S
StubbleSpark
Guest
Any fool can tell Brown’s work is schlep. But in the words of Reading Rainbow: “You don’t have to take my word for it.” (dah dee dat!)
“The writing goes on in similar vein, committing style and word choice blunders in almost every paragraph (sometimes every line). Look at the phrase “the seventy-six-year-old man”. It’s a complete let-down: we knew he was a man — the anaphoric pronoun “he” had just been used to refer to him. (This is perhaps where “curator” could have been slipped in for the first time, without “renowned”, if the passage were rewritten.) Look at “heaved the masterpiece toward himself until it tore from the wall and Saunière collapsed backward in a heap beneath the canvas.” We don’t need to know it’s a masterpiece (it’s a Caravaggio hanging in the Louvre, that should be enough in the way of credentials, for heaven’s sake). Surely “toward him” feels better than “toward himself” (though I guess both are grammatical here). Surely “tore from the wall” should be “tore away from the wall”. Surely a single man can’t fall into a heap (there’s only him, that’s not a heap). And why repeat the name “Saunière” here instead of the pronoun “he”? Who else is around? (Caravaggio hasn’t been mentioned; “a Caravaggio” uses the name as an attributive modifier with conventionally elided head noun “painting”. That isn’t a mention of the man.)”
(source: itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000844.html )
Really the best time to protest the movie is before it is released. Once it is out picketing the theater will only encourage bigots like xphan to jeer at us while dumping their dollars into the registers. We can have Catholic masters like Shakespeare and Tolkein they can have:
D. Brown’s “book” : A voice spoke, chillingly close. “Do not move.”
On his hands and knees, the curator froze, turning his head slowly.
Only fifteen feet away, outside the sealed gate, the mountainous silhouette of his attacker stared through the iron bars. He was broad and tall, with ghost-pale skin and thinning white hair. His irises were pink with dark red pupils.
“Just count the infelicities here. A voice doesn’t speak —a person speaks; a voice is what a person speaks with. “Chillingly close” would be right in your ear, whereas this voice is fifteen feet away behind the thundering gate. The curator (do we really need to be told his profession a third time?) cannot slowly turn his head if he has frozen; freezing (as a voluntary human action) means temporarily ceasing all muscular movements. And crucially, a silhouette does not stare! A silhouette is a shadow. If Saunière can see the man’s pale skin, thinning hair, iris color, and red pupils (all at fifteen feet), the man cannot possibly be in silhouette.” (same source)
I personally cannot wait for the scene showing how he falls, mortally wounded, and positions his body to provide clues. Carried out in concrete visuals, the scene screams bathos:
Let’s see… right arm … good … nope little more … left arm … all right … that should do it … now what was I doing? oh, that’s right, dying: AGH!
And what about the: “Magdalen was (she’s dead, you know) a goddess because she was married to Jesus, who incidentally is NOT a deity but emphatically a plain, ordinary human” idea? Wha- HUUUH??
Or the historical absurdity that Christians were fed to lions for hundreds of years for not lighting incense at the altar of Caesar but would finally roll right over when Constantine supposedly CHANGES everything about their faith and worship?
Rich story telling, that. I’m sorry, I mean writing reminiscent of “the kind of freshman student who makes you want to give up the whole idea of teaching.” (same source).
Or what about the militant lesbian theologian Mary Daly whose thought drives the book’s message? She believes women are superior to men and that real “equality” can only be achieved when men and women are raised on separate continents! (Gee, why would a lesbian suggest that?) She’s the one who started the WE MUST ALL WORSHIP GODDESSES NOW! movement in pop-theology.
She was fired from that bastion of Catholic orthodoxy (sarcasm) Boston College (where Brown went to school) when she refused to let men take her class. Females, however were free to come over to her place anytime after class for a proper “initiation”.
Don’t fear the movie. Fear for the movie-goers who have not had the proper MST3K training to survive this B movie wannabe.
“The writing goes on in similar vein, committing style and word choice blunders in almost every paragraph (sometimes every line). Look at the phrase “the seventy-six-year-old man”. It’s a complete let-down: we knew he was a man — the anaphoric pronoun “he” had just been used to refer to him. (This is perhaps where “curator” could have been slipped in for the first time, without “renowned”, if the passage were rewritten.) Look at “heaved the masterpiece toward himself until it tore from the wall and Saunière collapsed backward in a heap beneath the canvas.” We don’t need to know it’s a masterpiece (it’s a Caravaggio hanging in the Louvre, that should be enough in the way of credentials, for heaven’s sake). Surely “toward him” feels better than “toward himself” (though I guess both are grammatical here). Surely “tore from the wall” should be “tore away from the wall”. Surely a single man can’t fall into a heap (there’s only him, that’s not a heap). And why repeat the name “Saunière” here instead of the pronoun “he”? Who else is around? (Caravaggio hasn’t been mentioned; “a Caravaggio” uses the name as an attributive modifier with conventionally elided head noun “painting”. That isn’t a mention of the man.)”
(source: itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/000844.html )
Really the best time to protest the movie is before it is released. Once it is out picketing the theater will only encourage bigots like xphan to jeer at us while dumping their dollars into the registers. We can have Catholic masters like Shakespeare and Tolkein they can have:
D. Brown’s “book” : A voice spoke, chillingly close. “Do not move.”
On his hands and knees, the curator froze, turning his head slowly.
Only fifteen feet away, outside the sealed gate, the mountainous silhouette of his attacker stared through the iron bars. He was broad and tall, with ghost-pale skin and thinning white hair. His irises were pink with dark red pupils.
“Just count the infelicities here. A voice doesn’t speak —a person speaks; a voice is what a person speaks with. “Chillingly close” would be right in your ear, whereas this voice is fifteen feet away behind the thundering gate. The curator (do we really need to be told his profession a third time?) cannot slowly turn his head if he has frozen; freezing (as a voluntary human action) means temporarily ceasing all muscular movements. And crucially, a silhouette does not stare! A silhouette is a shadow. If Saunière can see the man’s pale skin, thinning hair, iris color, and red pupils (all at fifteen feet), the man cannot possibly be in silhouette.” (same source)
I personally cannot wait for the scene showing how he falls, mortally wounded, and positions his body to provide clues. Carried out in concrete visuals, the scene screams bathos:
Let’s see… right arm … good … nope little more … left arm … all right … that should do it … now what was I doing? oh, that’s right, dying: AGH!
And what about the: “Magdalen was (she’s dead, you know) a goddess because she was married to Jesus, who incidentally is NOT a deity but emphatically a plain, ordinary human” idea? Wha- HUUUH??
Or the historical absurdity that Christians were fed to lions for hundreds of years for not lighting incense at the altar of Caesar but would finally roll right over when Constantine supposedly CHANGES everything about their faith and worship?
Rich story telling, that. I’m sorry, I mean writing reminiscent of “the kind of freshman student who makes you want to give up the whole idea of teaching.” (same source).
Or what about the militant lesbian theologian Mary Daly whose thought drives the book’s message? She believes women are superior to men and that real “equality” can only be achieved when men and women are raised on separate continents! (Gee, why would a lesbian suggest that?) She’s the one who started the WE MUST ALL WORSHIP GODDESSES NOW! movement in pop-theology.
She was fired from that bastion of Catholic orthodoxy (sarcasm) Boston College (where Brown went to school) when she refused to let men take her class. Females, however were free to come over to her place anytime after class for a proper “initiation”.
Don’t fear the movie. Fear for the movie-goers who have not had the proper MST3K training to survive this B movie wannabe.
