Publication

Abstract : Secret societies have continually been attention-grabbing topics for novelists of adventure stories and conspiracy theories and Dan Brown is one among them. With the dawn of the 21st century, a new interest in secret societies spread through all venues of life and shaped this centuries' culture, in literature, arts, movies, industry; it even reached politics and religion. Terms like Illuminati, Assassins, Freemasons and their symbols like the All Seeing - Eye, the Pyramids, Fleur-de-lis and the like, are used in popular culture like songs, novels, cartoons, and even in trademarks. Dan Brown’s novel Angels and Demons (2000) could be an excellent example of a conspiracy novel that is rich with the foremost outstanding secret societies within the world; The Illuminati. In this research, secret societies like “The Illuminati” from Brown’s Angels and Demons (2000) and “Opus Dei” from The Da Vinci Code (2003) are examined and equated to facts, references and sources. Secret societies are analyzed and compared, and differences docketed as to how they exhibit themselves in their official websites vis-à-vis how they are presented in the novel. The analysis attempts to answer queries like what is a secret society? Why were they formed? Why were they required to operate in secrecy? What is the Opus Dei? What are the Illuminati? And if secret societies do exist. The research comes up with the hypothetical fact that secret societies mask their identity to attain societal acceptance. The research takes a qualitative approach with content analysis.