Dan Brown at Transworld

	NBC Today Interview: Author Dan Brown, "The Da Vinci Code" talks to Matt Lauer about the success of his book and the research he did in order to write it. Matt Summer is a time for many to slow down a little bit and catch up on some good reading, and each year there is a runaway hit. This year, "The Da Vinci Code," written by Dan Brown, is poised to take the summer by storm. It's sitting at the number one spot on the New York Times best seller list. Dan, good morning. Nice to see you. Dan Nice to be here. Matt Let me be more specific, OK? It's not only number one on the New York Times best seller list, it is number one on every best seller list in the country right now. Dan That is true. Matt It's a million copies in print, something like that. Ho hum for you, or--or a bit shocking? Dan No, entirely shocking. I mean, I worked very hard on this book, and I'm not surprised that people are enjoying it. I really didn't expect that this many people would be enjoying it quite this much. Matt You written before, and you've been successful, but this is a whole different category here. Dan You know, yes, and this--I think it's because the book deals with themes that--that really cut across a huge portion of the population: ancient secret societies, mysterious locations in Europe and, of course, in this case, the codes and the paintings of da Vinci. Matt You bring back a main character in this book that was in "Angels and Demons", another book of yours. A Harvard professor. Dan Yes. Matt Robert Langdon. Tell me a little bit about him. Dan He is a professor of religious symbology or iconography. Matt Let me stop you there. Dan All right. Matt Because normally if you say to somebody, 'Oh, and the main character's a professor of religious symbology and iconology,' they're going to go, 'Check, please.' Dan Right. Matt And yet you manage to make this guy interesting. Dan A symbologist, as the name implies, is somebody who understands symbols. He's somebody who might be able to look at the, for example, the eye inside the triangle on the back of the dollar bill. He might be able to know where that came from, what it means, its historical significance. And I worked very hard to make all of this sort of arcane information accessible and exciting. Matt My job here is to kind of make this simple in a six-minute segment here. So basically, and--and don't shoot me for this, but basically the story is the search for the holy Grail and some clues disguised in da Vinci's paintings. Dan Yes. Matt Tell me more about that without giving anything away. Dan Well, this is going to be tricky, but the most important fact is that the holy Grail is not what people think it is. That is part of the theme of the book. The holy Grail is not a cup; it is something far more powerful. And at the beginning of the book this professor is so summoned to the Louvre to look at some symbols that are found around the murdered curator. These symbols lead to the paintings of Leonardo da Vinci, which in turn lead to a great historical secret. And, of course, in the process, this professor becomes a hunted man. Matt How much of this is based on reality in terms of things that actually occurred? I know you did a lot of research for the book. Dan Absolutely all of it. Obviously, there are--Robert Langdon is fictional, but all of the art, architecture, secret rituals, secret societies, all of that is historical fact. Matt So what'd you do? You traveled the world, you know, running into museums and… Dan Essentially, yeah. Matt ...interviewing a lot of historians. Dan My--well, I'm very fortunate. I married an art historian who, you know, with whom I travel, and we have a great time. Matt Her name's Blythe, by the way. You dedicate the book to her. Dan Yes. Matt Was she the inspiration? Dan In many ways, yes. She--she is an enormous da Vinci fanatic and really got me extremely interested in this topic. And I approached it with some skepticism and became a believer the more time we spent in Europe in these museums. She's a great editor. Matt But the lightbulb is going on here. Now you take your wife to Europe, to Paris and places like this, and yet you get to call it research and write it all off. Dan Well, as far as my accountant knows, it's entirely research. Matt It's all through the book. Dan That's right. Matt How much of a difficulty was there, Dan, in kind of drawing the line between making this overly heavy with the history yet maintaining this thriller aspect? Dan Yes, that's an important point. I--I very liberally used my delete key. For every single page in "The Da Vinci Code" that a reader reads, there are 10 pages that end up in my trash can. This is above all a thriller. And I tried to use just that information that really served the story and really helped move the plot along. Matt You do something else here is that you ask the reader to challenge certain long-held beliefs or truths about religion. Dan Yes. Matt ...Christianity. That can be a mine field for an author. And people take that very seriously. Dan Yes. Matt Were you worried about that at all? Dan Yeah, I was very curious when the book came out how it would be received. And--and I'm happy to say there was just an instant tidal wave of good will and enthusiasm for this book. There were a handful of people for whom it was a little bit shocking, but the vast majority loved it. Matt Let me bring up something in Newsweek magazine. Dan Oh, yeah. Matt Oh, yeah. An author named Lewis Perdue claims that your book, and I think the words he used, "just phenomenally similar" to a book that he had written several years ago called, "Daughter of God." What's your response--I mean, basically, he's accusing you of plagiarism. Dan Yes. Well, I obviously was not amused. Apparently, this happens all the time to best-selling authors. And when "Da Vinci Code" debuted at number one, I actually got a lot of calls from best-selling authors, calls with congratulations, and also of warnings saying, 'Well, get ready, because there are going to be people that you've never heard of coming out of the woodwork sort of wanting to ride on the coattails.' And all I can really tell you about Mr. Pu-- I've never heard of him, I've never heard of his work, and you know. Matt So it's like one of these nice problems for a best-selling author to have. Dan Yeah, it's just one of these dubious badges of honor that you wear once you hit the best seller list, I guess. Matt Let me read you what the New York Times review of the book said, "Gleefully erudite novel. Mr. Brown takes the format he's been developing through three earlier novels and fine-tunes it to blockbuster proportion-or perfection," excuse me. That's a pretty good endorsement. Dan Very, very nice. That was a wonderful first review to read. Matt How does this impact the--your next steps in your career? I mean, once you get these kind of reviews, these kind of sales, this kind of exposure, how much pressure do you find on your next project? And what is the next project? Dan Well, the next project is another Robert Langdon thriller. This professor of symbology will be exploring another secret brotherhood. I can't say too much about it. But, obviously, the positive response, it's wonderful. It changes your life dramatically. I'm--I'm sitting on the TODAY show, talking to Matt Lauer. That's a new experience. The same time, I'm a writer. I spend my life essentially alone at a computer. That doesn't change. I have the same challenges every day. Matt Well, congratulations on that, on the talk about the book and certainly on the sales and all the reviews. And being number one on all those lists has to feel awfully good. Dan It's terrific. Matt Dan Brown... Dan Thank you. Matt …good to have you here.