Just lunatic ravings akin to the ones that drove Eco to romanticize about love, lust, knowledge, etc. Is it a fantastic twist? A conspiracy centuries in the making? No. Most, by the time they get there, will already know who the culprit is, and given the setting and the tools the protagonists are carrying, what will happen in the final scene. Provided you made it as far as the end, all in hopes of finding a conclusion so stellar as to redeem the drudgery that preceded it, what one is most likely to find is disappointment. I'm sure the late Borges heard this, face-palmed, and then turned in his grave.ĮDIT: I have been duly informed, perhaps by the type referenced above, that Borges was actually alive when this 'work' was published. Lurk around bookworms long enough and you're bound to find some pompous pseudo intellectual enraptured by the rich, textured, yet subtle literary clues so artfully crafted into this piece: 'You mean to tell me that Jorge De Burgos, the blind monk, is actually a nod to Jorge Luis Borges, the blind Argentinian writer? Whaaat?' So clever. In which its heavy-handedness is offensive. Do yourself a favor and quit after he has solved his first 'mystery' (page 25?).ģ. You must often wait a chapter or two to get back to the mystery that drove you to read this thing in the first place. Just when you thought it was getting interesting, just when the plot is getting meatier and it grabs your attention, here comes a dissertation or a long drawn description of doors, churches, parchments, beasts, characters that are totally irrelevant to the plot, and backstories that do nothing to shed light on the events.

Knowing most would not put up with this crap for 500 pages, he wisely chose to interrupt his many digressions on poverty, heretics, whether or not Jesus laughed, Aristotle, architecture, etc, with an amateurish mystery plot. Yes, I'm almost certain Eco wrote this thing for the sole purpose of informing us of how knowledgeable he is of the finer points of monastic orders, book trivia, and medieval philosophy. Eco's writing is so infectious, lively, and likeable that I thought it appropriate to pen my review in his style.

The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco