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#21 |
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I've read it, a lot. I first read in in 2002, when I was seventeen, and haven't come across a more impressive novel since (even after reading all of Eco's other novels).
It's true that Umberto Eco isn't for the lazy readers, but I have never found his erudition too much. His books require a bit of attention from its readers, but are never too difficult or erudite. They're simply novels written by one of the greatest living intellects in the world, trying to teach us a valuable lesson through a great story. Eco is a semiotician, a master of words and signs. People have said that his first novel, The Name of the Rose can be used to explain the principles of semiotics, and it's hard to argue. It's a great novel; intellectual, deep, rich in atmosphere but above all: a wonderfully written story. Most of his imitators fail in matching the greatness of the Rose because they just follow the general blueprint that Eco laid down in his first novel: historical setting, labyrinthine plot, erudite dialogues and a shitload of pretentions. The ultimate recipe for intellectual recognition, and in many cases, for a surprisingly dull, bloated novel. They fail because they fail to recognize Eco most underappreciated asset as a writer: he's not only an intellectual, semiotician, philosopher and scarily accurate historian; he's also a masterful storyteller. That's why The Name of the Rose is so great, and why so many other are so dull. As good as that novel is, even The Rose falls short in comparison to Foucault's Pendulum, which is the single most impressive thing I've ever read. It has everything that made Eco's first novel so great blown up to the extreme; every single character is at least highly intelligent (with Lia being arguably the most impressively rational character ever written), the plot is constructed like a swiss watch, Belbo is Eco's most dramatically relevant character yet, and the ending is an eye opener that'll change the way you'll view, not only conspiracy theories, but reality in general. Readers of Eco have generally been divided into two groups; the ones who love him and the ones who hate him. In my experience, the ones that hate him are almost always the ones who don't understand him. They flame him for trying too hard to be difficult. While I can see why readers who are used to reading books by Dan Brown can see some truth in this statement, anyone who's read Eco's nonfiction will appreciate how his novels are simple Eco relaxing and having a good time. One doesn't even need to go so far as to read his semiotic works (which ARE very daunting); just compare Foucault's Pendulum to Gravity's Rainbow or Finnegan's Wake, and the argument of Eco being unjustly difficult goes right out the window. Eco's novels are simply as difficult and as deep as they need to be to get his point across. Nothing more, nothing less. Foucault's Pendulum has received the most of this kind of criticism, mostly because of the many, many conspiracy theories and passages in latin Eco throws at his reader. People get lost when they try to follow every single bit of information Eco gives them, when they should simply continue reading, and let the endless flow of information and conspiracies overwhelm them. The overall reading experience will be so much the better for it, and the ending will hit a lot harder when one tries to stay 'in the flow' of reading. |
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#23 |
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This is one of my favorite books because I think of it as a huge riddle.
There are a few things "wrong" about the premise of the novel. Firstly Casaubon writes the whole books (it's obvious that he writes the book not just remembers and/or narrates it to himself) from 6 p.m. to 3 a.m. - there's no way anybody could write 600 pages that fast. Most people are impressed by the multitude of references in the book, but forget the fact that Casaubon is -supposedly- remembering it all, somewhere in the first quarter of the book he mentions an obnoxiously long book title in Latin- there's no way anybody could remember that and that's precicely why Eco mentions it. Also things fall into place a bit too perfectly, somebody's always in the right place at the right time not only just in the Plan but in the story itself, people say that Casaubon is not a reliable narrator, I agree, but where does he start being unrelliable? Secret society who break into museum and can afford to sacrifice people? - I'm a bit skeptical about that. I'm not sure if I remember it well, but I think there's also an extra quote in the book- there were 120 quotations on Belbo's list, the book has 120 chapters and one chapter has two quotes at the begining. The question is which of the quotes was not on the list. I took the book back to the library a few days ago, so I can't check to make sure, but I think I'll reread it again sometime soon just to try to figure it out. I read Six Walks in the Fictional Woods right before I reread Foucault's Pendulum and I really don't think Eco was just sloppy about this kind of things. It amuse me because I've talked to other people who read it and nobody else noticed the inconsitencies, they were all just impressed at how intellectual and philosophical the novel is. |
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#24 |
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120
The number 5 is in chapter 5. Five is the number of the Goddess as in the five pointed star, Roman numeral V (as mons veneris) and the travels of the planet Venus (see Desantillana--Prologue to Parmenides) and in chapter 5 Lorenza is identified with Sophia. 5! (per nnyhav)=120 and 120 (babylonian)saroi=432000, another important astronomical number (see Campbell, In All Her Names). 120 is also a symbol of the Triune God: "The directional poles are critical to the interpretation of the numerical symbolism. The number 1 is associated with north and always represents the Creator God. The number 2 represents the Generative Word and zero is a placeholder that makes this a 3-digit number, and 3 is associated with the Spirit of God. With this in mind, the symbolism of the number 120 seems to be that the lifespan of the sons of Adam is the exclusive knowledge of God, God’s Generative Word and God’s Spirit." Just Genesis: Methuselah's Real Age In Genesis, 120 represents the span of human life. The number comes right out of the blue in FP describing the Rosicrucian tower just before the chapter on the Name. In their sense it represents more of a life span at the end of which a secret is revealed. Rosencreutz' headstone says: see you in 120 years. Eco certainly wants us to see it--it feels like every 10 pages--and you're correct, he was not sloppy about such things. |
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#25 |
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I've read both The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum and probably prefer the former, but mainly because I read it around the time I was studying a course entitled World Religions, which I studied immediately after another course on philosophy, and found the story to be easily the most breathtaking I'd ever read. Every page was immeasurably interesting and rewarding, and it just tied in with what I'd been learning with the courses.
With Foucault's Pendulum, I was equally as impressed, and every page prompted several "Wow! I never knew that" exclamations from myself, and several "Did you know..." conversation starters to my long-suffering friends, but the 'knowledge dump' didn't impress me as much, and I think, when I read this, I noticed its faults much more - which are the same in both novels, i.e. the untranslated Latin, which just gets in the way of reading. It's a shame, really, that the religion/philosophy was just a passing interest/obsession, and I think this is probably clouding my memory of both novels, but I'm glad that I read The Name of the Rose at the time I did. I would totally disagree with the statement that the first 70-75 pages [of Foucault's Pendulum] are tough to get through - the whole book is challenging, in my experience, but very rewarding also. When I read it, back in 2006, I was advised to ignore the information overload and just continue reading, a strategy which worked wonderfully. ETA: The number references in johnr60's post is very interesting, as is the unreliable narrator idea in andy.'s post - I would agree that the unreliable narrator is an intentional literary technique rather than Eco being sloppy. |
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