. The whole thing is an elaborate hoax going back to the 1960s, but with its roots in a local tourism-boosting scheme in Rennes-le-Chateau in the early twentieth century (read The Treasure of Rennes-le-Chateau, a Mystery Solved, by Bill Putnam and John Edwin Wood, Sutton 2003). People are so attracted by the idea that they don't bother looking into the history of where the idea came from.

Now, what Mr Brown should have been sued for, in my opinion, is producing such an incredibly badly-written book, irrespective of the subject matter. It really is awful. No characterisation, ill-connected plotlines, and riddled with shocking grammatical and structural errors. It does not appear to have been proof-read. In fact, it reads like a second-rate Hollywood action screenplay. And behold! that is exactly what it has now become.

Please forgive my ranting, but I have seldom been so traumatised by the flagrant abuse of the printed word. There's easy reading, and there's rubbish.

As for Foucault's Pendulum: not easy reading! I found it best to read it once, then go back to it a few months later. But I got a lot more out of it than I got from The Da Vinci Code.
 

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Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :
 
I suppose it all depends what you expect to get out of a good conspiracy-theory novel.

DVC was, IMO, a moderately reasonable read. Not too bad a story, if a little trite. But then DB is a second-rate story writer. If you want a good summer read, DVC works. The idea that anyone could actually take it seriously still amazes me.

FP, OTOH, was a far more serious look at conspiracy theories. It demonstrates why they are such rubbish. It is harder work, needs more attention to read, but rewards the reader with a really good insight into the essential elements of any good conspiracy theory. With a degree of factual or legendary information.

IIRC, DB missed out the Rosencrucians and the Nazi's in his book, so it really doesn't pass muster.
 

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Posted by leo (# 1458) on :
 
‘A lunatic is easily recognised…Sooner or later he brings up the Knights Templar.’ Umberto Eco, quoted in The Times.
 

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Posted by ken (# 2460) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by leo:
?A lunatic is easily recognised?Sooner or later he brings up the Knights Templar.? Umberto Eco

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