The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown

DapperGent

ObeyGiant wrote:

That's almost the blurb from the back of the book, taken verbatim. So I don't think spoilers were too necessary.

I'm actually not one who reads the back of books as I reckon they give away a little too much also.

I will admit I'm hyper sensitive in the area of spoilers though.

solas

after reading this thread earlier I was inspired to do a bit of googling on some of the information in the book, I picked up at wikipedia lots of relevant stuff, but the name plantard rang a bell, I thought I had heard it years ago in association with the murder of the french woman down in cork (if anybody remembers) so I did a search and found no match to the name.
Then, as I was flaking through the info on the priory of sion at wikipedia, I came across this..

"Between 1961 and 1984 Plantard contrived a mythical pedigree of the Priory of Sion claiming that it had been founded in Jerusalem during the First Crusade by Godfrey de Bouillon. Research in the Rennes-le-Château mysteries led Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln to the pseudohistorical Secret Files of Henri Lobineau, compiled by "Philippe Toscan du Plantier," that became the source for their book, Holy Blood, Holy Grail, in which they reported claims that..[/snip]"

Somehow I had thought the womans name was plantard, but then I saw the name tuscan du plantier and I remembered that was her name, did a search and as it turns out he is the father of Sophie tuscan du Plantier, who was murdered in west work 7 years ago.

I genuinely got the name plantard mixed up, but coincidently the actual name I was thinking of pops up in the same theme, which I think is a bit strange.

/edit
k..I just realised he isn't her father, but wonder if they are related.
oh..and apologies if this post seems off topic (yet contains plenty of links to information re dvc at wikipedia)

L!aM

Personally, I prefered Angels and Demons.

nesf

RuggieBear wrote:

I happened to enjoy both books but would never really compare them....The DVC is the Bigmac to the Cryptonomicon's four course meal with quality wine.

I agree completely. The DVC is standard garden variety fiction for reading on a day when you're brain is tired and wants the literary equivilant to daytime TV. To claim it's a wrok of literary genius is not something that any sane/educated person would do. That said it's not a history book, and it's not aimed at intellectual readers. Umberto Eco's work is inaccessable to most "regualr" people and is not going to be read by them.

I find the vehimence that people have with this book to be unsettling. It's a popular mainstream fiction novel. Usually novels in this catagory are not going to be either brilliantly researched, intellectual, unique or ground breaking. They tend to be fast paced and easy to digest. I personally don't think it's worth getting worked up about DVC's obvious flaws in plot and writing style. It's a semi-good story for the type of book it is. Leave it at that

sprinkles

L!aM wrote:

Personally, I prefered Angels and Demons.

So did I, but I thought the end of Angels and Demons lacked alot. That said so did the DVC. I wasn't overly impressed with either. They are a good read but nothing to cry from the roof tops about.

billy the squid

Finnished this book tonight I liked it, but after 26 chapters of angels and demons which i started today, there seems to be more comic relief in it.

Plenty of good twists in the Da Vinci Code, but I thought that some parts of it were a little long winded.

The showdown at the end was a little dissapointing, I would have liked to know whether or not Opus Dei did or did not get booted out of the Catholic Church at the end

despite its faults, i would rate this book as unputdownable though. generally a good yarn.

fade2black

A couple of things....When I got into The Da vinci Code I did what I do when I start and like any other book - I go out and buy everything else the author has done. I'm a writer myself and I too have put a book together but I have to say that after DVC things went down hill. Firstly..no writer should get overly friendly with the same word, it seems Mr. Brown is shagging the word incredulous..it popped up everywhere, repetition is one of my pet hates. Next, same protagonist in Angels and Demons...and almost identical female counterpart....by the way...did he dump the girls at the end of each book or what...maybe he's just a bit of a lothario..

DVC was interesting but Brown used the power of the topic to rape his readers I think...and they were all left wondering in the end what actually happened. What was true and what was made up...Im not fond of this type of writing, it's either fact or it's fiction. Sure you can throw in some universally known true info but what Brown did was a bit of a kop out methinks...

