This engrossing novel by Italian writer, historian, and philosopher Umberto Eco has been described as the “thinking man’s ‘Da Vinci Code’ “. Having read both, I must say I have felt quite distinct feelings after reading the two novels. Whereas ‘The Da Vinci Code’ read like yet another thriller, albeit with a controversial theme, ‘Foucault’s Pendulum’ reads like a scholarly work. It is almost a reference book on Western occult and secret societies.
Although the novel has liberal doses of occult, religion (mainly Judaism and Christianity), and medieval history, the real theme is psychological. It is about how people believe outlandish conspiracy theories that, though internally consistent, may be entirely imaginary explanations of history or the real world.
Jacopo Belbo, Diotallevi, and Casaubon are three editors at Garamond Press, a small publishing firm in Milan, Italy. Casaubon, the narrator of the story, is a PhD student specializing in the history of the ever-fascinating Knights Templar. In publishing a series on occult literature, satirically named ‘Isis Unveiled’, they review dozens of occult texts written by several authors, whom they term ‘the Diabolicals’, in jest. From one such encounter with an author, they get an idea to formulate a ‘Plan’ of their own, based on all kinds of obscure occult, religious and historical texts that would give a new interpretation of the great secret of the Knights Templar and the few dozen secret societies that have been associated with the Templars over the centuries. They immerse themselves in the task wholeheartedly, initially aware of the purely fictional nature of their work. Their effort is meant to be a satire on the work of the Diabolicals. But, as they actually use all their knowledge and references to create a Plan that is remarkably consistent in all its details, they begin to suspect that it might really be the truth. Belbo and Diotallevi are particularly consumed by this thought, while Casaubon is very proud of their creation.
And then, as the summary on the back cover of the book says, ‘the Plan begins to take over’. Diotallevi dies of cancer, but attributes his death to their attempt to flout Jewish Kabbalistic norms and rewrite history. Certain people with deep occultist interests and beliefs, including some Diabolicals, get wind of the Plan, and they believe in it without question. They come to think that there is a secret which the three editors know, and which, despite their being members of obscure secret societies, they don’t. So they lure Belbo into a trap where he perhaps meets his end. The novel ends with Casaubon being anxious about his own end at the hands of the occultists, although the reader may never be completely certain that there are indeed such conspirators pursuing Casaubon.
(The plot and background of the novel can be found in some detail on this Wikipedia page.)
That is the beauty of the novel. By the end, fiction has got so mixed up with reality that one doesn’t know what to believe. That is the power of conspiracy theories with supposedly deep, earth-shaking secrets.
This is not a fast-paced thriller, and the pace quickens a bit only towards the end. Nearly two-thirds of the novel is a leisurely development of the plot, a few sub-plots, the Plan and the characters. It is full of (at times, exhaustingly full of) arcane religious rituals, secret societies, historical figures that supposedly were involved in the grand plan of the Templars. Indeed, the Plan is so carefully woven by the author that at times, it really seems true.
The book’s structure is also based on Jewish Kabbalah – divided into ten parts that are based on the ten Sefirot in the Kabbalah. In Kabbalah, a seeker gains incremental knowledge of the universe and of God by mastering each succeeding Sefirah. Similarly, with each succeeding part in the novel, the reader knows something more about what is really happening. Each chapter starts with a quote (mostly from really obscure, esoteric texts) that is appropriate to the advancement of the story in that chapter.
And finally, you wonder how one man could conceptualize a creation so complex, and yet so simple. As one of the blurbs on the book says, it is ‘endlessly diverting’. It has thrown up a huge number of leads in terms of further ‘research’ for me – occult, the fascinating world of secret societies, Western theology and history.
