The Lost Symbol [electronic resource] :

Titre:

Auteur:

Description:

-- et within the hidden chambers, tunnels, and temples of Washington, D.C.,! “Impossible to put down.... Another mind-blowing Robert Langdon story.” —The New York Times Famed Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon answers an unexpected summons to appear at the U.S. Capitol Building. His plans are interrupted when a disturbing object—artfully encoded with five symbols—is discovered in the building. Langdon recognizes in the find an ancient invitation into a lost world of esoteric, potentially dangerous wisdom. When his mentor Peter Solomon—a long-standing Mason and beloved philanthropist—is kidnapped, Langdon realizes that the only way to save Solomon is to accept the mystical invitation and plunge headlong into a clandestine world of Masonic secrets, hidden history, and one inconceivable truth ... all under the watchful eye of Dan Brown's most terrifying villain to date.

Éditeur:

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group,

Date:

2009

Format numérique:

CLOUDLIBRARY EPUB

Langue:

Anglais

Résumé

THE #1 WORLDWIDE BESTSELLER FROM THE ICONIC AUTHOR OF THE DA VINCI CODE

"Impossible to put down." -- The New York Times

"Thrilling and entertaining, like the experience on a roller coaster." -- Los Angeles Times

Famed Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon answers an unexpected summons to deliver a lecture at the U.S. Capitol Building. His plans are interrupted when a disturbing object--artfully encoded with five symbols--is discovered in the building. Langdon recognizes in the find an ancient invitation into a lost world of esoteric, potentially dangerous wisdom.

When his mentor, Peter Solomon--a long-standing Mason and beloved philanthropist--is kidnapped, Langdon realizes that the only way to save Solomon is to accept the mystical invitation and plunge headlong into a clandestine world of Masonic secrets, hidden history, and one inconceivable truth . . . all under the watchful eye of a terrifying enemy.

Robert Langdon returns in Inferno, Origin, and The Secret of Secrets (coming soon)!

Critiques (5)

Critique du Publishers Weekly

After scores of Da Vinci Code knockoffs, spinoffs, copies and caricatures, Brown has had the stroke of brilliance to set his breakneck new thriller not in some far-off exotic locale, but right here in our own backyard. Everyone off the bus, and welcome to a Washington, D.C., they never told you about on your school trip when you were a kid, a place steeped in Masonic history that, once revealed, points to a dark, ancient conspiracy that threatens not only America but the world itself. Returning hero Robert Langdon comes to Washington to give a lecture at the behest of his old mentor, Peter Solomon. When he arrives at the U.S. Capitol for his lecture, he finds, instead of an audience, Peter's severed hand mounted on a wooden base, fingers pointing skyward to the Rotunda ceiling fresco of George Washington dressed in white robes, ascending to heaven. Langdon teases out a plethora of clues from the tattooed hand that point toward a secret portal through which an intrepid seeker will find the wisdom known as the Ancient Mysteries, or the lost wisdom of the ages. A villain known as Mal'akh, a steroid-swollen, fantastically tattooed, muscle-bodied madman, wants to locate the wisdom so he can rule the world. Mal'akh has captured Peter and promises to kill him if Langdon doesn't agree to help find the portal. Joining Langdon in his search is Peter's younger sister, Kathleen, who has been conducting experiments in a secret museum. This is just the kickoff for a deadly chase that careens back and forth, across, above and below the nation's capital, darting from revelation to revelation, pausing only to explain some piece of wondrous, historical esoterica. Jealous thriller writers will despair, doubters and nay-sayers will be proved wrong, and readers will rejoice: Dan Brown has done it again. (Sept. 14) Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.

