Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco
"Foucault's Pendulum" is a novel by Umberto Eco that intricately weaves themes of conspiracy, knowledge, and the quest for truth through the lives of its characters. The story centers on Jacopo Belbo, a senior editor at a Milan publishing house, who finds himself ensnared by a group of occultists known as the Diabolicals. They believe Belbo possesses a secret map or code that is crucial for their esoteric mission. In a parallel narrative, Casaubon, a junior editor, rushes to Paris in a desperate attempt to rescue Belbo while hiding in the Musée des Arts et Métiers, home to the famous pendulum of Léon Foucault.
As Casaubon reflects on his past encounters with Belbo and their involvement in a mystery surrounding the Knights Templar, the lines between intellectual exploration and dangerous obsession blur. The novel explores the consequences of their intellectual game, initially dismissed as harmless, which escalates into a serious matter with deadly implications. With elements of magical realism and philosophical inquiry, "Foucault's Pendulum" invites readers to contemplate the nature of belief, the search for meaning, and the fine line between fiction and reality. This complex narrative is a testament to Eco's literary prowess and his ability to engage with profound themes through the lens of an intriguing storyline.
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Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco
First published:Il pendolo di Foucault, 1988 (English translation, 1989)
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Satire
Time of plot: 1970-1984
Locale: Milan, Paris, and Rio de Janeiro
Principal characters
Casaubon , a historian employed by a Milan publishing firmJacopo Belbo , a senior editor at the firm and a former political activistDiotallevi , an editor interested in Jewish mysticismGarramond , owner of the publishing firmColonel Ardenti , the author of a book the firm considers for publicationAgilè , an aged occultist claiming to be the comte de Saint-GermainInspector Di Angelis , a policeman investigating Ardenti’s disappearanceLorenzo Pelligrini , a beautiful woman loved by BelboAmparo , a beautiful Brazilian woman loved by CasaubonLia , Casaubon’s wife
The Story:
Jacopo Belbo, the senior editor at a publishing house in Milan, Italy, is taken hostage by a shadowy group of occultists. These Diabolicals, as Belbo thinks of them, are convinced that he possesses a secret map or code. They are determined to get hold of it so they can complete the task they believe their society was set up to accomplish. Casaubon, the firm’s junior editor, rushes to Paris, hoping to save Belbo’s life and perhaps his own. He hides in the Musée des Arts et Métiers (Museum of Arts and Trades), where the famous pendulum of Léon Foucault is housed. Casaubon’s investigations have led him to believe that the occult society will gather there at midnight that night, as the moment of the summer solstice approaches.
As he waits in hiding, Casaubon thinks over the events of the last dozen years: He first meets Belbo when in a Milan tavern that serves as a meeting place for students and workers of every political persuasion; it has always seemed to him to resemble Rick’s bar from the 1942 film Casablanca. He is then a doctoral student in philology, writing a thesis on documents pertaining to the medieval Knights Templar. Belbo is reviewing a manuscript submitted by a retired army colonel that purports to solve the mystery of the Templars’ lost treasure. Just as Casaubon is brought into the office, where he briefs Belbo and the other editor, Diotallevi, on the Templars, the manuscript’s author disappears, and the three men of letters become caught up in a police investigation.
Casaubon leaves Italy shortly afterward, following a beauty named Amparo back to her native Brazil, where he teaches for the next two years. Returning to Florence in the late 1970’s, he is unable to secure a teaching position and therefore becomes a literary researcher, modeling his agency on that of Sam Spade, the detective hero of the 1941 film The Maltese Falcon. He is soon doing research for Belbo’s firm and before long is a regular fixture in the editorial office. He marries and awaits the arrival of his first child. Then disaster strikes.
An adviser to the press, an old occultist who hints that he has been active for several hundred years, invites the editors to a Rosicrucian ritual in a country villa. They attend and witness the mysteries not forbidden to outsiders, but Belbo is shocked to learn that the old man is after his beautiful mistress and seems to have won her affection. Madly jealous, Belbo later decides to make the old man envy him. He therefore intimates that he has the secret map or code that seemed to have been lost when the colonel disappeared some years earlier.
Belbo soon regrets his rash claim. He had thought the search for this code was an intellectual game. The three editors devised rules on their own for deciphering the code and figuring out what they called “the plan.” They never suspected that people would take the game so seriously that they were prepared to kill.
By the time Belbo disappears, Diotallevi is in the hospital. He is dying of cancer, half-convinced that the deadly cells multiplying in his body represent a sort of divine judgment on his efforts to crack the Kabbalistic code. Meanwhile, Casaubon has decided that the new life growing in his wife’s womb is far more magical and important than any occult plan. When he goes in search of Belbo, he is trying to protect both their safety and their sanity.
Bibliography
Barranu, Manuela. “Eco and the Reading of the Second Level.” In Illuminating Eco: On the Boundaries of Interpretation, edited by Charlotte Ross and Rochelle Sibley. Aldershot, England: Ashgate, 2004. Applies Eco’s concept of “second-level” reading to identify formal properties in the novel. Includes a time chart placing episodes of the plot in chronological order.
Bennett, Helen. “The Limitations of Openness: Foucault’s Pendulum and Kabbalah.” In Umberto Eco’s Alternative: The Politics of Culture and the Ambiguities of Interpretation, edited by Norma Bouchart and Veronica Pravadelli. New York: Peter Lang, 1998. Discusses the representation of Kabbalah in Eco’s novel and relates the text to Kabbalistic traditions of textual interpretation.
Bondanella, Peter. Umberto Eco and the Open Text: Semiotics, Fiction, Popular Culture. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Chapter 6 summarizes Eco’s comments on “over-interpretation” and “paranoid interpretation” and discusses them in connection with Foucault’s Pendulum.
Farronato, Cristina. Eco’s Chaosmos: From the Middle Ages to Postmodernity. Toronto, Ont.: University of Toronto Press, 2003. Chapter 4 includes a section on readers’ complicity in crime, as presented in Foucault’s Pendulum. Chapter 7 continues the theme while considering Eco’s adaptation of the whodunit form.
Francese, Joseph. Socially Symbolic Acts: The Historicizing Fictions of Umberto Eco, Vincenzo Consolo, and Antonio Tabucchi. Madison, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2006. The chapter on Eco discusses his theory of reading. A section is devoted to Foucault’s Pendulum and the different kinds of reading that its characters demonstrate.
Hutcheon, Linda. “Irony-Clad Foucault.” In Reading Eco: An Anthology, edited by Rocco Capozzi. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. Discusses Eco’s response to Michel Foucault, the literary and cultural theorist.
Naparstek, Ben. “’I Invented Dan Brown.’” Jerusalem Post, December 13, 2007. Discusses Eco’s reaction to Brown’s The Da Vinci Code.
Rushdie, Salman. Imaginary Homelands. London: Penguin, 1991. Section 9 includes an essay on Eco’s fiction. Rushdie much prefers The Name of the Rose to Foucault’s Pendulum, which he finds “devoid of characterization” or humor.