So busy with classes, Fairfield students and professors don’t often have time to read a book of their choice. But many have made time for one special book.
Out for over a year, “The Da Vinci Code”, is still on this month’s New York Times Best Seller’s list.
“I read it first semester and it was absolutely amazing,” Ralph Acampora ’06 said about the murder mystery novel by Dan Brown. “It combines fiction, suspense and some historical facts.”
Jaime Bivona ’06 hasn’t read the book but said, “My roommate read it, so there’s a copy of it on our coffee table. Not a day goes by when someone doesn’t comment about having read it or wanting to read it.”
Many professors say they really didn’t want to read it but have done so to see what the fuss is about.
“I did read the book, only because so many people were asking me about it when it first came out,” said Dr. Martin Lang, professor of religious studies.
Dr. Philip Eliasoph, professor of art history, “burned through it last summer as a quick beach read.”
“[I] found it alarmingly seductive and yet horrifying with chapters flashing by in five pages,” said Eliasoph. He added that he was “disappointed as it moved towards its patently absurd crescendo but took considerable pleasure from the sleuthing/art world intrigue mixed with pseudo-art history and sketchy biographical data on the always enigmatic Leonardo.”
But it’s the mixture of fact and fiction in this book that have most people talking about the book long after they read it.
When he began reading the book, Professor Paul Lakeland said, “I didn’t think a lot of it was true. What seems to have made it a best seller is not its mystery plot, but its background information.”
The book includes religious facts pertaining to history, literature and current religious groups.
In addition, there is a short fact page before the story begins which states, “All the descriptions of art work, architecture, documents, and secret rituals in this novel are accurate.”
Lakeland said the information presented in Brown’s book could be categorized as “what’s true, what might be true, what’s possibly true and what’s not true.”
An example discussed was the information about Constantine, emperor of Rome in the early fourth century. Although Lakeland said that most of the facts pertaining to Constantine were true, there is evidence to contradict an idea expressed in “The Da Vinci Code” that he changed the text of the four gospels in the Bible.
As for the controversy surrounding Constantine’s baptism on his deathbed, which leads to assumptions that Constantine wasn’t Christian, Lakeland said that it wasn’t a common practice in those days.
Lang agreed, adding, “Constantine was focused on Christianity, built the first churches in Jerusalem and Rome.”
Both Lakeland and Lang agreed that the idea of a bloodline of Christ, which the is the main focus of the book, does not have any credible evidence.
Eliasoph advised readers, “Never take this master [Leonardo Da Vinci] literally…Leonardo withholds much information to keep us guessing through the centuries.”
Lakeland advises students, “It’s just a story. Don’t believe everything you read in the book. How odd it is that in a day when religious practice is in decline, how [people] don’t believe what’s in the Gospels, [yet] believe all of this information [in The Da Vinci Code]?”
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