"Oh what a tangled
web we weave, when first we practice to deceive."
Sir Walter Scott
Winter 2003
Volume I,
issue 3
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"Oh what a tangled
web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." |
Winter 2003 |
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Lisa Polisar is a writer and a musician from New Mexico. Her debut
thriller, Blackwater Tango, was published in hardcover in November of
2002, and her second mystery, Knee Deep, debuts in
December of 2003.
Currently a staff writer with Crosswinds Weekly, and a fiction editor of the 12 Gauge Review, she also writes a monthly mystery-spoof article in New Mystery Reader magazine. Direct correspondence to Lisa@LisaPolisar.com or editor@lifeloom.com. Ms. Polisar's website is lisapolisar.com. |
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| Literary
Amphetamines: A Review of Dan Brown's Latest Opium of the Masses |
Without stripping this book of its high-concept sophistication, it's a scavenger-hunt adventure written from the same literary "blueprint" as Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone. This formula has been recycled thousands of times all the way back to Homer's Odyssey and beyond. You have a hero, and the hero must be surrounded by one or two close confidantes. The hero must have a quest, the fulfillment of which largely determines his future, his sense of well-being, and possibly the future of mankind. And don't forget the diabolical villain, who constantly threatens the hero's plan to fulfill his quest.
Pepper this basic formula with a mélange of elements that give the story atmosphere and depth. What's left is a Pandora's box jam-packed with secrets in every conceivable size and shape – invisible pens, indecipherable codes, basements reached by hidden staircases, emblems, ancient talismans, and 2000 year-old secret societies. Harry Potter has them. The Da Vinci Code (DVC) has them as well.
Does this mean bestselling author, Dan Brown is secretly penning young adult fantasy novels? What we're really comparing here are two publishing phenomena. Other than this month's newest Harry Potter release, DVC has been the publishing sensation of the year. With over a million copies in print, unprecedented foreign sales and a track record of 24 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, you have to wonder why everyone's suddenly reading the same thing. Does it promise a miracle fix for flabby thighs or male patterned baldness? DVC delivers its literary punch by unveiling a host of scandalous secrets and exposing the most elaborate cover-up of all time. And herein lies the real power of this amazing story: through the course of a 449-page book, Brown takes on the chore of debunking every truth we have ever been told… about Catholicism, even Christianity. You can't read it without repeatedly thinking, "Oh my God, can this possibly be true, and if it is, how did I not know about it?"
The Holy Grail. I see you rolling your eyes, thinking, "God, not this again." Well don't jump to conclusions; this is no typical grail-hunt. Hidden deep in the heart of this convoluted story, Brown serves up a panoply of incredible yet supportable theories, involving the Merovingian lineage descended directly from Jesus, and the presence of Mary Magdalene in Da Vinci's The Last Supper. In short, the Holy Grail, within the context of DVC, is not a chalice…but a woman.
Holy Grail stories have been spewed through many guises, from Monty Python to Indiana Jones. But here, Brown is presenting a classic struggle between two formidable forces – one that wants to protect, and another that seeks to destroy, this greatest secret of all time. The protector, Priory of Sion (a/k/a Knights Templar), is a society assembled to protect the secret of the Holy Grail. Opus Dei, loosely known as the mafia-arm of the Catholic church, represents the malevolent force chasing the main characters through their tangled web of unsolvable puzzles.
But there’s a much larger issue looming behind these ideas: Christianity’s purposeful squelching of the feminine goddess figure. Every piece of DVC’s plot revolves around this unifying theme – that pre-Christian paganism was dominated by goddess worship, and this idolatry of the divine feminine proved threatening and was ultimately deflated by the all-powerful church. Brown contends that the church changed history to reflect a more male-dominant guise. Numerous Catholic publications condemn DVC as infecting readers with a warped view of history and undue hostility toward Catholicism.
When asked how much of DVC is based on truth, the author says, “All of it. The paintings, locations, historical documents, and organizations described in the novel all exist. Photos of the paintings and locations can be viewed in art books or on my website.”
Brown says of its controversial nature, “…the secret I reveal is one that has been whispered for centuries. It is not my own. Admittedly, this may be the first time the secret has been unveiled within the format of a popular thriller, but the information is anything but new. My sincere hope is that The Da Vinci Code, in addition to entertaining people, will serve as an open door to begin their own explorations.”
The Secrets
The tangled plot of DVC follows Harvard symbologist, Robert Langdon and French cryptologist, Sophie Neveu, who team up to investigate the bizarre, ritual death of The Louvre’s renowned curator, Jacques Sauniere. The story’s mythology progresses through four parallel threads – that of Langdon and Sophie, the French police force hunting them, a villainous monk, and a corrupt bishop. Langdon, a quirky intellectual with a Mickey Mouse watch, makes for a rather bland protagonist if not for fiery, young Sophie. The highly stylized death of Sauniere, Sophie’s estranged grandfather, launches her and Langdon into a multi-layered odyssey…through time, the world of symbolic art, and through hidden religious sects.