Critique de Booklist

A mysterious clue leading to a series of puzzles; a ruthless villain who will stop at nothing; ancient secrets; mysterious organizations that link past to present Brown has taken the elements that made The Da Vinci Code a success and reworked them in this long-anticipated sequel. Robert Langdon, the symbologist hero of Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons, is lured to Washington, D.C., where he believes he is to give a speech. Instead, he finds that an old friend has been abducted. Only Langdon can unlock the hidden mysteries that can save his friend's life. Brown combines Freemasons, the Institute of Noetic Sciences, Albrecht Durer, and various other ingredients to create a story that could be a mishmash but never quite loses cohesiveness. Readers who found the previous Langdon novels to be excessively wordy and much too slowly paced will level the same criticisms here, and Brown really needs to cool it with the amateurish overuse of exclamation marks, italics, and sentence-ending punctuation like ?! On the other hand, you can't deny that he knows how to put together an intriguing, if emotionally uninvolving, story: he keeps us guessing with his riddles and puzzles, and we move through the story in a cantering, orderly fashion. Other writers could have taken this story and really run with it Matthew Reilly, say, or James Rollins but fans of the first two Langdon novels will flock to this one and they won't be disappointed. One final note: Brown may have done himself a slight disservice by setting the novel in Washington: he's inviting comparison to the lighter, and livelier, National Treasure movies.--Pitt, David Copyright 2009 Booklist