Digital Fortress and Angels and Demons are just poo.

comet

I don't know, I think Hanks is a decent choice to be honest

Cactus Col

On Richard and Judy last week (I was in the Gym and Star Trek was on ads), Hanks said he hasn't been offered it.

theCzar

billy the squid wrote:

The showdown at the end was a little dissapointing, I would have liked to know whether or not Opus Dei did or did not get booted out of the Catholic Church at the end

It wasn't really up to Dan Brown! According to the google results of "Opus Dei" they're still a prelature

Bungalow Bill

I enjoyed this book when I was reading it, and was shocked at many of the little facts in the book. I then decided to do a bit of googling on some of the scandalous stuff and it turns out that they are not facts at all. 'Les dossiers secrets' or whatever they are called have never been accepted by historians and are generally regarded as a hoax created by Pierre Plantard who thought he was a descendant of Jesus. The catholic church never murdered 5million women, the figure is closer to 50,000 and they weren't all women. The picture of the woman at jesus' right hand side is not a woman it is john the disciple. Peter is not making a threatening gesture with his hand, it describes a scene from the bible where he whispers in his ear. The fact that the face looks feminine is more to do with the amount of retouches and repaints it has undergone, it used to look quite different. You will also found that Leonardo was a homosexual and this wasn't the only time he painted a feminine lokking man. The church did not meet at that council to decide whether jesus was divine or not, but more, how divine he was. And am I the only one who can't really see the perfectly formed 'M' in the last supper!
The dead-sea scrolls are not the discarded remaining gospels from the third century they are infact judaic writings. Apparantly a scrap of them may be a tiny bit of the gospel of Saint-Mark, thats all.
The book give the gnostic gospels which were written in the second century more credit than the ones written by the people closest to him and were written very close to the time when he was alive.
Normally I wouldn't bother researching something like this and I am by no means a god-fearing christian but people all over the world are taking this book as fact beacuse he basically is insisting that it is. One review on amazon called it further research of the bible, others called it the greatest book of all time. :rolleyes:

Lafortezza

Da Vinci Code = 7.5/10
Angels and Demons = 7/10
Deception Point = 5/10
Digital Fortress (half way through) = 3.5/10

I was impressed by the DVC despite all its failings and minor points that caused many a 'ffs' and 'wtf?'.
A&D was reasonably good but the other 2 books are total shíte.

carpocrates

Hi Everyone!!
I've only ever read four books in my whole life and the Da Vinci code is three of them. I just thought it was so great and I can't wait for the film too.
I've never read an academic historical book before but I have to admit this one was absolutely brill! Who would have though that all these artists and historical figures weren't just boring toss-wits who accomplished nothing after all but were all part of something really interesting like a giant conspiracy? Not me anyway! And that God had been invented by the Romans to enslave women? Suddenly society appears so clearly to me.
In conclusion I can recommend this book to everyone else who's never read a book before, you won't be disappointed!!

threebeards

Yeah good read but previously discussed.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=2228305#post2228305

LoLth

threads merged.

Goodshape

carpocrates wrote:

I've never read an academic historical book before

Before? Before what, exatly?

I really don't think the Da Vinci Code qualifies; it ranges from total fiction to theory and 'almost-fiction'. Not exactly historical or academic.

That said; Welcome to books! You'll find some of the most interesting things in the world between a couple of pieces of cardboard.

DapperGent

carpocrates wrote:

Hi Everyone!!
I've only ever read four books in my whole life and the Da Vinci code is three of them. I just thought it was so great and I can't wait for the film too.
I've never read an academic historical book before but I have to admit this one was absolutely brill! Who would have though that all these artists and historical figures weren't just boring toss-wits who accomplished nothing after all but were all part of something really interesting like a giant conspiracy? Not me anyway! And that God had been invented by the Romans to enslave women? Suddenly society appears so clearly to me.
In conclusion I can recommend this book to everyone else who's never read a book before, you won't be disappointed!!

The book is badly written bull****. It's not an academic historical book. It's bull****.

LoLth: mind your language. There is a censor on boards for a reason. getting around it using non-standard characters is still not allowed.

carpocrates

sigh...
...but what do you mean not an acadmic tome? Trawling google for convenient historical half-truths and fitting them awkwardly into a mystery story for idiots qualifies as academia does it not?

Hobart

carpocrates wrote:

sigh...
...but what do you mean not an acadmic tome? Trawling google for convenient historical half-truths and fitting them awkwardly into a mystery story for idiots qualifies as academia does it not?

