This article is about a mystery novel; for the upcoming film see Angels and Demons (film). For other meanings, please see the articles on angels and demons.
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Angels and Demons (which can also be shortened as Angels & Demons) is a bestsellingmysterynovel by Dan Brown. Published in 2000, it introduces the character Robert Langdon, who is also the principal character of Brown's subsequent, better-known novel The Da Vinci Code. The story involves a conflict between an ancient group, the Illuminati, and the Catholic Church. It is credited with being the first novel to contain ambigrams.
This book deals with moral issues such as the debate between science and religion. It outlines many of the internal workings of the Vatican (some in great detail) as a plot to blow up the Vatican unfolds during the conclave.
Angels and Demons has many similarities with Brown's other books -- all events happen within 24 hours, it starts with a murder, and then takes a breakneck pace through many European settings. In this book, much of the artwork is by the noted sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini.
Just as with Brown's other novels, there is a mixture of fact and fiction that some readers find entertaining, but others find inaccurate and misleading, to the point of promoting conspiracy theories.
The book was originally published in 2000, to no particular acclaim, with a first printing of less than 10,000 copies. In 2003 though, it was re-released because of the attention around the second Langdon book (Brown's fourth novel), The Da Vinci Code, which as of 2005 has sold over 60 million copies. Angels and Demons did considerably better than Brown's other two books, Deception Point and Digital Fortress, because of its connection with The Da Vinci Code, and made it into the New York Times Bestseller List (in 2004, all four of Brown's novels were once on the list in the same week). As of 2005, there are now over 8 million copies of Angels and Demons in print, in a variety of languages.[link]
The book's popularity has led to a corresponding increase in tourism to the book's locations in Rome. [link]
CERNdirectorMaximilian Kohler discovers one of the facility's most respected physicists, Leonardo Vetra, murdered in his own secured, private quarters at the facility. His chest is branded with a symbol — the word "Illuminati", formed as an ambigram, using a burning hot object. Instead of calling the police, Kohler researches the topic on the Internet and finally gains contact with Professor Langdon, an expert on the Illuminati. Kohler requests his assistance in uncovering the murderer.
What Langdon finds at the murder scene frightens him: the symbol appears to be authentic, and the legendary secret society, long thought to be defunct, seems to have resurfaced. Kohler calls
Vetra's adopted daughter Vittoria to the scene and it is later revealed that the Illuminati has also stolen a canister containing a quarter of a gram of antimatter — an extremely deadly weapon that could destroy an entire area when in contact with matter. When charged with electricity at CERN, the canister's magnetic field controls the drop of antimatter to float in pure vacuum, ensuring safety; but when it is taken away from its electricity supply, the canister will automatically switch to using its back-up battery which only lasts for 24 hours. The horrible truth is that now the Illuminati has put the stolen canister somewhere in Vatican City, with a security camera in front of it as its digital clock counts down to explosion.
It turns out that the Papal election is being held that night, making it the perfect time for the Illuminati to hide the antimatter inside the Vatican and destroy all the important people in the Roman Catholic Church. Cardinal Mortati, host of the election, discovers that four cardinals who are the top picks in the current Pope election are missing. Actually, they have been kidnapped by the Hassassin in the book, who is also the killer of Leonardo Vetra. Langdon and Vittoria therefore set off to the Vatican in hopes to find the killer and retrieve the antimatter, but Kohler succumbs to illness and cannot go with them.
After they arrive, their search is assisted by Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca and the Vatican Swiss Guards, including Commander Olivetti, Captain Rocher and Lieutenant Chartrand. Clues found in the Vatican Archives take Langdon and Vittoria through many tourist attractions in Rome following the so-called "path of illumination", as they seek out locations which the book calls the "Altars of Science". Each altar relates to one of the classical elements (Earth, Air, Fire and Water) which were once considered to be the only constituents of all matter.