Critique du New York Review of Books

The new Dan Brown puzzler is the scariest one yet. It's not so much the barbarous machinations of the villain, another one-dimensional, self-mortifying hulk, that sends chills down your spine. Or the plot, which is an Oedipal MacGuffin. No, the terrifying thing about "The Lost Symbol" is that Brown - who did not flinch when the Vatican both condemned the "The Da Vinci Code" and curtailed the filming of "Angels & Demons" in Rome - clearly got spooked by that other powerful, secretive ancient sect, the Masons. His book is a desperate attempt to ingratiate himself with the Masons, rather than to interpret the bizarre Masonic rites and symbols that illuminate - as in Illuminati! - how the ultimate elite private boys' club has conspired to shape the nation's capital and Western civilization ever since George Washington laid the cornerstone for the Capitol building in a Masonic ritual wearing full Masonic regalia, including a darling little fringed satin apron. If the Masons are more intimidating than the Vatican, if Brown has now become part of their semiotic smoke screen, then all I can say is, God help us all. Or as Brown, who is more addicted to italics than that other breathless Brown, Cosmo Girl Helen Gurley, might put it: What the hell? Of course, who can blame him? How can you not be frightened by a brotherhood that includes Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny; Buzz Aldrin; and Dave Thomas, the founder of Wendy's? During the five years he researched this book, did Brown begin to believe those sensational stories about how, if you expose the secrets of the Masons, they will slit your throat? Did he discover that the Masons are not merely a bunch of old guys dressed up in funny costumes enjoying a harmless night away from the wives? Could they really be, as a recent Discovery Channel documentary on the ancient order wondered, "Godless conspirators bound to a death pledge who infiltrate institutions and run the world"? Did Brown decipher the cryptic documents locked in a safe at the C.I.A. - founded by another Mason, Harry Truman! - and figure out that some of those wild tales were true? That Jack the Ripper was a Mason whose identity was covered up by the Masonic police commissioner? That Salieri and others murdered Mozart after the young Masonic composer revealed some of the order's secret symbols in "The Magic Flute"? I was really looking forward to Brown's excavation of Washington's mystical power, ancient portals, secret passageways and shadow worlds. As a native, I've loved the monuments here since I was little. I've often driven past the Scottish Rite Masonic temple with its two sphinxes on 16th Street. And my first memory as a little girl was picking up my dad from work at night from the brightly lighted Capitol. I was eager to learn occult lore about our venerable marble temples and access the lost wisdom of the ages. So I happily curled up with Robert Langdon, the author's anodyne, tweedy doppelgänger, and suppressed my annoyance that the Harvard symbologist was still wearing his Mickey Mouse watch, hand-grinding his Sumatra coffee beans and refusing to entangle with the latest brainy babe who materializes to help untangle ancient secrets. This book's looker, Katherine Solomon, is a lithe, gray-eyed expert in Noetic science, the study of "the untapped potential of the human mind." Brown must also want to explore the untapped potential of the human body, since he has made his heroine 50 years old, something that no doubt caused the Hollywood studio suits to spritz their Zico coconut water. Katherine, a few years older than Langdon, may be a tribute to Brown's wife and amanuensis, Blythe, who is 12 years older and helped him write "187 Men to Avoid: A Survival Guide for the Romantically Frustrated Woman." Emotions are the one thing Dan Brown can't seem to decipher. His sex scenes are encrypted. Even though Katherine seems like Langdon's soul mate - she even knows how to weigh souls - their most torrid sex scenes consist of Robert winking at he or flashing her a lopsided grin. Brown's novels are obviously inspired by Indiana Jones and "Raiders of the Lost Ark." But he can only emulate the galloping narrative drive and the fascination with mythological archetypes, pyramids, Holy Grails, treasure maps and secret codes; he can't summon the sexy, playful side of the Spielberg-Lucas legacy. His metaphors thud onto the page. Inoue Sato, an intelligence official investigating a disembodied hand bearing a Masonic ring and iconic tattoos that shows up in the Capitol Rotunda, "cruised the deep waters of the C.I.A. like a leviathan who surfaced only to devour its prey." Insights don't simply come to characters: "Then, like an oncoming truck, it hit her," or "The revelation crashed over Langdon like a wave." And just when our hero thinks it's safe to go back in the water, another bad metaphor washes over him: "His head ached now, a roiling torrent of interconnected thoughts." You can practically hear the eerie organ music playing whenever Mal'akh, the clichéd villain whose eyes shine "with feral ferocity," appears. He goes from sounding like a parody of a Bond bad guy ("You are a very small cog in a vast machine," he tells Langdon) to a parody of Woody Allen ("The body craves what the body craves," he thinks). But Brown tops himself with these descriptions: "Wearing only a silken loincloth wrapped around his buttocks and neutered sex organ, Mal'akh