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5d:{"position":1,"content":"$5e"} 5f:{"position":2,"content":"Observing the insane is amusing only up to a point. With the exception of the main character, one Simone Simonini, everyone in this novel is a historical figure and the vast majority of them is pathologically bent. That Europe has a long history as a collective madhouse is not news. So just what are we supposed to take away from “The Prague Cemetery”?"} 60:{"position":3,"content":"Here’s what I mean: The republicans plot against the monarchists who plot against the liberals who plot against the Templars who plot against the Jesuits who plot against the Freemasons who plot against the Roman Catholics who plot against the communists who plot against the Protestants who plot against the French who plot against the Germans who plot against the Russians and behind every plot are the Jews who are plotting to take over the world. It’s enough, if you’ll forgive me, to make you plotz."} 61:{"position":4,"content":"Watching paranoids do their thing over such a long stretch of pages really isn’t all that fascinating. Precisely how much time do you wish to spend among folks who maintain that Napoleon was Jewish? That Jesus was a Celt? That the Alliance Israelite Universelle is the Elders of Zion in disguise? In addition, Eco covered much of this territory with much greater energy and creativity in “Foucault’s Pendulum.” Maybe the problem this time is the author’s decision to hew so closely to historical accuracy (history is not necessarily the most artful of novelists). Whatever the case, all those intrigues among the Bourbons, the Garibaldians, the Carbonari, the royali

Eco falls flat

Umberto Eco’s latest novel turns out not quite a treat.