At each altar, one of the four cardinals kidnapped by the assassin, is murdered by a method appropriate to that particular altar's element – Cardinal Ebner is killed by having dirt stuffed down his throat (Earth); Cardinal Lamassé is killed by being stabbed in the lungs (Air); Cardinal Guidera is burnt to death (Fire); and Cardinal Baggia is drowned (Water) – and branded with an ambigram of that element. The media are alerted to these killings and later the Hassassin confesses to having murdered the previous Pope using a drug called Heparin. This alerts Vittoria to perform the world's first autopsy on a Pope – and she finds his tongue to be black, a sure sign of Heparin overdose.
Afterwards, the Hassassin kills Olivetti and kidnaps Vittoria, but Langdon journeys to save her. It seems that the assassin has sexual feelings to attractive females including a prostitute and Vittoria. During a scuffle with the Hassassin, Langdon figures that Janus, the Illuminati leader, disguised, is coming to brand the camerlengo with a sixth brand. When Langdon is about to lose the fight, Vittoria escapes and attacks the Hassassin. With Langdon's help they kill him. Maximillian Kohler is revealed to be the 11th hour Samaritan, also an anti-Catholic. Langdon strongly believes that Kohler is Janus, on a suicide mission to kill the camerlengo. Langdon and Vittoria arrive in time to save the camerlengo, who has been branded with the Illuminati Diamond, an ambigram that shows all the elements written together in a perfect square. When the door is forced open during the meeting, it is seen that Kohler is brandishing a pistol at the camerlengo. The Swiss Guard shoots Kohler and Captain Rocher is also killed by Lieutenant Chartrand, after the camerlengo calls him an Illuminatus. Kohler gives Langdon a camcorder, telling him to give it to the media. Langdon puts it in his pocket, but doesn't intend to give it out as he believes it is a message preaching the good of science and the evils of religion. As the camerlengo is transported to the hospital, he suddenly seems to receive a message from God, telling him where the antimatter is. He discovers it upon St. Peter's real tomb, and, accompanied by Langdon, rushes the antimatter to a helicopter, in hopes of getting it high enough to avoid damaging the Vatican. They succeed, and the camerlengo jumps out of the helicopter, landing safely at the Vatican using a parachute, which leads people to believe in this as a "miracle".
Meanwhile, Robert Langdon also escapes and lands in the Tiberina River near Tiberina Island, which is famous for its reputation as an island blessed with miracles of healing. One of the nurses reveals that the camcorder given to Langdon by Kohler is continuously playing the same message over and over again, and it seems it was not a sermon about science and religion, but a revelation about Janus, Kohler, and the camerlengo. Langdon is so incensed by this that he boards a helicopter which takes him straight to the Vatican, where he plays the camcorder. It is then that it is finally revealed that the camerlengo was Janus — he tricked the Hassassin into believing the Illuminati were still active, and the brands he used were confiscated and hidden deep inside the Vatican long ago. Kohler had contacted Rocher and told him the truth about the camerlengo, allowing Kohler to meet with the camerlengo alone, with a pistol in his wheelchair. In the diary of Leonardo Vetra, it is said that Vetra met with the camerlengo, the only other person who knew about Vetra's discovery before he was murdered. Kohler, through use of psychology, gets the camerlengo to admit to hiring the Hassassin to murder Vetra. Kohler says then that there is no escape after the camerlengo had admitted to his sin, but the camerlengo laughs and simply says "Confessing your sins is the escape." He then brands himself with the Illuminati Diamond, screaming with pain, alerting the Swiss Guards, who kill Kohler. After being shown this, everyone in the Sistine Chapel is struck dumb, and Cardinal Mortati realizes that it means the camerlengo had murdered the Pope. The camerlengo responds to this by calling the Pope "a vile liar" before telling everybody that the Pope had fathered a child and had broken his vow of celibacy. Mortati responds by revealing that although the Pope had loved a woman, he had not broken any vow as his child was born through artificial insemination. Then the final revelation comes — the Pope's child is none other than Camerlengo Carlo Ventresca. Struck dumb with the horrifying implications of this, the camerlengo flees and eventually commits suicide on the balcony by cremating himself. His ashes are collected by Mortati and laid to rest in the Pope's sarcophagus.