began his preparations," and "Hanging beneath the archway, his massive sex organ bore the tattooed symbols of his destiny. In another life, this heavy shaft of flesh had been his source of carnal pleasure. But no longer." BROWN has always written screenplays masquerading as novels, but now he's also casting. Warren Bellamy, the Masonic architect of the Capitol is described as an elderly African-American man with close-cropped, graying hair who enunciates his words with crisp precision: "Bellamy was lithe and slender, with an erect posture and piercing gaze that exuded the confidence of a man in full control of his surroundings." Morgan Freeman, call Ron Howard. The Bellamy character provides another opportunity for Brown to burnish the Masons, as when the architect tells Langdon: "The craft of Freemasonry has given me a deep respect for that which transcends human understanding. I've learned never to close my mind to an idea simply because it seems miraculous." The author has gotten rich and famous without attaining a speck of subtlety. A character never just stumbles into blackness. It must be inky blackness. A character never just listens in shock. He listens in utter shock. And consider this fraught interior monologue by the head of the Capitol Police: "Chief Anderson wondered when this night would end. A severed hand in my Rotunda? A death shrine in my basement? Bizarre engravings on a stone pyramid? Somehow, the Redskins game no longer felt significant." My dad always said in his day that the Masons were not welcoming to Catholics. The Catholic Church once considered the Masons so anti-Catholic, Catholics who joined were threatened with excommunication. Now the church hierarchy merely disapproves. (They like secret rites, blood rituals and the exclusion of women only when they do it.) But Langdon suggests to his Harvard students that the Masons are "refreshingly open-minded" and do not "discriminate in any way." To a student protesting that Masonry sounds like a "freaky cult," Langdon counters that it's "a system of morality" He notes, "The Masons are not a secret society . . . they are a society with secrets." He debunks stories of the founding fathers' supposedly building a Satanic pentacle and the Masonic compass and square into the capital's street design, scoffing, "If you draw enough intersecting lines on a map, you're bound to find all kinds of shapes." The Masons are represented in the dazzling person of Peter Solomon, Katherine's older brother, a handsome, wealthy historian and philanthropist who runs the Smithsonian Institution and inspired the youg Langdon's interest in symbols. In interviews, Brown has said he was tempted to join the Masons, calling their philosophy a "beautiful blueprint for human spirituality." In the next opus, Langdon will probably be wearing a red Shriner's fez with his Burberry turtleneck and Harris tweed. In this book, Langdon helps stop the villain from releasing a video to YouTube that he has surreptitiously taped during his Masonic initiation rites. The blind-folded initiate drinks blood-red wine out of a human skull and has a dagger pressed to his bare chest; he has to take part in an enactment of his own brutal murder - "there were simulated blows to his head, including one with a Mason's stone maul" - and hear a biblical reference to human sacrifice, "the submission of Abraham to the Supreme Being by proffering Isaac, his firstborn son." These are meant partly as warnings about what can befall anyone who leaks the order's secrets - warnings Dan Brown clearly took to heart. "Langdon could already tell that the video was an unfair piece of propaganda," Brown writes, adding that the symbologist thought to himself, "the truth will be twisted . . . as it always is with the Masons." Brown skitters away from giving us the book we expected: one that might have clued us in on which present-day politicians are still Masons and what mumbo jumbo they're up to. That job was left to Eamon Javers of Politico, who uncovered a list of Freemasons in Congress that reads like a vast rightwing conspiracy. Joe "You lie!" Wilson is a member of the Sinclair Lodge of West Columbia, S.C. Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the House minority whip, who's trying to suffocate President Obama's health care plan, is a member of a Richmond lodge his dad and uncle belonged to. Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, who chimed in against "death panels," urged Javers: "Don't judge us by the funny hats we wear." Even more ominously, President Obama suddenly left the White House on a recent night and went to the Washington Monument, the obelisk that figures in Brown's climactic scene, and stayed inside for 20 minutes. If you add the 13 minutes it probably took to walk to the limo and drive back to the White House and return to his residence, you reach the magic Masonic number of 33! In the end, as with "The Da Vinci Code," there's no payoff. Brown should stop worrying about unfinished pyramids and worry about unfinished novels. At least Spielberg and Lucas gave us an Ark and swirling, dissolving humans. We don't get any ancient wisdom that "will profoundly change the world as you know it" - just a lot of New Agey piffle about how we are the gods we've been waiting for. (And a father-son struggle for global domination, as though we didn't get enough of that with the Bushes.) What the hell, Dan?! Maureen Dowd is an Op-Ed columnist for The Times.

