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The DaVinci Code

by Dan Brown

Dan Brown has been called a genius. I don't know whether I'd go quite that far, but I'll certainly join the multitude who heap praise on this relatively new author. It requires skill to mix fact and fiction, and in The DaVinci Code we're left wondering what the ratio actually is. Mr. Brown does give us two important facts even before he begins his story, but The DaVinci Code supplies us with a scenario that could actually occur. Perhaps one of the reasons for this novel's extreme popularity is the steady decline of church and organized religious influence on today's thinking people. Those capable of thinking for themselves are rejecting any faith demanding belief in principles no longer viable.

The DaVinci Code cleverly includes information from non-fiction books such as 'Holy Blood, Holy Grail' of which readers who prefer fiction wouldn't necessarily be aware. Even fictional accounts of a very different Second Coming such as Glenn Kleier's 'The Last Day' didn't receive identical fame, although assuredly deserved. Dan Brown's major contribution to the world in this case isn't his excellent writing; it's his ability to bring the controversy between organized religious belief versus an individual's ability to formulate his/her own out into the spotlight of public opinion. The DaVinci Code questions Christianity and the Christian church's desire for power plus control, versus actual historical truth.

Dan Brown provides us with two facts which alone might give one pause. The organization known as Opus Dei, or God's Work, is an actual Catholic organization with a multi-million dollar edifice on Lexington Avenue in New York City. The Priory of Sion is also an actual organization, founded way back in 1099 to protect the truth behind what current Christian churches disseminate.

The DaVinci Code begins with the murder of the Louvre's curator, Jacques Sauniere. Eventually we know not only who the murderer is, but why he's killed three others before the curator. An American professor, Robert Langdon, currently lecturing in Paris, is awakened in the middle of the night by the Parisian DCPJ, or Judicial Police (equivalent to our FBI) and taken to view the curator's body. Jacques Sauniere was shot in the stomach, and in spite of immense pain, had managed to leave several clues before being overtaken by actual death. One of them was himself - completely naked, in the pose of DaVinci's Vitruvian Man - only with a pentagram on his abdomen, drawn with his own blood.

Agent Sophie Neveu from the DCPJ's Cryptology Department arrives and adds to Langdon's confusion when she privately advises him they are both in danger: The Judicial Police think Langdon killed Sauniere - who happened to be her grandfather.

Sauniere's involvement with the Priory of Sion comes to light, along with the reason Sophie and her grandfather were estranged for many years. Sophie helps Langdon to escape the DCPJ, and from then on The DaVinci Code becomes a race between influential believers from the Catholic church and those who want the truth uncovered.

It soon becomes evident that Sauniere's clues are one puzzle after another, testing Sophie and Robert's mental abilities to the limit. Add to this that their every gain is countered by a loss of some kind, and every discovery they make leads to a more complex conundrum. Every effort the pair makes toward solution of each code is simultaneous with attempting to foil the church representatives and the Judicial Police, both of whom are trying to stop them. Their final success, after a number of harrowing experiences and escapes, leaves the reader breathless, and the eventual discovery of the goal and location sought so desperately throughout the book leaves us with the question of exactly how much of this novel is truth. Where does the fiction really end?


The DaVinci Code is about equalizing male and female. The two thousand years of male domination through so-called Christianity has ended with the close of the Piscean Age. Before that, the Age of Aries declared the Goddess all-important, and the female was revered as the most sacred symbol. Now the Age of Aquarius is upon us, and with it, the balance between male and female energies. I found it interesting that in astrology, Pisces is a female sign and Aries a male sign - although humankind in general leaned toward the opposite in both ages! Dan Brown mixes his knowledge of astrology and the Tarot in with his erudite information on DaVinci and other famous names actually belonging to the Priory of Sion.

I could not put this book down - I started reading it late one evening and didn't stop until the final page, read at somewhere around four-thirty in the morning. Dan Brown has written three other books prior to The DaVinci Code, but none as informative or spellbinding. The book's success, staying at the top of the bestseller list for weeks, tells us not only that Dan Brown writes beautifully and knows how to tell a convincing story, but also that the American public is ready to devour any information available promising enlightenment and truth - even when disguised as fiction.

Alan Paul Curtis

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