Langdon and Vittoria then stay at the Hotel Bernini. Lieutenant Chartrand delivers a letter and package to Langdon from the new Pope, Mortati himself. The package is the Illuminati Diamond brand, which is loaned indefinitely to Langdon.
Characters in \"Angels and Demons\"
These are the principal characters that drive the plot of the story.
[Spoiler warningSpoiler warning]: In addition to plot and/or ending details about Angels and Demons, such spoilers for Brown's other books follow.
There are many elements in Angels and Demons that are similar to elements in Brown's other books
Common to two books
These elements are common between The Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons
Robert Langdon is the main character.
The story begins with a gory murder involving a naked victim.
Langdon is introduced with a phone-call while he is sleeping.
Langdon is teamed with a beautiful, highly intelligent woman who is closely related to the murder victim.
The mysterious instructor behind the assassin uses an alias to hide their true identity (Janus in Angels and Demons and The Teacher in The Da Vinci Code).
The prominent assassin of the book (the Hassassin in Angels and Demons and Silas in The Da Vinci Code) commits the murders under the impression that he is doing so for an organization which is apparently behind the murders, but turns out to be actually framed for them (the Illuminati in Angels and Demons and Opus Dei in The Da Vinci Code).
Both prominent assassins in both books have features distinctive from other characters in the story (the Hassassin is an Arab and Silas an albino).
At one point along the way, Langdon makes a mistake whilst following the trail of clues and is directed to the wrong place.
Each book has a prominent disabled character – Maximilian Kohler and Sir Leigh Teabing. Both use this to their advantage by bringing revolvers to meetings with the camerlengo or Langdon/Neveu, respectively, and escaping metal detectors because of their condition.
Both books have law enforcers who are suspected to be a villain but turns out not to be – Commander Olivetti and Captain Rocher in Angels and Demons and Bezu Fache in The Da Vinci Code.
In both, a message is written on papyrus-based paper.
Both talk about men closely related to the Roman Catholic Church (Jesus in The Da Vinci Code, and the Pope in Angels and Demons) having a child.
In both books, Langdon fails to recognize that an object (the Illuminati Diamond/6th Brand in Angels and Demons) or clue (the unfamiliar "language" on the back of the wooden rose cutout in The Da Vinci Code) are actually mirror images.
Elements that are common to all four of Brown's books
These elements are common in The Da Vinci Code, Angels and Demons, Deception Point, and Digital Fortress.
A murder happens in the prologue of each of the books.
The murder will be perpetrated by a character (or, as in Deception Point, characters) who will remain as the henchman of the main villain: Hulohot, the Hassassin, the Delta Force and Silas in Digital Fortress, Angels and Demons, Deception Point, and The Da Vinci Code respectively.
The primary events in each book take place during the course of approximately 24 hours.
The primary male character is always a scholar of some sort. The primary female character is always a character with a mathematically inclined area of expertise.
A key character in each book (such as Maximilian Kohler in Angels and Demons and Bezu Fache in The Da Vinci Code) is portrayed in such a way that the reader would suspect them to have masterminded the killings, but it turns out to be untrue.
The mastermind behind the killings turns out to be a salient figure for most of the book, and supposedly against the motives behind the murders. The camerlengo in Angels and Demons, for example, is thought to be against the existence of the Illuminati, while in The Da Vinci Code, Sir Leigh Teabing's motives appear to be parallel to those of the Priory of Sion.
The main character and the female protagonist end the story with the implication of a sexual relationship, though details are not given.
Fact and fiction behind the book
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For more information on these elements of the book, please see the following articles:
Illuminati, a secret brotherhood at the heart of the book's plot
The book fictionalizes a story about the Altars of Science in Rome, consisting of four locations, each representing the four elements—earth, air, fire and water—which are believed to be "the Path of Illumination," a trail to the meeting place of the Illuminati in Rome.