I agree with you actually. Too many times, on this and other boards people google "facts" and present them in a " I knew this already but" type fashion. The truth is I could design a web page a present any "argument" as fact, it's pathetic tbh.

As for the book, I did find it badly written. The author seems to want to over emphasise the "edge of your seat" type novel, with every chapter ending on a cliff hanger.

He does appear to have taken a lot of poetic license wrt his interreptation of the historical elements within the book, but who knows he may have some points?

QC

I've tried to read Angels and Demons myself, but only got a couple of pages in before putting it down out of annoyance. The writing is appalingly bad. I wouldn't describe his style as plain and accessible, childish is more like it. Awful, awful stuff.

theCzar

The documentry on channel 4 last night gave DVC the trashing it deserved.

ObeyGiant

You think? I wouldn't be the Da Vinci Code's greatest fan, but I thought the documentary was completely redundant, and basically amounted to:
"Well, we think the theories put forward in the Da Vinci Code are good"
"Well, we don't"
"There you have it folks".

Ridiculous bumpf that didn't get to the meat of any of the arguments. But I guess that's what you get when you're just trying to cash in on something else's popularity.

theCzar

allow me to rephrase: the historical basis got a thrashing. I thought the show was nicely pieced together.

It wasn't one sided it talked to both sides. It talked to the people behind Brownes theories about their theories, and showed there was little historical basis to any of it, that the whole book is a house of half-truths out of context mixed total fabrication.

At the end Baldrick (he'll always be Baldrick to me) summed up it nicely, DVC is a decent, if unspectacular novel, with a fairy tale kind of story that everybody wants to be true.

I had nothing against DVC until the great unwashed jumped on it as the best book ever written.

positron

Well I suppose this was out of scope for last night's C4 program, but he did totally ignore the whole side of the book that talks about ancient symbols, the star, venus, how everything pagan is branded evil these days, and church's part in it and of course the books they found in Egypt - how could he have ignored all that lot? I think he toned it down a bit to suit the viewers, otherwise they wouldn't be too happy if he had to say something like church screwed up, or something of that sort, and thats IMHO!

ObeyGiant

But this is what I'm saying - I don't think the historical basis got a thrashing. We all know that the Da Vinci Code plays fast and loose with "facts", but the experts they got on there, for both sides of the argument, just couldn't do it. The scene where they 'debunked' the last supper is exactly the kind of thing I'm referring to:
"Well, it looks like a girl to me"
"Sure, but John was apparently quite effeminate, and Da Vinci was quite the homo in his time, so it's probably not a girl"
"Right so!"
All this without even mentioning some of the other oddities in this painting.

theCzar

As regards the experts, of course they couldn't have them stating that X is true/untrue, since they don't know for sure, e.g. last supper has been touched up and restored numerous times so the experts could only speak in vague terms and maybes, but that was part of the point, Browne drew conclusions where there were none to be taken.

As for the symbolism, Da Vinci is (reputably) gay, so it's hardly surprising if he did include feminine touches. Or maybe he's just painting his vision of the Last Supper, and all the rest is the academics justifying themselves (But that's just me talking)

growler

it's pretty difficult to categorically state anything involved as being fact, the only people who know for sure what did and didn't happen are all dead, self confessed experts on either side are , regardless of their qualifications, resorting to an informed (or not), but ultimately biased opinion.

If you believe that there's no smoke without fire, Brown creates so much smoke that many people end up believing that some of it must be true.


Having just read Neal Stephensons Quicksilver I can't see anyone getting mixed up between what's historical fact and what's fiction, maybe DVC just managed to attract a more gullible audience.

fade2black : isn't buying every book by an author a bit OTT ? you must have been well pished off with Dan Brown then

Talliesin

theCzar wrote:

As regards the experts, of course they couldn't have them stating that X is true/untrue, since they don't know for sure,

Well no, there are quite a few statements made in the book that we do have good documentary evidence that disproves them.

The book consists of:

• Known facts
• Allegations that are neither proven nor disproven
• Allegations that have since been debunked
• Ideas that were previously the accepted history, but which later research has disproven.
• Stuff the author just made up.

That is how authors write books.

erceefce

One of the better books which I have read the last years! :cool:

Ardent

erceefce wrote:

One of the better books which I have read the last years! :cool:

Lord help us. What kind of books do you normally read?!