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10 April 2006, 23:03St. Petersburg art historian set to accuse Dan Brown of plagiarism
St. Petersburg, April 10, Interfax - St. Petersburg art historian, employee of the western European art history department at Hermitage Mikhail Anikin is set to demand Dan Brown's honorarium for the Da Vinci Code book as compensation for moral damages.
The famous bestseller is based on "the Da Vinci code" deciphered by him, Anikin said, adding that after years of research he offered his own interpretation of La Jaconde according to which "this is not a portrait but an allegory, composed of Madonna and Christ's images."
"My book 'Leonardo Da Vinci, or theology in paint' is enough to prove that Brown's work is not just plagiarism, but a cynical theft," Anikin said.
Moreover, he has already sent a relevant document to the Russian Prosecutor General's Office, Anikin said. "Last year I urged Brown to come home by Weeping Cross. Should he fail to apologize in written and to pay off moral damage, I will turn to court," Anikin said.
Of course, Anikin is not the first person who has accused Brown of plagiarism. Earlier, the two authors of the Holy Blood and the Holy Grail, Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, said that Brown had stolen their central theme for his thriller from their book published in 1982.
However, a British court ruled on April 7 that the Da Vinci Code is not plagiarism of the earlier work. |