According to the book, the "altars" were hidden as religious artwork in order to avoid the wrath of the Vatican and secure the secrecy of the Illuminati. The artworks that make up the Four Altars were all sculpted by Gian Lorenzo Bernini.
Though the book is not clear where exactly the meeting place was, it is stated to be within the famed Castel Sant'Angelo.
Water—The famous Fountain of Four Rivers at Piazza Navona
Image:Santa_maria_del_popolo_F.jpg|The facade of Santa Maria del Popolo. Habakkuk and the Angel, Altar of Earth is in Chigi Chapel of Santa Maria del Popolo.
Image:Watykan Bazylika sw Piotra.JPG|Obelisk in Saint Peter's Square, Altar of Air
image:Estasi santa teresa.PNG|Ecstasy of St Theresa, Altar of Fire
Image:Rzym Fontanna Czterech Rzek.jpg|Fountain of Four Rivers, Altar of Water
Factual inaccuracies
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In the beginning of the book, Brown claims that "references to all works of art, tombs, tunnels, and architecture in Rome are entirely factual (as are their exact locations). They can still be seen today. The brotherhood of the Illuminati is also factual."
Despite Brown specifying the limits of his novel's factual accuracy, some readers have objected to other areas of information being misleading, in part based on the public comments made by the author and also due to the style of writing (for example, characters making expositions on their areas of expertise). Brown, having previously stated that his books were so research intensive they took a couple of years to write, has stated in a recent court case that he was "not much of a detail person".
The acknowledgement of organizations including CERN in the writing of the book gives the impression of the facts being supplied or reviewed by those organizations. CERN felt it appropriate to provide some scientific corrections to the book.[link] For example, the CERN website maintains that is scientifically impossible to use artificially made antimatter as a fuel source without violating physical conservation laws. Although, antimatter reacting with matter could possibly be used as an energy source if the antimatter could be obtained from a pre-existing source. (Which if there is any extant antimatter would necessarily be in a part of the universe not normally in contact with "regular" matter.) According to CERN an antimatter bomb is implausible because current methods of antimatter production are only able to produce miniscule amounts of antimatter. In addition, the energy output would be twice the energy content of the antimatter alone, since it would also include the energy content of the matter it reacts with.
According to Brown, Galileo Galilei founded the Illuminati in order to spread scientific knowledge that the Church attempted to suppress. In reality, there is no evidence to suggest that Galileo was associated with any of the incarnations of the Illuminati (the most famous, the Bavarian Illuminati, was founded more than a century after his death).
The difficulty of creating an ambigram is greatly exaggerated. An ambigram of almost any word can be created without any extraordinary knowledge or skill, although the more elegant the ambigram (elegance usually being judged by readability) the more difficult it will be. The ambigrams in the book would not be extraordinarily difficult to construct, although the character Robert Langdon initially rests much of his case for the Illuminati link on that supposed difficulty. The ambigrams in the book were made by an artist by the name of John Langdon, who Dan Brown commissioned to create the ambigrams.
The book states that Christians came to know about 'god-eating' from the Aztecs. However, Christianity is at least 1900 years old, and Christians and Aztecs did not come into contact until 1519. There are early Christian and Roman references to the Communion.
In examining the body of the previous Pope, the Swiss Guard simply slides back the marble top of the tomb and checks the Pope's tongue. In fact, Popes are buried in three nested coffins, which would have made this task somewhat more difficult.
Dan Brown claims that "Bernini's city-wide cross of obelisks marked the fortress in perfect Illuminati fashion; the cross’s central arm passed directly through the center of the castle’s bridge, dividing it into two equal halves." In fact, neither of the two arms of the cross go through the Castel Sant'Angelo.
