What Does It Matter! (On the Da Vinci Code, Foucault’s Pendulum & Other Matters)
August 13th, 2009
Read “The Da Vinci Code” in 2005, after deliberately ignoring it for quite some time because of the hype. And then saw the movie later.
Well, the wealth of information (esp. regarding symbols) is generally sound. But it doesn’t hold a candle to the erudition of Umberto Eco’s “Foucalt’s Pendulum.” (I have yet to understand the elaborate explanation of how Foucault’s Pendulum works…)
One thing I liked in the novel is the rather sympathetic portrayal of the head of the Opus Dei, Bishop Aringarosa. (Not so in the movie.) I’ve heard a lot of negative publicity regarding the Opus Dei and their founder Jose Ma. Escriva. (From the late Larry Henares, in his TV show and Philippine Daily Inquirer column, as well as from a Filipino priest who studied in a university run by the Opus Dei…) Bishop Aringarosa may be ultra-conservative in his theology but in the end, when the time came for his faith to be tested, his heart proved to be ultimately in the right place.
Also, it had a more hopeful, happy ending than “Foucault’s Pendulum,” which was darker and more poignant. Eco’s novel bewails the lack of understanding that so-called believers/enlightened ones have. Parang si Elsa sa Himala: “Walang himala! Ang himala ay nasa puso ng tao!”