Any Comments on Foucault's Pendulum?

[CAcyclist]

I have a friend who wants me to read this book. It sounds interesting. I'm just wondering if anyone here has read it and what they think. I selected Snow Falling on Cedars for him to read from my collection if he hasn't read it yet.

[Teaser]

1. It's an attack on Radical Postmodernism

Such as that espoused by Irigary and the Acoylytes of Michel Foucault, disguised as an occult mystery novel.

It also emphasizes the responsibility one has when creating "truths". Make sure you create the right ones.

Good book. Very dense.

[redqueen]

2. *Very* dense.

I recently put it down in favor of a couple other books, I was so fatigued with it. I'll pick it up again someday, when midterms aren't approaching fast.

[jfxgillis]

5. Whoops. Seems like you already ignored my advice.

If you're fatigued, you're trying to hard to keep track.

Don't. The "track" will emerge organically if you just ride the wave.

[redqueen]

16. Yeah, I can't help myself!

I will give it another shot later this year... right now I'm absorbed in The Annotated Lolita.

[CAcyclist]

38. Ok I finished it

I still don't know how I feel about this book. I spent the first 500 pages just astonished that anyone would string together all these disparate events in such a casual fashion. Maybe that comes from being a veterinarian. So many times, I have had a patient come in that looked and sounded exactly like it had some such and such disease so much that I started focusing on that specific direction too early only to have the labwork or the xrays come back later and flatly contradict me. People want you to tell them what is wrong immediately and it is such a temptation, but you have to remind yourself of all the differentials that exist until you have ruled them in or out in a step-wise fashion. You can't just skip ahead.

This book was all about skipping ahead. Finally, Lia breaks in and tells her husband that his theory is "all mud" and I wanted to cheer - finally the voice of reason! That is, until she goes on and on about her theory that it is all a laundry list and she makes conclusions based on the same sort of blindered reason, but in the opposite direction.

[Orrex]

40. By the way, that's what's commonly called a MASSIVE SPOILER

Sure, it's a 20 year-old book, but people still get upset when you reveal what ROSEBUD is.

Also, it's a mistake to skip ahead unless your only intent is to get to the end more quickly. If you actually want to read the book, read the book! :)

[CAcyclist]

41. What are you talking about?

I read the whole book - I didn't skip ahead - I meant that the protagonist was making tenuous connections. What's the point of having a discussion list if I can't discuss the book? Maybe you guys ought to tell me what the rules are around here.

I don't consider that what I said was a spoiler anyway. I didn't reveal the end of the book. Maybw this discussion list is just a waste of my time. I won't bother you guys here anymore.

[Orrex]

42. So brittle! (this post contains MASSIVE SPOILERS)

Well, you said that the book was all about skipping ahead. After you lamented the first 500 pages, I took "skipping ahead" to mean "skipping ahead" through the book, rather than reading the whole thing. Sorry if I misunderstood you, but I think mine was a reasonable interpretation of your statement.

Here's the basic rule: if you're going to divulge a major plot element, have the basic courtesy, in your subject line, to indicate "SPOILERS" or something to that effect. That way, someone who wants to read the book can do so without accidentally receiving a piece of info that can destroy his or her enjoyment of it.

Anyway, a great deal of the plot hinges on the idea that the "laundry list" really does represent a vast and arcane Plan. You didn't reveal the end of the book, but you certainly took the wind out of the book's mainsail.

If you think this discussion list is a waste of your time, then your next step is entirely up to you.

[jfxgillis]

3. Do not ... repeat ... DO NOT

allow the obscure and estoric references and allusions or the untranslated French phrases to interfere with the flow. You don't have to understand them, you're really not supposed to understand them at first. There'll be cumulative effect and you will get it as you get into the book.

The only thing you need to know is the French word "fou."

[RaleighNCDUer]

7. So what is the French word 'fou'?

After devouring 'Name of the Rose' I tried 'Foucault's Pendulum', but could not bull my way through it. Haven't tried it for about 10 years, butit is still in my library, in hopes that I can 'get it' when I grow up. As tomorrow is my 53rd birthday, I'm beginning to despair of that hope.

[jfxgillis]

18. I had to look it up--

--it means, roughly "mentally sick like a wild animal," possibly "rabid crazy."

[Bridget Burke]

35. "Le Fou" is the Tarot card known in English as....

The Fool.

[CAcyclist]

39. Thanks, I finished it.

I kept your advice in mind. I initially had a list of words to look up, but then just gave up on that.

[XNASA]

4. It's a difficult read, at first.

But ultimately rewarding.

Plus it's got all kinds of cool stuff about the Knights Templar.

[Orrex]

6. Excellent Excellent Excellent

You must read it this very instant! It's the definitive fictional work on all things conspiratorial. It even refers in passing to Holy Blood, Holy Grail, the pseudohistorical precursor to Dan Brown's overblown effort.

Eco's writing is quite dense but well worth the effort. It's a tragedy that The Davinci Code was made into a film, because Foucault's is a far superior book by any literary measure.

[bluestateguy]

8. Foucault is the most incomprehensible author I have ever read

and I spent many years in graduate school, so I read my share of gobbledygook, but Foucault was the WORST. Sheer gibberish!

[China_cat]

11. Never read Finnegan's Wake, I take it?

[bluestateguy]

14. No I didn't. "Discipline and Punishment" gave me a headache

So I didn't come back for more.

[China_cat]

19. Foucault's Pendulum

is Dick and Jane compared to Finnegan.

[mike_c]

24. the difference though is that Joyce is fun to read...