The most exciting elements of this story involve revelations about the life and works of Leonardo Da Vinci. Think about it – how much do we know about him? Nearly nothing. Multitudes of other famous artists have been depicted, dissected, and glorified through high profile, commercial films – Mozart (Amadeus), Beethoven (Immortal Beloved), Van Gogh (Vincent and Vincent and Theo), Picasso (too many to name). Lesser-known films were made about Gaugin, Warhol, Rembrandt, etc. And yet a quick Google-search reveals just one documentary on Da Vinci, entitled The Life of Leonardo Da Vinci (1972, Renato Castellani, dir.).
Why do we know so little about this legendary renaissance man who some consider the greatest genius of all time? Da Vinci’s (1452-1519) work covered four main themes – painting, architecture, anatomy, and mechanics. Centuries before anyone else, he designed blueprints for the invention of weapons, the bicycle, a helicopter, and an automobile. He designed canals and underwater exploration gear, and was forever fascinated with the intricacies of the human body as they related to science and nature.
But Leonardo’s real intrigue lies in his association with the world’s oldest secret society. The Priory of Sion, founded in 1099 by French King Bodefroi de Boullion, is a real, documented secret order still in existence, whose members at one time included Sir Isaac Newton, Boticelli, and Victor Hugo, among others. The Priory has, through history, clung to a two-fold purpose – to protect the real truth about the Holy Grail and the integrity of the Merovingian line.
Aside from his clandestine affiliation with the Priory of Sion, DVC also portrays the artist as highly spiritual, a flamboyant homosexual, a pagan who exhumed corpses to study human anatomy, a writer who kept journals written in backwards-script – in essence, a rebellious, artistic genius of grand proportions.
Is your head spinning yet? The mind-boggling density of historic facts gives DVC a Clancy-ish slant, where the lines between fiction and nonfiction are more than just blurred. When asked how he constructs such a complex book without bogging down the pace of the story, Brown compares writing thrillers to making maple sugar candy. “You have to tap hundreds of trees…boil vats and vats of raw sap…evaporate the water…and keep boiling until you've distilled a tiny nugget that encapsulates the essence…For every page in The Da Vinci Code, I wrote ten that ended up in the trash.”
Inventing a Bestseller
This book’s hypnotic, widespread acceptance comes from two distinct fronts. Its broad appeal is directed toward X-Files fans, history buffs, code breakers, treasure hunters, conspiracy theory junkies, and all levels of fallen Catholics. What does that tell us about its commercial success? Nothing. No matter how potent a story is, no one’s going to read or buy it…if they don’t know what it is. That’s where the elusive world of marketing comes in.
Marketing is a largely subliminal science, based in part on consumer-statistics, sociology, and psychology. In order to properly publicize a thriller of this magnitude, marketing personnel must anticipate the public’s response to a particular book, and understand precisely what void it will fill – on the bookshelves and with readers themselves.
Timing is another key ingredient to creating a wide literary reception. “In February when DVC was released,” comments Jeff Trachtenberg, Marketing Editor with the Wall Street Journal, “nothing else was really out there to compete with it except for John Grisham’s King of Torts – a legal thriller.” So with very few other “big books” launched in February, and none of them even remotely close to the twisted subject matter of DVC, it becomes easier to saturate the book-buying market with just one title. “Older books play a significant role in this media bombardment,” Trachtenberg continues. “People read DVC and immediately devoured all remaining copies of Brown’s earlier books, like Angels and Demons and Digital Fortress. This prompted publishers to reprint new editions of these books in response to the incredible demand.” So all of a sudden, an author like Dan Brown traverses the literary world to become water cooler fodder at every American business.
Nancy Rutledge, owner of Book Works in Albuquerque, claims that independent bookstores made the book pop. “The publisher’s advance reading copies helped tremendously, because booksellers could read the book and get excited about it before it was actually out,” said Rutledge. She noted that Book Works dedicated an entire mantelpiece to stacks of DVC, displaying it beside related books such as The Chalice and the Blade and books on the Holy Grail as well as Da Vinci’s art. “We labeled The Da Vinci Code as our summer reading pick and displayed personal notes from staff touting the book,” explained Rutledge.
So many “great books” turn out to be fleeting trends that fade nearly overnight. This will not be the case with Dan Brown. He is already at work on the sequel, and Columbia Pictures has just acquired the motion picture rights. The Da Vinci Code is a drug worse than nicotine. Because once you get a taste of the illicit nature of its forbidden secrets, you just can’t get enough. A scholar and, no doubt, one of the most potent storytellers of his generation, Dan Brown has earned himself the title of revelationist – the pre-eminent master of denouement – forever tearing down curtains and exposing the horrendous truths and shattering lies behind them.
Copyright 2003 by Lisa Polisar
The Web Mystery Magazine is an on-line quarterly journal dedicated to investigating the mysterious genre in print, in film, and in real-life. The Web welcomes well-researched, well-written articles and reviews. Writers are invited to send letters and inquiries to editor@lifeloom.com.
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"Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." |