Critique du Guardian

This is the first sentence of Angels and Demons (2000), the novel that launched "Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon" on an unsuspecting world: "Physicist Leonardo Vetra smelled burning flesh, and he knew it was his own." Its sequel, 2003's The Da Vinci Code , begins as follows: "Renowned curator Jacques Sauniere staggered through the vaulted archway of the museum's Grand Gallery." I expected Langdon's third outing to begin with something along the lines of: "Internationally admired administrator Jacobus von Pelzer felt the stiletto penetrate a spleen, which he knew was his, as he lurched through the Folger Shakespeare Library." But no. Restrained by the best editing that money can buy, Dan Brown opens The Lost Symbol with italics instead: "House of the Temple. 8:33 PM. The secret is how to die ." Brown, a former English teacher, became the face of American commercial fiction when he unexpectedly hit the jackpot with The Da Vinci Code . His formula - twist-filled treasure hunts in upmarket tourist locations, plus creepy villains and hefty dollops of pseudo-learning - was pretty slick. Yet his lack of writing skills soon made him perhaps the only novelist around whose work regularly gets picked apart in stand-up routines. Sample Brown sentences: "The room was dark. Medieval. Stone." "The eerie phone conversation had left him feeling turgid . . . distended somehow. Not himself." Then there's his imaginative geography and history and use of exploded conspiracy theories, many of them labelled "FACT" in his opening pages. The authors of the 1980s conspiracy bestseller that provided The Da Vinci Code 's key revelation took Brown to court, without success, in 2006. Six years in the making, The Lost Symbol has plainly been copy-edited more vigilantly than his earlier efforts. There are some brilliantly clunky passages: "My God, Katherine was right. As usual." But the writing is mostly bad in an uninspired way. Someone seems to have half-persuaded Brown that "symbolism" is a more effective word than "symbology", and there's no more talk of "trying to diffuse what looked like a second bomb about to explode". Being set in Washington DC, the story also has fewer opportunities for English characters to come out with such expressions as "I guess we'll see who's short a few crumpets." Although there are a few self-deprecating in-jokes, and cautious references to 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq, which we sense Brown was against, the responsibilities of bestsellerdom weigh heavily on the book. This time round, Peter Solomon, Langdon's previously unmentioned mentor, has been kidnapped by a villain who blackmails Langdon into searching for "the Lost Word". This key to the "Ancient Mysteries" is apparently hidden in the DC metro area, having been buried there by the Masons as far back as "the 1800s". Also on the scene are a caustic CIA woman, the man in charge of the Capitol building, and a blind Anglican priest who's a senior Mason too. The heroine is Solomon's sister, Katherine, a specialist in "Noetic Science", which turns out to be Brown's usual mind-over-matter, quantum entanglement stuff. It's fun that Katherine has "created beautifully symmetrical ice crystals by sending loving thoughts to a glass of water as it froze", but not as fun as the heroine of Angels and Demons reaching similar conclusions "by using atomically synchronised cameras to observe a school of tuna fish". The main change is the replacement of the spooky killer and the shadowy master-villain. A single character now fills both roles: "the one who called himself Mal'akh". Covered from head to toe in occult tattoos, Mal'akh is the best creation in the book, although several of his attributes are heavily indebted to Thomas Harris's second-string serial killers. Unfortunately, he's also one of two major drawbacks: the twist involving him is so obvious that many readers will surely assume it's a double bluff, while the esoteric conspiracy, which lacks drama and rapidly fizzles out, with no popes leaping from exploding helicopters or crazy theories about Jesus. Meanwhile, Langdon gets chased and solves codes, wowing other highly educated characters by knowing what "apotheosis" means. The ideological switcheroos that characterised his previous adventures have been replaced by endless New Age sermons. Brown has no pretensions to being Umberto Eco, and his earlier books are endearingly goofy. Angels and Demons , in particular, resembles a demented, home-made approximation of ruthlessly commercial would-be Hollywood product rather than the genuine article. Brown didn't seem to be talking down cynically to his intended audience or taking himself and Langdon too seriously. The new book makes enjoyable use of both a blacked-out laboratory and a pickled giant squid, but even Brown has trouble working up wonder at discovering that the Masons like mucking around with skulls. Massive success, and the attention it brings, haven't done much for his sense of fun; perhaps the book would have benefited from a few more such lines as "This guy eluded the French police . . . in loafers?" To order The Lost Symbol for pounds 17.99 with free UK p&p call Guardian book service on 0330 333 6846. Dan Brown . . . endearingly goofy Caption: article-danb.1 This is the first sentence of Angels and Demons (2000), the novel that launched "Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon" on an unsuspecting world: "Physicist Leonardo Vetra smelled burning flesh, and he knew it was his own." Its sequel, 2003's The Da Vinci Code , begins as follows: "Renowned curator Jacques Sauniere staggered through the vaulted archway of the museum's Grand Gallery." I expected Langdon's third outing to begin with something along the lines of: "Internationally admired administrator Jacobus von Pelzer felt the stiletto penetrate a spleen, which he knew was his, as he lurched through the Folger Shakespeare Library." But no. Restrained by the best editing that money can buy, Dan Brown opens The Lost Symbol with italics instead: "House of the Temple. 8:33 PM. The secret is how to die ." This time round, Peter Solomon, Langdon's previously unmentioned mentor, has been kidnapped by a villain who blackmails Langdon into searching for "the Lost Word". This key to the "Ancient Mysteries" is apparently hidden in the DC metro area, having been buried there by the Masons as far back as "the 1800s". Also on the scene are a caustic CIA woman, the man in charge of the Capitol building, and a blind Anglican priest who's a senior Mason too. The heroine is Solomon's sister, [Katherine], a specialist in "Noetic Science", which turns out to be Brown's usual mind-over-matter, quantum entanglement stuff. It's fun that Katherine has "created beautifully symmetrical ice crystals by sending loving thoughts to a glass of water as it froze", but not as fun as the heroine of Angels and Demons reaching similar conclusions "by using atomically synchronised cameras to observe a school of tuna fish". - Christopher Tayler.

