A Library Of The World

I'd read The Name Of The Rose, Umberto Eco's first novel, when it was published in English in 1983, and have since reread it. Over the years, I've read interviews with, and some pieces by, the professor and semiotician, but not any of his subsequent novels.

Last night, we watched a charming, imaginative, and provocative movie done as a tribute to Eco, who passed in 2016, Umberto Eco: A Library Of The World; trailer below, and you can find the whole thing on YouTube.  It starts in Eco's home library, consisting of more than 31,000 volumes, including many rare books, arranged in his idiosyncratic classification system.  Along the way we are introduced to other libraries, various characters and colleagues, and clips of interviews with the professor who, it is clear, knows his role is also to be an entertainer.  It is also a visually creative film, an asset that Eco would appreciate.

The theme can be stated with a couple of quotes from Eco in the film; "Libraries are mankind's common memory" and that, "without memory it is impossible to build a future".  From Eco and the other characters we get thoughts of the transition from the print era to the digital world; how in the print world there was a limited amount of information one could be exposed to, while the digital world presents the opposite situation.  In contrast to the print world, one has to be selective in what to be absorb in the digital.  Eco did not ignore technology; after all, he carried a cellphone - he just did not turn it on.

There is a lot more, including explanations of what Eco believes about knowledge and reality, and always done in a fun way, which the professor would have wanted.

We learn that Eco, and many others in the movie, are obsessed with Athanasius Kircher (1602-80), a German polymath and Jesuit who wrote many lengthy, and profusely illustrated books, on a range of subjects, including hieroglyphics, religion, geology, sinology, medicine, biology, technology, and the Bible.  He's described as incredibly interesting and, often incredibly wrong.

Umberto Eco enjoyed his life and he invites you to enjoy this tribute to him.