Dan Brown

The Da Vinci Code

Corgi Paperback, 2004.

First published in 2003.

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It seems that I really should be ashamed of myself for having enjoyed this book a great deal; even more for rating it with the maximum five stars. Strangely enough, I am not. There are simple reasons for that: I picked up the book with as an unprejudiced mind as it is possible for human being to have and I didn't expect more than it could give me. So I found it gripping, compelling and fascinating read; a real page turner from cover to cover - and I had already watched the movie and knew pretty well everything that would happen; still the book hold my attention consistently, and that's saying a great deal. Certainly it isn't a book that is designed to make you think and enrich your personality. Far from it. It is book to be read solely for pleasure and entertainment. Is there anything so bad in that?

Before proceeding with this review there are two extremely important things about The Da Vinci Code that must be mentioned and stressed firmly since many people don't seem to remember them. This book is: 1) fiction; 2) a thriller. Now, let's look at some of the most debatable points about it; I fully realise that I myself must be a damned fool to bother with others' stupidity but then again, nobody's perfect.

Historical inaccuracy.
Did you expect historical accuracy in a work of fiction? If you did, you hardly know the meaning of the word 'fiction' or you are too lazy to read historical studies in order to gain some knowledge and you hope to get it in the easy way, through a novel. Obviously Dan Brown cannot hold a candle to Gore Vidal, for instance, but then again The Da Vinci Code is not a historical novel; not that it would have mattered if it was. A novelist is at full liberty to manipulate his facts, historical or not, in every possible way he chooses. His aim is to write a story, not history. His story must be coherent, plausible and convincing; and Dan Brown did an excellent job. Of course there are some improbabilities but no more that should be expected in a thriller. Now some of you may cry out: 'Ah, but Dan Brown said in so-and-so interview that everything in the book is true!'. He may well have. It only shows that Dan Brown is not a very intelligent man and as we all know, one can be an excellent novelist without being very intelligent. If the most readers of The Da Vinci Code had been so, they might have enjoyed a nice little game called 'read more history, learn something new and historically accurate about the fictional events described in the novel'; but it was not to be. For my part, beside a great deal of entertainment, the book did tickle my interest into reading more history about the Holy Grail, sacred feminine, the Knights Templar and so on. That's far more than it should be expected from a thriller and it is an excellent bonus indeed. But it is much harder, and requires much more mental power and application, than just to spill venom on how historically inaccurate the novel, a work of fiction, really is; obviously this is how most people fulfill heir characters. Well, there is no harm in it. Actually, it is rather amusing spectacle to watch.

The story wasn't new.
So what? Dr Johnson said more than two centuries ago that if a story is new it is unlikely to be good and if it is good it is unlikely to be new. The story of The Da Vinci Code is very good indeed. Moreover, it is told in skillful way that shows a good deal of excellent sense for dramatic incident. By the way, the story was new for me and I find it compelling. But that doesn't at all mean that I am going to accept everything in it as a gospel truth, nor do I have time, or desire for that matter, to waste my time and energy with scathing attacks on the historical inaccuracy of a novel, a work of - I repeat! - fiction.

The characters are dull.
Of course they are - they must be. For this a thriller, remember? And thriller is made with action, not with profoundly drawn characters of immense psychological depth. If you are looking for such thing in, I repeat, a thriller, you are looking in the wrong place. If you could find it, the book would not be a thriller. By the way, at least the main characters are not at all so badly drawn. Both in Robert and Sophie there is something; not much for sure but something nonetheless. Furthermore, the flirt between them is limited to five lines out of five hundred pages and that's something highly commendable indeed.

Dan Brown writes badly.
Well, if anything The Da Vinci Code is eminently readable. I call something 'badly written' if it is totally unreadable or utterly tedious; I found Dan Brown's style neither. His sentences can be somewhat clumsy sometimes but nothing terrible at all. Moreover, their meaning is rarely unclear. I surmise most of these accusations how badly Dan Brown writes are made by people who try to write themselves and are green with envy that somebody who doesn't at all write better (actually much worse, if you ask them) should attain such a popularity and make pots of money while their considerable merit still remains unrecognised by the world. It is very natural. I guess another reason for this may be the deep preconception in the minds of many people, who probably don't even realise how conceited they are, that something readable can have any value, that something popular must be valueless. It must be a great comfort for such people that what they read is not read by the common run of men because it so much above their intelligence. It is flattering for the human vanity, is it not?

The book offends a good many devout Christians and Christianity as a whole and so on and so forth.
Well, frankly speaking, all people who are offended as Christians and think their religion, nay their faith even, compromised by a work of fiction are - no apologies! - perfect morons. No excuses can be found and no allowances can be made for people who so obviously and so completely lack common sense. There is no obligation to read, much less to like, any work of - I repeat yet again - fiction; and if you don't have the slight amount of imagination, should you like it, to enjoy it, you'd better not read it at all. The tremendous religious hysteria that The Da Vinci Code has caused is just another perfect example for the uncommon stupidity of the human race as a whole.

Is The Da Vinci Code a great book? I don't know - and neither do you. Only time can, and will, tell this. I can certainly say it is an excellent thriller and since I think a book should be judged, if at all, only within its genre I have no hesitation to give it full five stars. Surely it is isn't a book designed to make you think or to develop your personality; it is such by design; so any accusations that it actually doesn't are simply pathetic. It is book to be read solely for entertainment and enjoyment. It is a thriller and the first and foremost you should ask from a thriller is to give you a thrill. If it does that, it does quite enough. I don't expect I will ever re-read The Da Vinci Code but I certainly don't consider the time spend reading it as lost. It's been quite a thrill ( )

I like the concept of the book but it's certainly not worth all the hype it's gotten. It's ok but don't expect anything spectacular ( )

Unfassbar ...: ...schlecht! Obwohl es mittlerweile fast 800 Rezensionen zu dem Buch gibt, muss ich mein Entsetzen hier festhalten.

Ich habe vorher noch nie etwas von Dan Brown gelesen und weiss jetzt auch warum. Um eine längere Reise zu überbrücken, habe ich es gewagt, das Buch an einem Bahnhofkiosk zu kaufen, wo es definitiv auch hingehört.

Ich kann mich den 1Stern-Rezensionen nur anschliessen. Die unheilvolle Allianz aus Indiana Jones und MacGyver - Story, gepaart mit dem Schreibstil eines Konsaliks, ist eine Beleidigung für das Papier. Die Darsteller sind so schamlos simpel und der mit einer Prise Esoterik und pseudo-wissenschafflichen Fakten angereicherte Plot dermassen dümmlich, dass das Gehirn beim Lesen schmerzt.
Ein Klischee jagt das nächste, wobei dem Leser null Fantasie zugetraut wird und einem die Emotionen der Figuren regelrecht aufgedrängt werden mittels plumpen Beschreibungen wie "er seuftze erleichtert auf", "mit ihm ist nicht gut Kirschen essen" etc. Dan Brown bzw. der Übersetzer fühlten sich offenbar bemüssigt, der Geschichte durch schülerhafte Adjektive, Adverbe und Standardfloskeln Leben und Spannung einzuhauchen.

Meine Skepsis sog. Bestsellern gegenüber wurde mehr als nur bestätigt. "Sakrileg" hat es geschafft, meine ohnehin schon bescheidenen Ansprüche um Längen zu unterbieten. Angesichts meiner Erwartungen wirklich eine reife Leistung.

2003 ( )

Very good. ( )