Critique du Library Journal

Brown's long-awaited blockbuster (after The Da Vinci Code) does not disappoint. Robert Langdon receives an invitation to give a lecture in Washington, DC, but discovers an empty chamber when he arrives at the venue. He quickly learns that he's been summoned for his knowledge rather than his oratory skills and that his friend Peter Solomon has been abducted. To save his life, Langdon must follow a set of clues and uncover a treasure hidden somewhere in the nation's capitol. Brown follows the template that worked in his earlier Langdon novels and proves he is the undisputable master of the genre. He even takes time to poke fun both at his popularity and the six-year gap between books. Verdict Not playing it safe, Brown crafts a compelling thriller with a rather odd yet intriguing nemesis; the final revelation is guaranteed to stir up more controversy and offshoots examining the themes explored. Buying this book is a no-brainer, but reading it will activate the brain cells in a way few suspense novels achieve. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/09.]-Jeff Ayers, Seattle P.L. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Extraits

Prologue House of the Temple 8:33 P.M. The secret is how to die. Since the beginning of time, the secret had always been how to die. The thirty-four-year-old initiate gazed down at the human skull cradled in his palms. The skull was hollow, like a bowl, filled with bloodred wine. Drink it, he told himself. You have nothing to fear. As was tradition, he had begun this journey adorned in the ritualistic garb of a medieval heretic being led to the gallows, his loose-fitting shirt gaping open to reveal his pale chest, his left pant leg rolled up to the knee, and his right sleeve rolled up to the elbow. Around his neck hung a heavy rope noose--a "cable-tow" as the brethren called it. Tonight, however, like the brethren bearing witness, he was dressed as a master. The assembly of brothers encircling him all were adorned in their full regalia of lambskin aprons, sashes, and white gloves. Around their necks hung ceremonial jewels that glistened like ghostly eyes in the muted light. Many of these men held powerful stations in life, and yet the initiate knew their worldly ranks meant nothing within these walls. Here all men were equals, sworn brothers sharing a mystical bond. As he surveyed the daunting assembly, the initiate wondered who on the outside would ever believe that this collection of men would assemble in one place . . . much less this place. The room looked like a holy sanctuary from the ancient world. The truth, however, was stranger still. I am just blocks away from the White House. This colossal edifice, located at 1733 Sixteenth Street NW in Washington, D.C., was a replica of a pre-Christian temple--the temple of King Mausolus, the original mausoleum . . . a place to be taken after death. Outside the main entrance, two seventeen-ton sphinxes guarded the bronze doors. The interior was an ornate labyrinth of ritualistic chambers, halls, sealed vaults, libraries, and even a hollow wall that held the remains of two human bodies. The initiate had been told every room in this building held a secret, and yet he knew no room held deeper secrets than the gigantic chamber in which he was currently kneeling with a skull cradled in his palms. The Temple Room. This room was a perfect square. And cavernous. The ceiling soared an astonishing one hundred feet overhead, supported by monolithic columns of green granite. A tiered gallery of dark Russian walnut seats with hand-tooled pigskin encircled the room. A thirty-three-foot-tall throne dominated the western wall, with a concealed pipe organ opposite it. The walls were a kaleidoscope of ancient symbols . . . Egyptian, Hebraic, astronomical, alchemical, and others yet unknown. Tonight, the Temple Room was lit by a series of precisely arranged candles. Their dim glow was aided only by a pale shaft of moonlight that filtered down through the expansive oculus in the ceiling and illuminated the room's most startling feature--an enormous altar hewn from a solid block of polished Belgian black marble, situated dead center of the square chamber. The secret is how to die, the initiate reminded himself. "It is time," a voice whispered. The initiate let his gaze climb the distinguished white-robed figure standing before him. The Supreme Worshipful Master. The man, in his late fifties, was an American icon, well loved, robust, and incalculably wealthy. His once-dark hair was turning silver, and his famous visage reflected a lifetime of power and a vigorous intellect. "Take the oath," the Worshipful Master said, his voice soft like falling snow. "Complete your journey." The initiate's journey, like all such journeys, had begun at the first degree. On that night, in a ritual similar to this one, the Worshipful Master had blindfolded him with a velvet hoodwink and pressed a ceremonial dagger to his bare chest, demanding: "Do you seriously declare on your honor, uninfluenced by mercenary or any other unworthy motive, that you