Chancellor Of The Duchy Of Besses O' Th' Barn

Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:

    > Frank F. Matthews writes:
[]
    > > In all of Mr. Brown's novels and most of the rest I've seen that use
    > > real locations there are significant liberties taken with reality.
    >
    > Many, many novelists take such liberties.

Isn't that what he wrote?

--
David Horne- www.davidhorne.net
usenet (at) davidhorne (dot) co (dot) uk

Padraig Breathnach

Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:

    >Padraig Breathnach writes:
    >> Yeah, but usually authors don't change geography unless it serves the
    >> plot in some way.
    >Which is pretty often.
It can do, which is why I qualified my remark. How do you quantify
"pretty often"? One often (even pretty often) sees inaccuracies which
have no purpose in the plot, and which betoken nothing other than poor
research or carelessness.For me, that takes from the value of a work.

    >However, most authors don't claim that everything they say in their
    >novels is true.
But most also strive for verisimilitude, and usually getting the
background right is part of that effort.

--
PB
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Mxsmanic

Padraig Breathnach writes:

    > But most also strive for verisimilitude, and usually getting the
    > background right is part of that effort.

Most readers will not notice mistakes, since they've never been to the
places mentioned in the novel.

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Ronald Hands

Since we're such a literary bunch, I thought I'd mention a couple of
books I've enjoyed lately -- and just to stay within reach of
topicality, they both have a European connection.
One is a novel, from a few years back, by Ronald Wright titled A
Scientific Romance. It's a cleverly done dystopian time travel tale,
even involving the original H.G. Wells time machine, and carries the
reader forward to 2500 AD, when Britain is a tropical, highly polluted
jungle whose few inhabitants live a near-stone-age existence in
Scotland. All of it is derived by extrapolating from present trends.
I came to this after reading Wright's new book, A Short History of
Progress, which is a packaging of his recent series of five lectures on
the CBC, known as the Massey lectures. He started out as an
archeologist and in the lecture series he examines the fate of past
civilizations which have out-run their resources. The most riveting
case is that of Easter Island. The whole world is now one giant Easter
Island, and the prospects don't look good, judging on past performance.
The other book to mention is Jeremy Rifkind's The European Dream,
subtitled How Europe's union of the future is quietly eclipsing the
American dream.
Rifkin is proudly American -- and defends American individualism and
initiative -- but he thinks the U.S. has lost its way, and that Europe
is on the right track.
As a Canadian, I've read bits and pieces about the European union,
but thought of it mainly as a political union (open borders and all
that) and had no idea how advanced and intelligent some of the policies
are that its bureaucrats are cooking up. If they're adopted, that is.
Rifkin points out that the EU is a larger market (450 million people)
than the U.S., with larger internal and external trade.
It is developing policies that he calls a Second Enlightenment. These
include the questioning of unbridled scientific inquiry (which contains
risks that could destroy the world); putting the burden of proof on
producers (that products claimed to be harmless actually are); the
precautionary principle; systems thinking; rights of animals; reuniting
ecosystems, and many others, all aimed at a sustainable economy.
The only problem with the book is that Rifkin is insufferably
verbose. If you check it out, be prepared to do extensive skimming.

-- Ron

Padraig Breathnach

Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:

    >Padraig Breathnach writes:
    >> But most also strive for verisimilitude, and usually getting the
    >> background right is part of that effort.
    >Most readers will not notice mistakes, since they've never been to the
    >places mentioned in the novel.

True. But if you're going to make mistakes about places, it's better
to be mistaken about Lille or Marseille than about Paris: fewer people
are likely to spot them.

--
PB
The return address has been MUNGED

nitram

On Mon, 06 Dec 2004 19:26:52 +0100, Mxsmanic <[email protected]>
wrote:

    >Earl Evleth writes:
    >> Brown was wrong, however, in stating that prostitutes hang around on
    >> the Place St. Suplice. It is a quartier which rolls up the sidewalks
    >> after 8 PM and the Arrodissement main police head quarters is on the corner.
    >Brown was wrong about almost everything he writes of in Paris.

I suspect he never visited Paris, before writing the book.
He probably got his info from this group.
--
Martin

Bogus Address

    >> Brown was wrong, however, in stating that prostitutes hang around on
    >> the Place St. Suplice. It is a quartier which rolls up the sidewalks
    >> after 8 PM and the Arrodissement main police head quarters is on the
    >> corner.
    > Brown was wrong about almost everything he writes of in Paris.

Maybe there's an opportunity for a "Da Vinci Code booboos" website?
The folks in soc.history.medieval started one listing the mistakes
in "Braveheart" - I think they decided to limit it to the first
ten minutes of the movie once they saw the scale of what they were
getting into.

I could probably do the Roslin Chapel bit - where in the book does
that come in?

