Ex Libris Kirkland

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Translator William Weaver
First Written 1994
Genre Fiction
Origin Italy
Publisher Harvest
ISBN-10 0156001314
ISBN-13 978-0156001311
My Copy library copy
First Read October 29, 2013

The Name of the Rose



At one point the two protagonists are describing a compass like a new invention and I was VERY surprised. Were compasses not common in the 14th century? When WERE they invented?

Noted on January 29, 2025

The most interesting parts of this for me was the postscript; where Eco talks about his theory and plan of writing this book.

Noted on January 29, 2025

I re-read this in 2025, twelve years later, because it was a pick for the book club. I can't say I enjoyed it much more, but I did finish it. But it was much more clear this time that the core of the book isn't a murder mystery; that's just the frame used for Eco to spin out what he wants to talk about. And what he wants to talk about is HOW MUCH he knows about Middle Ages Italy.

Noted on January 29, 2025

YAWN. I get that this is probably a brilliant book, it seemed terribly dry for a friggin' murder mystery. I quit halfway through reading this book.

I think I know enough about middle-age-type monasteries, so the extensive scene-setting just seemed like it went on forever. Our narrator is an acolyte of a wandering monk who has hung around Roger Bacon, and so therefore is a walking one-man Enlightenment. It's not as interesting as it sounds.

Noted on November 10, 2013

The good of a book lies in its being read. A book is made up of signs that speak of other signs, which in their turn speak of things. Without an eye to read them, a book contains signs that produce no concepts; therefore it is dumb. This library was perhaps born to save the books it houses, but now it lives to bury them. This is why it has become a sink of iniquity.

Quoted on January 29, 2025

[Typical of how this book could have been half as long, discussing a compass:]

"I was thinking of a way to get our bearings in the labyrinth. to not simple, but it would be effective... After all, the exit is in the east tower: this we know. Now, suppose that we had a machine that tells us where north is. What would happen?"

"Naturally, we would have only to turn to our right and we would be heading east. Or else it would suffice to go in the opposite direction and we would know we were going toward the south tower. But, even assuming such magic existed, the labyrinth is in fact a labyrinth, and as soon as we headed east we would come upon a wall that would prevent us from going straight, and we would lose our way again..." I observed.

"Yes, but the machine I am talking about would always point north, even if we had changed our route, and at every point it would tell us which way to turn."

"It would be marvelous. But we would have to have this machine, and it would have to be able to recognize north at night and indoors, without being able to see the sun or the stars. ... And I believe not even your Bacon possessed such a machine." I laughed.

"But you are wrong," William said, "because a machine of the sort has been constructed, and some navigators have used it. It doesn't need the stars or the sun, because it exploits the power of a marvelous stone, like the one we saw in Severinus's infirmary, the one that attracts iron. And it was studied by Bacon and by a Picard wizard, Pierre of Maricourt, who described its many uses."

"But could you construct it?"

"In itself, that wouldn't be difficult. The stone can be used to produce many wonders, including a machine that moves perpetually without any external power, but the simplest discovery was described also by an Arab, Baylek al-Qabayaki. Take a vessel filled with water and set afloat in it a cork into which you have stuck an iron needle. Then pass the stone over the surface of the water, until the needle has acquired the same properties as the stone. And at this point the needle-though the stone would also have done it if it had had the capacity to move around a pivot— will turn and point north, and if you move it with the vessel, it will always turn in the direction of the north wind. Obviously, if you bear north in mind and also mark on the edge of the vessel the positions of east, south, and west, you will always know which way to turn in the library to reach the east tower."

"What a marvel!" I exclaimed. "But why does the needle always point north? The stone attracts iron, I saw that, and I imagine that an immense quantity of iron attracts the stone. But then...

Quoted on January 29, 2025

… suggested I abbreviate the first hundred pages, which they found very difficult and demanding. Without thinking twice, I refused, because, as I insisted, if somebody wanted to enter the abbey and live there for seven days, he had to accept the abbey's own pace. If he could not, he would never manage to read the whole book.

Therefore those first hundred pages are like a penance or an initi-ation, and if someone does not like them, so much the worse for him. He can stay at the foot of the hill.

Entering a novel is like going on a climb in the mountains: you have to learn the rhythm of respiration, acquire the pace; otherwise you stop right away.

Quoted on January 29, 2025

I was embarrassed at telling a story. I felt like a drama critic who suddenly exposes himself behind the footlights and finds himself watched by those who, until then, have been his accomplices in the seats out front.

Is it possible to say "It was a beautiful morning at the end of November" without feeling like Snoopy? But what if I had Snoopy say it? If, that is, "It was a beautiful morning.." were said by someone capable of saying it, because in his day it was still possible, still not shopworn? A mask: that was what I needed.

Quoted on January 29, 2025

The text is there, and produces its own effects. Whether I wanted it this way or not, we are now faced with a question, an ambiguous provocation; and I myself feel embarrassment in interpreting this conflict, though I realize a meaning lurks there (perhaps many meanings do).

The author should die once he has finished writing. So as not to trouble the path of the text.

Quoted on January 29, 2025


Ex Libris Kirkland is a super-self-absorbed reading journal made by Matt Kirkland. Copyright © 2001 - .
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