Damned Lies II

So, I finished reading Baudolino, and here’s a bit of housekeeping. There is a discourse of truth and falsehood throughout, which makes the novel very intellectually engaging. I’ll have to try not to get too worked up about this, as Eco ended up covering some ideas that appeared in my undergrad dissertation. For instance, one character suggests leaving out some aspects of the story which do not particularly fit with ‘the truth’, a standard medieval approach which would nonetheless make most modern historians blanch.

The novel ends with a tongue-in-cheek remark about the author himself, something about how an even bigger liar than Baudolino may eventually tell the tale. I found this interesting because Eco takes yet another step back from the main plot, which is already framed by Baudolino’s dialogue with Master Niketas. We are constantly made aware of the artifice of this story. For example, Eco seems to be aware that his narrator appears too perfect; there is a brief observation that Baudolino’s tale transforms effortlessly from a tender account of a friend’s death into a soaring epic describing the fording of a river. Time after time we are forced to stop and think that something is not right. This is clearly a deliberate decision on Eco’s part, because he is a talented enough writer to be able to transcend genres without causing consternation to the reader.

What also emerges at the end of the novel is a curiously moral tone, perhaps another result of Eco’s obvious depth of knowledge of the literature of the period. I won’t say much on this, but although Baudolino always lies for good ends his lies do begin to overtake him. He creates so many monsters and mythical beings that they eventually come to invade his reality. A moral consequence, and another layer of truth and falsehood.

All in all, it is a puzzling book that leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Self-consciously unanswered, I should say, as the enigmatic Baudolino rides off into the sunset. I’m tempted to say that I’ve been overthinking it as I’ve been reading, but I don’t think this is really possible with Umberto Eco. Obviously I’ll have to have a go at Foucault’s Pendulum, which is even weightier than Baudolino. But not just now.