Brown writes that CERN owns a hyper-sonic space craft based on a "Boeing X-33". Boeing didn't design the X-33. It was designed by Lockheed Martin for NASA at its Skunk Works facility and the construction of the prototype was some 85% complete when the program was cancelled by NASA in 2001, after a long series of technical difficulties including flight instability and excess weight.
Brown writes that the abovementioned craft could go at Mach 15, which is very incredible considering that the world's fastest rocket engines can only reach Mach 13. Even at Mach 15, reaching Switzerland from Boston in 1 hour is virtually impossible. (While a flight at Mach 15 could travel the distance from Boston to Switzerland in less than an hour, additional time for acceleration and deceleration render such a flight in the given time unlikely.)
Brown writes that the antimatter canister will detonate with the energy of a 5 kiloton bomb. However, the energy released will be from the total consumption of 0.5g of material; 0.25g of antimatter, and 0.25g of normal matter. This has the energy equivalent of 1013Joules, or about 10 kilotons of TNT.
Containment of hydrogen (anti- or otherwise) in a magnetic field would not be possible in a small portable container. For the hydrogen to form a droplet at normal temperatures and in a vacuum (as would be necessary to isolate it from normal matter) would require a magnetic field of extraordinary strength, beyond the power of a portable power source. This magnetic field would have to extend well beyond the canister and would cause vigorous effects on ferromatic materials nearby. Furthermore, hydrogen in its conventional liquid state is diamagnetic, and would be difficult to suspend unless the compression induced by the magnetic field caused the hydrogen to become metallic (as in the core of gas giant planets).
Brown writes that the "All-Seeing Eye" is insignificant to the US, although the "all seeing eye of God" is mentioned several times in the Bible. The pyramid it is situated on (in the one-dollar bill) does have meaning: it is constructed of 13 layers and has 1776(MDCCLXXVI) in Roman numerals imprinted on the bottom.
Brown states that the new Pope must be chosen from the College of Cardinals. Strictly speaking, the only requirements for being Pope are to be male, Catholic, and not a heretic or in a schism. While it is rare for a non-Cardinal to be raised, it has occurred a few times in the past (albeit not since Archbishop Bartolomeo Prignano became Pope Urban VI in 1379. More recently, in 1958, Giovanni Montini, Archbishop of Milan, was seriously considered as a candidate for the papacy, despite his lack of a red hat.)
Brown has the BBC reporter claim that Ventresca was elected Pope by acclamation. Although acclamation was in the past a method to be elected Pope, in 1996 John Paul II issued the papal bull Universi Dominici Gregis. This document, which contains the electoral law, abolished all other forms of papal elections and states that only formal elections held in conclave by the cardinal-electors are valid.
Also, one of the central tenets of the book might in reality be considered very unlikely: a "24-hour" battery that works perfectly for EXACTLY twenty-four hours, zero minutes and zero seconds, and then shuts down completely. Battery lifetime is actually highly variable based on temperature, the age of the battery and the number of times it has been recharged, and "24 hours" would be only a vague estimate.
Additionally, it's a wonder that all the clocks and watches in the book have exactly the same time - precise to the second. That includes Langdon's watch, all the watches of the Swiss Guards, the Hassassin and the public clocks including those in various churches around Rome.
The author claimed that "Renaissance cathedrals invariably contained multiple chapels, huge cathedrals like Notre Dame de Paris having dozens" (pg. 264 - Paperback edition, chapter 65). However, Notre Dame is a typical example of a Gothic cathedral, having been built from 1163 to 1345 - a good two hundred years before the Renaissance period began.
While technically the Pope may not have broken his vows of chastity by fathering a child through artificial insemination, this is nonetheless deceiving. As the Catholic Church is against all forms of artificial insemination, this too would have been regarded as immoral and improper.
Burstein, Dan (ed). Secrets of Angels & Demons: The unauthorized guide to the bestselling novel, 2004, CDS Books. ISBN 1593151403 - Collection of many essays by world-class historians and other experts, discussing the fact & fiction of the novel
