I don't know about you lot but....

I'm all for bad things happening to Dan Brown. But what with recent attempts to patent movie plots in america, and various media industries going batshit about protecting copyright. I'd find it deeply troubling if he was found guilty. You can't copyright an idea.

I suspect it will be difficult to prove anything. He is not being accused of plagarism, as such, but rather something vague like stealing an idea. That is much more difficult to prove, especially when there are so many differences between the two books. In fact, there are many books (especially pop history) which incorporate a similar theme, such as The Templar Revelation. Even Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco covers much of the same territory. You could even go back to The Passover Plot, written in the 60s, and find much of the story there.

Shame. I'd still like to see him publically discredited. I do my bit: I try to spread the word against him, I throw a few dirty looks on the tube to twenty-something women trying to look intellectual, I 'accidentally' put other books in front of his in bookstores, but I fear my methods are small-time and ineffectual. As it stands, if he doesn't lose, the publicity can only to his books and forthcoming film(s!) good. And rationally, I know I should let it go, but the injustice of his popularity is a real thorn in my side. Enzo.. www.thedevilbetweenus.com

What happened Enzo? I haven't been on for weeks. What'd I miss?

Perhaps just a little envy and some sour grapes, mike.

Mike - Dan Brown's in court over allegations that he stole ideas from another book when he wrote the Da Vinci Code. AG - I am not envious of Dan Brown. I am envious of many people's talent, including people on this very site. However, I have no sour grapes about anyone and no shame about my envy. I would have thought you'd have better things to do than take pop-shots at me on one thread just because you've been getting a hard time off others on other threads. Enzo.. www.thedevilbetweenus.com

Enzo has no reason to envy Dan Brown. Actually, for me, Brown isn't that bad, simply because everyone knows he's crap, and as long as he continues to be absurdly popular, he's living proof that popularity means squat, that any literate person stands a chance of being a writer if they want, and that editors and publishers are not always the meticulous, hard-to-please arbiters of literary gold that we're supposed to think the are. Dan Brown makes me feel that once I've actually finished a novel I want to publish, it's only a matter of willpower and persistence to get it taken on.

Enzo, put that stick down, you are holding the wrong end of it. Why -do- people keep doing that?

Probably because that's the end that's being waved under their noses.

Goodness you're a cranky lot.

I'm still gonna see the movie! Tom Hanks! And that old dude! Can't be as bad as Gigli! :)

'not as bad as gigli' is hardly a good reason to go see a film