Reading Finnegan's Wake is like doing crossword puzzles or playing word games, although it really does help to have an annotated edition because of the many outdated topical references. But Eco seems just purposefully obscure. OK, I guess Joyce got pretty "purposefully obscure" in his later years too, but he still retains a fun sort of lyricism-- you read Joyce with your ears as much as with your eyes, or at least it always seems so to me. Eco's voice on the other hand is just so academic and dense.

By the end of Foucoult's Pendalum I felt like I'd been slogging so hard for so long that there was no joy in finishing it. I don't recommend it except as an academic exercise in modern literature, frankly. I just thought about Mark Twain's criticism of James Fennimore Cooper's novels, and it occurred to me what fun Twain would have had with Umberto Eco.

[Orrex]

28. But consider

There's a whole trend of current writers who belch forth tomes five hundred pages or longer, with few of those containing even 100 pages of worthwhile text. Have you ever read King's The Stand or any book by Crichton, Clancy, or Grisham? Eco, in contrast, is much better able to maintain an intelligent story over the long haul.

Comparisons to Joyce are, in my opinion, a trifle over the top, rather like saying that you can't possibly enjoy (insert movie name here) because it isn't Kurosawa.

Foucault's Pendulum is as fine a work of fiction as anyone is likely to find on the subject of massive, intricate conspiracy. If Joyce happened to write a such a novel, then please cite it so that I can read it at once.

[mike_c]

30. well, as mentioned down thread, there are other modern writers...

...like Thomas Pynchon who manage long, intelligent stories that do rise above the level of screenplay speculation. A post down thread mentions The Crying of Lot 49 for it's underlying conspiracy theme, but Gravity's Rainbow is probably a better comparison for sheer massive slogging and density, LOL. But Pynchon never seems to get as stuffy as Eco.

I realize this is ultimately a matter of personal taste more than literary merit. Umberto Eco is an important modern author-- I don't dispute that. But he's not really to my taste. I didn't like The Name of the Rose much better, I'm afraid.

[Orrex]

31. Why do you hate America?

Oh wait, he's Italian.

Yeah, taste is really the bottom line. For me, Joyce never seems to get above the level of trying to sound really, really impressive to his reader, though I know that that's hardly an intelligent critique.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm right and you're wrong.

It's simple, really.

(:sarcasm):

[mike_c]

32. LOL....

nah nah, nah nah nah!

:hi:

[China_cat]

34. It could be that it's the translation.

Eco doesn't write in English if I remember correctly.

Translators can make all the difference.

[Teaser]

13. This is a novel by Eco

and the Foucault referenced is the French Physicist, not the postmodernist. But there is a double allusion to Michel Foucualt in the books subject matter.

[Kire]

37. Wow

thanks for telling me that

BTW, I probably got twenty pages into Foucault's Pendulum, then I had to catch a plane and I never picked it up again. My copy is lost now.

[redqueen]

17. Did you read his academic stuff, or only the fiction?

Just curious...

[Orrex]

21. Uh, which book do you think we're discussing here?

Unless I'm missing a joke, which is entirely possible...

[acmavm]

9. I liked it. I like Umberto Ecco's In the Name of the Rose too. ( I

would never have figured out the movie if not for the book.) It is really involved and the plots is really twisted. Having said that, if you find you can keep up with it, the book is worth reading.

[soothsayer]

10. It's very good! A good read and interesting and educational to

boot, full of jolly good Knights Templar stuff. If you like it, you'll totally like the Name of the Rose.

I'm always trying to get folks to read Thomas Pynchon's "The Crying of Lot 49", and I think it's written in the same line as those above, but with (quite!) a bit more fun!

[longship]

12. Fairly good read.

However, it takes some effort. I did get through it, but I totally understand those who say that they set it down. It is very dense reading. Ultimately satisfying book.

[LouisianaLiberal]

15. Ahh, one of my favorite modern novels.

It is stunningly brilliant in so many ways. The first hundred pages or so can be confusing, but if you get through those pages it is definitely worth the time.

As Orrex said, it is a shame that FP was not given the budget and attention that DaVinci Code was given.

[ladjf]

20. What is the connection between the book and the actual

physics experiment proving the rotation of the Earth?

[Orrex]

22. Well, that would spoil the surprise, now wouldn't it?

But I'll tell you this much: the novel starts with the narrator hiding in a museum and reflecting upon the implications of the pendulum.

[ladjf]

25. Is he looking at a full size model of the Foucault Pendulum

experiment?

[Orrex]

27. That's how it starts, yes

But that's just the springboard--the story extends far beyond that experiment and its implications.

[ladjf]

29. Sounds fascinating. I'll get the book.

[CAcyclist]

23. Thanks all for all your comments!nt

[applegrove]

26. I'm going to have to wait for the movie again..

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

33. It's a good read.

It cycles back and force between insufferably boring gobbledygook to intense page-turning adventure.

But it's quite a bit different than Snow Falling on Cedars.

[Bridget Burke]

36. It's an intelligent conspiracy novel.

(Or, maybe not.) I enjoyed it thoroughly, although it's not light beach reading. But, relax--you WON'T be tested.

Want some more stories about the Secret Forces Behind Just About Everything?

* "Crying of Lot 49" by Thomas Pynchon. One of his lighter books, featuring an early reference to Yoyodyne Industries.

* "Mumbo Jumbo" by Ishmael Reed. The Wallflower League ("Lord, if I can't dance, no one will") & The Last Templar go up against Papa LaBas, owner of the HooDoo Kathedral in Harlem--during the Harlem Renaissance. The US has invaded Haiti & the loa are hungry. (One of my favorite books.)

* "The Illuminatus Trilogy" by Robert Shea & Robert Anton Wilson. The ultimate hippy mindfuck conspiracy trilogy--with lots of sex & drugs!