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While the typical conspiracy thriller depicts characters discovering signs of a conspiracy and then reacting to it, in Foucault’s Pendulum three characters invent a conspiracy theory as a sort of intellectual diversion. One of the characters, Casaubon, who also narrates the novel, is an academic who specializes in Medieval studies and who wrote his thesis on the subject of the . The other two characters, Belbo, and Diotallevi, work at a publishing company that puts out books on occult and esoteric subjects. Once Casaubon starts working at the publishing company, the three begin sharing ideas and, as a way of making fun of some of the more fantastic of the manuscripts they see in their work, they invent a conspiracy theory that they refer to as “the Plan.�

The Plan is ambitious, hypothesizing not only how the Knights Templar, the , the and the are connected with one another, but also how these secret societies are connected to , the , the and the . The three characters have among them a vast knowledge of European history, and because of this they are able to employ historic facts in their construction of the Plan, both as a way of connecting different parts of the theory together, and as a way of increasing its plausibility.

But, as Alexander Pope wrote, “A little learning is a dangerous thing.� As the characters work on increasing the historical accuracy of their theory, the line between fantasy and reality blurs and the characters begin to wonder whether the Plan is not just a fiction they thought up, but a real conspiracy that they are in fact discovering.

The line blurs for the reader as well. The Plan goes through a number of versions, each more complex than the previous, because with each new version the characters include another set of historical events or another secret society that was not mentioned in the earlier versions. Thus, once the characters have worked out a version of the Plan that describes the connections between the Knights Templar and the Rosicrucians, for instance, they discover a historical event or coincidence that will make it possible to include the Freemasons as well. To do this, however, they have to reinterpret the connections between the Knights Templar and the Rosicrucians. After such sets of connections have been drawn and re-drawn three or four times, it takes a feat of memory to keep any version of the Plan entirely sorted out in one’s mind.

Contributing to this blurring of fact and fiction is the paranoid logic of of the characters� thought processes: frequently, they will begin with a hypothetical connection between two historical facts and then build other hypothetical connections upon this first connection, supporting many of the subsequent connections with whatever historical facts seem to fit, with the result that sometimes one forgets which parts of the Plan are based in fact and which represent the fictional connections among those facts.

I found Foucault’s Pendulum challenging to read. I was not able to do it, but I suppose some ideal reader would be able to follow the details, both factual and fictional, of each version of the Plan, while keeping in mind an idea of how the general shape of the Plan is changing with each version. At one point, Casaubon supplies Belbo and Diotallevi with several pages listing a number of historic events, each of which might or might not be employed in the next version of the Plan. Casaubon’s narrative reproduces this list for the reader, without narratorial commentary, and while a reader with a strong grasp of European history and a good knowledge of the history of secret societies might be able to grasp what the list might suggest with regard to the shape subsequent versions of the Plan might take, I found as I read it that I was truly unable to see the forest for the trees.

This is not necessarily a bad thing, however. Eco’s novel depicts his characters overwhelmed by the connections they are able to make among various historical events, and if the reader is overwhelmed by those connections, perhaps he or she better understands what the characters are experiencing.

Difficulty level? Not as high as Gravity's Rainbow or Ulysses—you won’t need a companion or a reading guide or even to get through this one: Eco explains most of his references, and in fact much of the “action� of this intellectual thriller (with the emphasis on “intellectual�) consists of dialogues among the characters that could be read as essays, in dialogic form, on the different subjects the characters discuss. Like Platonic dialogues, but here instead of Socratic method becomes paranoia and the search for truth a search for the ultimate secrets of power.

Acquired Feb 12, 2011
Church rummage sale, Foster Road, Portland OR