freely and voluntarily offer yourself as a candidate for the mysteries and privileges of this brotherhood?" "I do," the initiate had lied. "Then let this be a sting to your consciousness," the master had warned him, "as well as instant death should you ever betray the secrets to be imparted to you." At the time, the initiate had felt no fear. They will never know my true purpose here. Tonight, however, he sensed a foreboding solemnity in the Temple Room, and his mind began replaying all the dire warnings he had been given on his journey, threats of terrible consequences if he ever shared the ancient secrets he was about to learn: Throat cut from ear to ear . . . tongue torn out by its roots . . . bowels taken out and burned . . . scattered to the four winds of heaven . . . heart plucked out and given to the beasts of the field-- "Brother," the gray-eyed master said, placing his left hand on the initiate's shoulder. "Take the final oath." Steeling himself for the last step of his journey, the initiate shifted his muscular frame and turned his attention back to the skull cradled in his palms. The crimson wine looked almost black in the dim candlelight. The chamber had fallen deathly silent, and he could feel all of the witnesses watching him, waiting for him to take his final oath and join their elite ranks. Tonight, he thought, something is taking place within these walls that has never before occurred in the history of this brotherhood. Not once, in centuries. He knew it would be the spark . . . and it would give him unfathomable power. Energized, he drew a breath and spoke aloud the same words that countless men had spoken before him in countries all over the world. "May this wine I now drink become a deadly poison to me . . . should I ever knowingly or willfully violate my oath." His words echoed in the hollow space. Then all was quiet. Steadying his hands, the initiate raised the skull to his mouth and felt his lips touch the dry bone. He closed his eyes and tipped the skull toward his mouth, drinking the wine in long, deep swallows. When the last drop was gone, he lowered the skull. For an instant, he thought he felt his lungs growing tight, and his heart began to pound wildly. My God, they know! Then, as quickly as it came, the feeling passed. A pleasant warmth began to stream through his body. The initiate exhaled, smiling inwardly as he gazed up at the unsuspecting gray-eyed man who had foolishly admitted him into this brotherhood's most secretive ranks. Soon you will lose everything you hold most dear. Chapter 1 The Otis elevator climbing the south pillar of the Eiffel Tower was overflowing with tourists. Inside the cramped lift, an austere businessman in a pressed suit gazed down at the boy beside him. "You look pale, son. You should have stayed on the ground." "I'm okay . . ." the boy answered, struggling to control his anxiety. "I'll get out on the next level." I can't breathe. The man leaned closer. "I thought by now you would have gotten over this." He brushed the child's cheek affectionately. The boy felt ashamed to disappoint his father, but he could barely hear through the ringing in his ears. I can't breathe. I've got to get out of this box! The elevator operator was saying something reassuring about the lift's articulated pistons and puddled-iron construction. Far beneath them, the streets of Paris stretched out in all directions. Almost there, the boy told himself, craning his neck and looking up at the unloading platform. Just hold on. As the lift angled steeply toward the upper viewing deck, the shaft began to narrow, its massive struts contracting into a tight, vertical tunnel. "Dad, I don't think--" Suddenly a staccato crack echoed overhead. The carriage jerked, swaying awkwardly to one side. Frayed cables began whipping around the carriage, thrashing like snakes. The boy reached out for his father. "Dad!" Their eyes locked for one terrifying second. Then the bottom dropped out. Robert Langdon jolted upright in his soft leather seat, startling out of the semiconscious daydream. He was sitting all alone in the enormous cabin of a Falcon 2000EX corporate jet as it bounced its way through turbulence. In the background, the dual Pratt & Whitney engines hummed evenly. "Mr. Langdon?" The intercom crackled overhead. "We're on final approach." Langdon sat up straight and slid his lecture notes back into his leather daybag. He'd been halfway through reviewing Masonic symbology when his mind had drifted. The daydream about his late father, Langdon suspected, had been stirred by this morning's unexpected invitation from Langdon's longtime mentor, Peter Solomon. The other man I never want to disappoint. The fifty-eight-year-old philanthropist, historian, and scientist had taken Langdon under his wing nearly thirty years ago, in many ways filling the void left by Langdon's father's death. Despite the man's influential family dynasty and massive wealth, Langdon had found humility and warmth in Solomon's soft gray eyes. Outside the window the sun had set, but Langdon could still make out the slender silhouette of the