The Da Vinci Code: A Guilty Pleasure?

[mmu1]

I like the odd story about mysterious cults, the templars, the Holy Grail, and the secret lives of great historical figures, but this was badly written garbage.

Tim Powers does a similar type of story (although with a fantasy element to it) a lot better - hell, so does whoever wrote the "Gabriel Knight" series of computer games.

 

[RaceBannon42]

I was totally engrossed in this book. I think I read it over a couple of evenings and found it to be a real page turner. Granted the character development was lousy but the twists and turns in the story, backed up with just enough historical fact/and or conjecture (w/ some misinformation too granted) kept me up reading late into the night to see where it would go. I found Angels and Demons to be the same. Neither were great works of fiction to knock those like Tolstoy, Hemminway, or Steinback off of the literature 101 reading list, but they were both a lot of fun to read.

 

[jarlaxlecq]

I was totally engrossed in this book. I think I read it over a couple of evenings and found it to be a real page turner. Granted the character development was lousy but the twists and turns in the story, backed up with just enough historical fact/and or conjecture (w/ some misinformation too granted) kept me up reading late into the night to see where it would go. I found Angels and Demons to be the same. Neither were great works of fiction to knock those like Tolstoy, Hemminway, or Steinback off of the literature 101 reading list, but they were both a lot of fun to read.

Same here. I loved it.

 

[Tarrasque Wrangler]

Given that very nearly the entire book is a lie, it's just par for the course.

Hmm. Was YOUR copy not filed in the bookstore's fiction department?

 

[Mark Chance]

Hmm. Was YOUR copy not filed in the bookstore's fiction department?

That's not the point. Anyone who's paid attention to Brown knows he claims things to be factual that aren't even at the same time he weaves them into third-rate fiction. Brown even goes so far as to include a "fact sheet" at the beginning of the novel. The problem is this: Many of his facts aren't.

The same dissembling occurs in this list of acknowledgements. For example, Brown thanks Catholic World News for helping him with his "research" for the novel. To quote the editor of Catholic World News, Phil Lawler: "Certainly we never did any research for him or answered any questions from him."

His bibliography of "reputable scholars" with which he researched his novel includes not a single author with the least bit of academic credibility. To front these pseudo-scholars and the musings of Brown's own rather pedestrian imagination as fact, which Brown does, is intellectual fraud.

One example of a "fact" from Brown's writing should suffice. According to Brown's "fact" page, the Priory of Sion-a European secret society founded in 1099-is a real organization. In 1975, Paris's Bibliothèque Nationale discovered parchments known as Les Dossiers Secretes, identifying numerous members of the Priory of Sion, including Sir Isaac Newton, Botticelli, Victor Hugo, and Leonardo da Vinci.

None of this is true. The Priory of Sion was a club founded in 1956 by four young Frenchmen. Two of its members were André Bonhomme (who was president of the club when it was founded) and Pierre Plantard (who previously had been sentenced to six months in prison for fraud and embezzlement). The group's name is based on a local mountain in France (Col du Mont Sion), not Mount Zion in Jerusalem. It has no connection with the Crusaders, the Templars, or previous movements incorporating "Sion" into their names.

These sorts of lies permeate Brown's recent work, tainting everything from his fanciful stories about the First Council of Nicaea, Constantine, Opus Dei, and the role of Mary Magadalene and Peter in the early Christian Church.

It isn't a defense to say that The Da Vinci Code is a work of fiction. Fiction can't change the basic facts about major historical figures and events without being subject to criticism when the book takes great pains to create the appearance of factuality, including placing a "fact page" at the beginning of the novel.

Brown has stressed the ostensible accuracy of the book on his web site and in interviews. This is not a case where an author and a publisher have produced an ordinary novel. They have gone to great lengths to mislead people into thinking that the novel has a historical basis. They deserve especially sharp criticism for this, and when criticism is made they cannot hypocritically hide behind the "It's just fiction" allegation after having made such extensive efforts to convince the reader that it is not "just fiction."

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

I like the odd story about mysterious cults, the templars, the Holy Grail, and the secret lives of great historical figures, but this was badly written garbage.

Tim Powers does a similar type of story (although with a fantasy element to it) a lot better - hell, so does whoever wrote the "Gabriel Knight" series of computer games.

I remember picking up Angels & Demons. That's the only book I've ever bought and taken back asking for a refund. I made it two pages in before deciding that I could not stand the writer's style. I've avoided Dan Brown like the plague ever since.

One little-known author I like is Daniel Easterman, who had a string of spy novels where the motivation involves religion of some sort...Brotherhood of the Tomb had a conspiracy involving Christ, while The Name of the Beast involved Armageddon. There are others involving Buddhism and Voodoo. He seems to have petered out, though, and is out of print mostly.

Brad

 

[Mark Chance]

There are others involving Buddhism and Voodoo. He seems to have petered out, though, and is out of print mostly.

I've read Easterman's The Ninth Buddha (IIR the title correctly). It was a pretty good book.

 

[ShadowX]

I remember picking up Angels & Demons. That's the only book I've ever bought and taken back asking for a refund. I made it two pages in before deciding that I could not stand the writer's style. I've avoided Dan Brown like the plague ever since.

One little-known author I like is Daniel Easterman, who had a string of spy novels where the motivation involves religion of some sort...Brotherhood of the Tomb had a conspiracy involving Christ, while The Name of the Beast involved Armageddon. There are others involving Buddhism and Voodoo. He seems to have petered out, though, and is out of print mostly.

Brad

Interesting. Any other books/authors with similar subject material? I like the Davinci Code for the puzzles. I could actually solve most of them with my meager knowledge. Which makes me wonder how they stumped the supposed experts in the novel...

 

[nikolai]

Brown has stressed the ostensible accuracy of the book on his web site and in interviews. This is not a case where an author and a publisher have produced an ordinary novel. They have gone to great lengths to mislead people into thinking that the novel has a historical basis.

I don't think these are fair criticisms. Brown's claims of fact are fairly minimalist. They're limited to the existence of all the architecture, art works, and secret organisations in the real world.

Your Priory of Sion example doesn't work. You first say "according to Brown's "fact" page, the Priory of Sion-a European secret society founded in 1099-is a real organization" and then comment that "the Priory of Sion was a club founded in 1956 by four young Frenchmen". So you accept that the Priory did exist? Which is all that Brown's fact page claimed.

 

[Warhoon]

I find it fascinating that the success of this work of fiction has birthed a resurgence of "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" pseudo-science works. In my local bookstores, "Da Vinci Code" and these works are regularly displayed together.

It's almost a real-life "Foucault's Pendulum". The author invents (although Brown has really "invented" little that wasn't invented before) the conspiracy and the woo-woo types hound him for his "secret knowledge".

Amazing.

Such a dearth of critical thinking in our society....