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Foucault's Pendulum

By Umberto Eco

(99)

| Mass Market Paperback | 9780345368751

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Book Description

"As brilliant and quirky as THE NAME OF THE ROSE, as mischievous and wide-raning....A virtuoso performance."
THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
Three clever book editors, inspired by an extraordinary fable they heard years befoe, decide to have a little fun. Randomly feeding esoteric bits of knowledgContinue

6 Reviews

1 person find this helpful

A satire of thrillers

Foucault's Pendulum is by far the most difficult novel I have ever read. I bet nine out of ten readers thought of abandoning it after 50 pages or so. I almost called it quits as well, because of the following frustrating reasons:
The language is unbelievably difficult. The origin ... (continue)

Foucault's Pendulum is by far the most difficult novel I have ever read. I bet nine out of ten readers thought of abandoning it after 50 pages or so. I almost called it quits as well, because of the following frustrating reasons:
The language is unbelievably difficult. The original Italian is translated into English, but all the other languages (e.g. French, German, Latin, etc.) are not - and there is a fair amount of those. Even if you skip all the foreign languages and read only the English parts, you'll still need a dictionary. But then no ordinary dictionary can cover all the esoteric terms used. So the best you can do is just skip all of them - about 10% of the whole book. But don't worry, it won't make a difference in understanding, because after a certain point you don't even want to understand anymore.
The subject material is extremely inaccessible to the average reader. Unless you already have some idea about subjects like cabalism, rosicrucianism, occult histories, western and middle-eastern religious societies and so on, you can't expect to know what the characters in the book are talking about. Umberto Eco assumes so much prior knowledge that this novel will only be enjoyed by readers well versed in occult stuff.
The plot is constantly side-tracked. Side tracks sometimes serve usual functions like background building and character development, but in this novel they just feel inconsequential. It feels as if Eco is trying to show off his wealth of arcane knowledge, which is impressive alright, but perhaps more suitable in a scholarly book, not a novel.
I would've quit reading too, if I hadn't come across a comment on the Internet regarding the book. It says that Foucault's Pendulum is intentionally difficult to read, especially in the first hundred pages or so, in order to discourage casual or impatient readers. Serious and perseverant readers, by persisting until the very end, will be rewarded by this very inspiring book. Piqued by this comment (which I later found to be false), I charged ahead in the book, bracing myself for the onslaught of literary monsters in every paragraph. I survived, and now I see the novel in a new light.
Foucault's Pendulum is actually a satire of thrillers. It is a thriller in itself, but it satirizes all thrillers that based their premises on religious conspiracy theories. Some people compare it to Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, but the comparison is inaccurate because the former is actually a prediction of the latter. Foucault's Pendulum makes fun of authors who look at disparate esoteric facts, dream up non-existent connections, and then cook up conspiracy theories with mass appeal. That’s very Dan Brown-esque, isn’t it? But Foucault’s Pendulum go deeper than just satirizing thrillers.
It reveals how fiction is turned into fact. In the novel, a concocted Plan develops a life of its own, attracts the attention and devotion of delusional conspiracy buffs, and ultimately consumes the lives of the Plan’s creators. Here the message is that there may be no clear dividing line between fact and fiction; fiction quickly becomes fact (or at least behaves like fact) when enough people believe in it. Practical jokes can backfire terribly if they are taken seriously by some.
It’s difficult to give a judicious review for this novel. The messages are instructive, the depth of the subject matter is impressive, but the intellectual challenge of the reading is just too overwhelming. I wouldn’t want to read another book like this – at least not for a few years.

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Holmes said on Sep 12, 2011 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

Foucaults Pendulum

Three friends decide to invent a conspiracy for their own profit, but will rue the consequences. A fantastic exposition of the whole conspiracy theory/secret history subculture, which makes this appear as daft as it is really is. Very dense prose which may put some of, as will the geeky subject ma ... (continue)

Three friends decide to invent a conspiracy for their own profit, but will rue the consequences. A fantastic exposition of the whole conspiracy theory/secret history subculture, which makes this appear as daft as it is really is. Very dense prose which may put some of, as will the geeky subject matter, but it was right up my street.

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Andy said on Dec 13, 2009 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

I wish I could sustain my interest beyond the first chapter, but somehow I'm struggling.

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Octoberon said on Apr 25, 2009 about the Paperback edition | Add your feedback

One of the densest, most intellectually challenging books I've ever read. Eco is all across the map, both figuratively and literally. Knights Templar, medieval conspiracies, occult societies, WWII Italy, 1980's computers, and much, much more. Providing that you can decipher the extremely dense ideas ... (continue)

One of the densest, most intellectually challenging books I've ever read. Eco is all across the map, both figuratively and literally. Knights Templar, medieval conspiracies, occult societies, WWII Italy, 1980's computers, and much, much more. Providing that you can decipher the extremely dense ideas and frequent historical and literary allusions, it's an extremely rewarding read. Beware of frequent titles and quotations in a variety of languages with no translations.

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Yandros said on Feb 14, 2008 | Add your feedback

http://blog.pixnet.net/celestechien/post/8152773

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Celeste said on Jan 13, 2008 | Add your feedback

The thinking man's Da Vinci Code?

Brilliant at times, but the plot falls flat at the end, and it doesn't have the driving urgency of Eco's The Name of the Rose.

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keithlaw said on Sep 13, 2006 | Add your feedback