========> Email to "j-c" at this site; email to "bogus" will bounce <========
Jack Campin: 11 Third Street, Newtongrange, Midlothian EH22 4PU; 0131 6604760
<http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/purrhome.html> food intolerance data & recipes,
Mac logic fonts, Scots traditional music files and CD-ROMs of Scottish music.

nitram

On 6 Dec 2004 22:30:46 GMT, [email protected] (bogus address)
wrote:

    >>> Brown was wrong, however, in stating that prostitutes hang around on
    >>> the Place St. Suplice. It is a quartier which rolls up the sidewalks
    >>> after 8 PM and the Arrodissement main police head quarters is on the
    >>> corner.
    >> Brown was wrong about almost everything he writes of in Paris.
    >Maybe there's an opportunity for a "Da Vinci Code booboos" website?
    >The folks in soc.history.medieval started one listing the mistakes
    >in "Braveheart" - I think they decided to limit it to the first
    >ten minutes of the movie once they saw the scale of what they were
    >getting into.
    >I could probably do the Roslin Chapel bit - where in the book does
    >that come in?

Towards the end.
--
Martin

Miguel Cruz

<[email protected]> wrote:
    > Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:
    >> Earl Evleth writes:
    >>> Brown was wrong, however, in stating that prostitutes hang around on the
    >>> Place St. Suplice. It is a quartier which rolls up the sidewalks after
    >>> 8 PM and the Arrodissement main police head quarters is on the corner.
    >> Brown was wrong about almost everything he writes of in Paris.
    > I suspect he never visited Paris, before writing the book.
    > He probably got his info from this group.

Nope, there are photos of Dan Brown being led on a personal tour of Paris
one January by some guy in hiking boots, shorts, and a photographer's vest
who was holding a Big Mac in one hand. Reporters the world over are
desperate to find out who that guy is.

miguel
--
Hit The Road! Photos from 32 countries on 5 continents: http://travel.u.nu

Mxsmanic

[email protected] writes:

    > I suspect he never visited Paris, before writing the book.

That was my very strong impression. Some of his errors were absolutely
horrendous. Police cars driving through the Tuileries to get to the
Louvre "quickly"? Why storm the iron gates and drive over dirt and
gravel when you can freely drive on the nicely paved streets on either
side of the Tuileries instead?

And why must one drive all the way up the Champs from the Louvre to get
to the American Embassy, when the embassy is on the northwest corner of
the place de la Concorde, while the Tuileries is on the west side of the
same roundabout?

--
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Mxsmanic

Padraig Breathnach writes:

    > True. But if you're going to make mistakes about places, it's better
    > to be mistaken about Lille or Marseille than about Paris: fewer people
    > are likely to spot them.

Yes. Although virtually no one in the world has been to Paris,
percentage-wise, even though it's the most visited city on the planet
for tourists.

--
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Holly J. Sommer

"Mxsmanic" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
    > Padraig Breathnach writes:
    >> True. But if you're going to make mistakes about places, it's better
    >> to be mistaken about Lille or Marseille than about Paris: fewer people
    >> are likely to spot them.
    > Yes. Although virtually no one in the world has been to Paris,
    > percentage-wise, even though it's the most visited city on the planet
    > for tourists.

Seems like lack of familiarity doesn't often dissuade folks from presenting
inaccuracies as facts, quite often (to wit: most of the ridiculous
USA-bashing going on in here).

-Holly

Padraig Breathnach

"Holly J. Sommer" <[email protected]> wrote:

    >Seems like lack of familiarity doesn't often dissuade folks from presenting
    >inaccuracies as facts, quite often (to wit: most of the ridiculous
    >USA-bashing going on in here).
Hmm. Presenting inaccuracies as facts: who has done that?

--
PB
The return address has been MUNGED

Magda

On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 22:06:45 -0600, in rec.travel.europe, "Holly J. Sommer"
<[email protected]> arranged some electrons, so they looked like this :

... "Mxsmanic" <[email protected]> wrote in message
... news:[email protected]...
... > Padraig Breathnach writes:
... >
... >> True. But if you're going to make mistakes about places, it's better
... >> to be mistaken about Lille or Marseille than about Paris: fewer people
... >> are likely to spot them.
... >
... > Yes. Although virtually no one in the world has been to Paris,
... > percentage-wise, even though it's the most visited city on the planet
... > for tourists.
...
... Seems like lack of familiarity doesn't often dissuade folks from presenting
... inaccuracies as facts, quite often (to wit: most of the ridiculous
... USA-bashing going on in here).
...
... -Holly

Have a freedom frie.

nitram

On Mon, 06 Dec 2004 21:24:55 -0600, [email protected] (Miguel Cruz)
wrote:

    ><[email protected]> wrote:
    >> Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:
    >>> Earl Evleth writes:
    >>>> Brown was wrong, however, in stating that prostitutes hang around on the
    >>>> Place St. Suplice. It is a quartier which rolls up the sidewalks after
    >>>> 8 PM and the Arrodissement main police head quarters is on the corner.
    >>> Brown was wrong about almost everything he writes of in Paris.
    >> I suspect he never visited Paris, before writing the book.
    >> He probably got his info from this group.
    >Nope, there are photos of Dan Brown being led on a personal tour of Paris
    >one January by some guy in hiking boots, shorts, and a photographer's vest
    >who was holding a Big Mac in one hand. Reporters the world over are
    >desperate to find out who that guy is.

    :-)

Was the sun setting on reality in the photo?
--
Martin