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book1988-present

Foucault's Pendulum

Disciplines:
fiction
culture/conspiracy theory
language/semiotics
history/occult history

Summary

Novel by Umberto Eco published 1988. Three editors invent a grand conspiracy linking the Knights Templar to all secret societies, only to discover their game is taken seriously and turns lethal. A satirical yet encyclopedic treatment of occultism, Kabbalah, and the paranoid imagination.

Core Contribution

Demonstrated how occult thinking functions as a semiotic system — the tendency to find hidden connections everywhere. Stands as the definitive literary meditation on conspiracism and esoteric culture.

Key Spikes & Highlights

  • conspiracy hermeneutics
  • occult encyclopedia
  • semiotic excess
  • Templar mythology

Historical Influences

Umberto Eco The Name of the Rose Eliphas Levi Kabbalah Templar historiography

Intellectual Lineage

No conceptual lineage found.

Allied Works

The Name of the Rose The Prague CemeteryBaudolinoUmberto Eco: A Theory of Semiotics

Contemporaries & Peers

The Name of the Rose Umberto Eco's semiotic writingsHoly Blood Holy Grail

Minds Influenced

Dan Brown academic occult studiesconspiracy theory scholarship

Intellectual Posterity

No conceptual posterity found.

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