Peril in Prague: The Secret of Secrets, by Dan Brown, reviewed |
Robert Langdon is a symbologist, and that is the meta joke – the only joke – of Dan Brown’s series of blockbusters, of which this is the sixth. Langdon, an Everyman – Frodo Baggins but taller, and with a professorship at Harvard – is a monied, moderate intellectual who likes swimming. And he is very ordinary – until he isn’t.
All novels have subtexts, even if they don’t really want them. They can’t help it. This one is: a monied, moderate intellectual can be interesting, and interesting things can happen to him. (I think Brown spends a lot of time at his desk. I also think he prefers ideas to people.) Langdon can set off the fire alarm in his hotel and jump out of the window into the river. He can be stalked by the Golem of Prague (it’s nice to have a Jewish hero who speaks. In. Very. Short. Sentences). He can have sex with a woman who........