Origin (novel)
Origin (English for "origin") is a novel by the US author Dan Brown , the original was published on October 3, 2017 . It is the fifth thriller in the series by the symbolologist Robert Langdon . The bound German edition was published by Bastei Lübbe on October 4, 2017 and contains 670 pages.
action
Robert Langdon, professor of symbolology at Harvard University , is invited by his former student and current futurologist Edmond Kirsch to the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao for a large-scale presentation. In the course of this presentation, the central questions of humanity - Where are we from? - where are we going? - should clarify, an assassination attempt on Edmond Kirsch happens, which he does not survive. As a result, Robert Langdon and Ambra Vidal (director of the museum and fiancée of the heir to the Spanish throne) are forced to flee the museum. During the escape, several places are illuminated and she leads the two main characters to Barcelona , more precisely to the Sagrada Familia . The main storyline deals with the events surrounding Edmond's presentation, which is to be made available to the world by means of a 47-character password.
Finally, Langdon and Vidal come up with the last presentation of the scientist and publish it. Edmond Kirsch answers the question of how life on earth came about with nature's striving for entropy (disorder). According to this, nature developed life in order to reach chaotic states more efficiently. In addition, the inventor discovered that humanity in its current form will become extinct around the year 2050 because it continues to develop ( transhumanism ).
It turns out that the computer intelligence Winston murdered its own inventor in order to make the discoveries of its inventor known to a much larger audience. According to Winston's calculations, the inventor only had nine days to live due to a serious illness and therefore thought of suicide. Artificial intelligence thus sees murder as an act of grace and an affordable sacrifice for the bigger picture.
main characters
The following people play a role in Origin:
Robert Langdon
Robert Langdon is Professor of Symbolology and Art History at Harvard University .
Edmond Kirsch
Multi-billionaire, computer scientist and former student of Robert Langdon. He is shot dead by Luis Avila during a presentation of his groundbreaking scientific research.
Ambra Vidal
Director of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao . Engaged to the Spanish prince.
Winston
A highly intelligent, self-learning, artificial intelligence , created by Edmond Kirsch. As in many other books and films, she makes accurate decisions, but ultimately Winston's decisions lack something human.
Prince Julian
Infant (King at the end of the novel) of Spain. He is preparing for his accession to the throne. Got engaged to Ambra Vidal.
Bishop Valdespino
Catholic bishop in the Royal Palace of Madrid. His friendship with the King of Spain made him a close family member for Prince Julian.
Navy Admiral Luis Avila
Luis Avila, a member of the Palmarian Catholic Church , appears as an assassin. His life story is illuminated again and again in a parallel narrative.
reception
Commercial win
Immediately after the book was published in October 2017 was to No. 1 on the mirror - bestseller place which reached the novel later in the year, a total of 9 times more. With his most successful novel, The Da Vinci Code, Brown placed first 50 times, but “Origin” was behind Maja Lunde's surprise success The Story of Bees, with around 350,000 copies sold, one of the best-selling books in Germany in 2017. When rated by the users of the web portal Krimi-Couch.de , the novel achieved 64 out of 100 points, which is the lowest value of novels by this author on the reader portal to date.
Contemporary criticism
In all reviews of the German-language media it is pointed out that the author also applies his proven principle in his 5th book from the Robert Langdon series, in which the reader struggles for education through a kind of scavenger hunt in the vicinity of cultural sights of a certain country is guided to solve mysteries.
Thomas Steinfeld in the Süddeutsche Zeitung compares the style with a computer game in which you have to constantly eliminate problems in order to reach the next level. Which reminds Wieland friend of the world on that time of the origin of mankind on the subject of the determination on the basis of theoretical physics would be needed no art historical decryption. As a friend, finds Wiebke Porombka in time , the author that in his decryption to the great human mysteries take itself too seriously, and both miss the more humorous approach, as in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy .
Irene Bilal on Deutschlandfunk sees a rather stereotyped story, but finds Brown's old recipe presented again in a very entertaining way. For the editor of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Rose-Maria Gropp, the ambitious thriller about nothing less than the origin of mankind and life did not go wrong at all, but she also sees current social references, she writes: In "Origin" it is also essentially possible about fanaticism, but Brown avoids any direct reference to Islamist terror, such as the one that just happened in Barcelona with the attack on Ramblas last August. Of course, he alludes to the motives of religious and ideological madness. Against the background of the current events in Spain, the turmoil caused by Catalan separatism, the fate of the Spanish monarchy based on the tradition of the Reyes Católicos, which is negotiated in "Origin", is more of a nostalgic petitesse. But nobody ever seriously suspected that Dan Brown was writing historical novels, and Origin is pretty entertaining; that's quite a lot. Both last-named reviewers end their criticism with a sophistic statement of the novel: If the laws of nature are so comprehensive that they are sufficient to create life - who then created the laws of nature?
Individual evidence
- ↑ Origin. Retrieved January 7, 2018 .
- ^ Dan Brown - Origin. Retrieved January 7, 2018 .
- ↑ Bestseller hardcover , book report , accessed on February 26, 2018
- ↑ These are the best-selling books of 2017 , Börsenblatt , January 3, 2018, accessed on February 26, 2018
- ^ Author Dan Brown , Krimi-Couch.de , accessed on February 26, 2018
- ↑ Sightseeing harms the mind , Süddeutsche Zeitung , October 4, 2017, accessed on February 26, 2018
- ↑ Dan Brown knows God's password , Die Welt , October 4, 2017, accessed February 26, 2018
- ^ The super formula for happiness , Die Zeit , October 23, 2017, accessed on February 26, 2018
- ↑ Looking for a solution with artificial intelligence , Deutschlandfunk , October 5, 2017, accessed on March 4, 2018
- ↑ A little edification never hurts , Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , October 4, 2017, accessed on October 20, 2017