world's largest obelisk, rising on the horizon like the spire of an ancient gnomon. The 555-foot marble-faced obelisk marked this nation's heart. All around the spire, the meticulous geometry of streets and monuments radiated outward. Even from the air, Washington, D.C., exuded an almost mystical power. Langdon loved this city, and as the jet touched down, he felt a rising excitement about what lay ahead. The jet taxied to a private terminal somewhere in the vast expanse of Dulles International Airport and came to a stop. Langdon gathered his things, thanked the pilots, and stepped out of the jet's luxurious interior onto the foldout staircase. The cold January air felt liberating. Breathe, Robert, he thought, appreciating the wide-open spaces. A blanket of white fog crept across the runway, and Langdon had the sensation he was stepping into a marsh as he descended onto the misty tarmac. "Hello! Hello!" a singsong British voice shouted from across the tarmac. "Professor Langdon?" Langdon looked up to see a middle-aged woman with a badge and clipboard hurrying toward him, waving happily as he approached. Curly blond hair protruded from under a stylish knit wool hat. "Welcome to Washington, sir!" Langdon smiled. "Thank you." "My name is Pam, from passenger services." The woman spoke with an exuberance that was almost unsettling. "If you'll come with me, sir, your car is waiting." Langdon followed her across the runway toward the Signature terminal, which was surrounded by glistening private jets. A taxi stand for the rich and famous. "I hate to embarrass you, Professor," the woman said, sounding sheepish, "but you are the Robert Langdon who writes books about symbols and religion, aren't you?" Langdon hesitated and then nodded. "I thought so!" she said, beaming. "My book group read your book about the sacred feminine and the church! What a delicious scandal that one caused! You do enjoy putting the fox in the henhouse!" Langdon smiled. "Scandal wasn't really my intention." The woman seemed to sense Langdon was not in the mood to discuss his work. "I'm sorry. Listen to me rattling on. I know you probably get tired of being recognized . . . but it's your own fault." She playfully motioned to his clothing. "Your uniform gave you away." My uniform? Langdon glanced down at his attire. He was wearing his usual charcoal turtleneck, Harris Tweed jacket, khakis, and collegiate cordovan loafers . . . his standard attire for the classroom, lecture circuit, author photos, and social events. The woman laughed. "Those turtlenecks you wear are so dated. You'd look much sharper in a tie!" No chance, Langdon thought. Little nooses. Neckties had been required six days a week when Langdon attended Phillips Exeter Academy, and despite the headmaster's romantic claims that the origin of the cravat went back to the silk fascalia worn by Roman orators to warm their vocal cords, Langdon knew that, etymologically, cravat actually derived from a ruthless band of "Croat" mercenaries who donned knotted neckerchiefs before they stormed into battle. To this day, this ancient battle garb was donned by modern office warriors hoping to intimidate their enemies in daily boardroom battles. "Thanks for the advice," Langdon said with a chuckle. "I'll consider a tie in the future." Mercifully, a professional-looking man in a dark suit got out of a sleek Lincoln Town Car parked near the terminal and held up his finger. "Mr. Langdon? I'm Charles with Beltway Limousine." He opened the passenger door. "Good evening, sir. Welcome to Washington." Langdon tipped Pam for her hospitality and then climbed into the plush interior of the Town Car. The driver showed him the temperature controls, the bottled water, and the basket of hot muffins. Seconds later, Langdon was speeding away on a private access road. So this is how the other half lives. As the driver gunned the car up Windsock Drive, he consulted his passenger manifest and placed a quick call. "This is Beltway Limousine," the driver said with professional efficiency. "I was asked to confirm once my passenger had landed." He paused. "Yes, sir. Your guest, Mr. Langdon, has arrived, and I will deliver him to the Capitol Building by seven P.M. You're welcome, sir." He hung up. Langdon had to smile. No stone left unturned . Peter Solomon's attention to detail was one of his most potent assets, allowing him to manage his substantial power with apparent ease. A few billion dollars in the bank doesn't hurt either. Langdon settled into the plush leather seat and closed his eyes as the noise of the airport faded behind him. The U.S. Capitol was a half hour away, and he appreciated the time alone to gather his thoughts. Everything had happened so quickly today that Langdon only now had begun to think in earnest about the incredible evening that lay ahead. Arriving under a veil of secrecy, Langdon thought, amused by the prospect. Ten miles from the Capitol Building, a lone figure was eagerly preparing for Robert Langdon's arrival. From the Hardcover edition. Excerpted from The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.