Rating: 
Summary: Novel of ideas well done, but little character
Review: .
Mulisch's design for this book is grand; not quite as grand as the ideas that fall within its scope, but since these ideas are in the realm of "what caused the universe?" that's OK. What we have is a plot where demi-gods/angels are disgusted with the scientific/rational progress of humanity, and work to separate their mystery from us. To do that, a sequence of genetic pairings and unlikely events have been contrived, to allow for the arrival of the Very Special Character. We, as readers, watch the pairings and events. Along the way, we have a number of very clever treatments of the Big Idea, both in the internal musings of characters, and discussions between them. The Big Idea is discussed in theology, history, physics, astronomy, architecture, art... It all gets a fairly thorough hashing through. The problem I have with this book, however, is not that the events feel contrived (I have fun suspending my belief every Christmas, watching "It's A Wonderful Life"), nor is it that discussion gets 'heady' some times... But in the end, I felt I knew more about the characters' thoughts than I knew about the characters themselves. I didn't feel as if I read that much about how characters behaved towards each other, not enough to get a sense of who the characters were. We get some characterizations, but the Very Special Character remains shallow, with no childhood friends or enemies; we never see him in school or developing with any broader world outside the building in which he grows up. The adults around him never talk about anything besides the Big Issues. Certainly, Mulisch did a great job of presenting their musings, and their most serious thoughts, but there's a lot of incidental life which fell under his radar screeen (perhaps beneath his scope?), and I didn't feel as if these characters were people. To contrast, think of any of the "Baltimore" films from Barry Levinson, and how the incidental, non-plot dialogues make us feel like we know his characters; or Pynchon's "Mason & Dixon", where characters indulge themselves to search out Cape Town for katjap. Certainly, there are some incidental details here and there in Mulisch's book, but not enough to really round out these characters. For Mulisch, the idea is the thing; for me, that's not enough.
Rating: 
Summary: Extraordinary fiction from the Netherlands
Review: DISCOVERY OF HEAVEN. Full appreciation of this novel may require a firm grasp of the difference between what is ambiguous and what is absurd. The book is about the interplay between the two and how they are mediated to the consciousness by meaning. That is, the novel asks us whether we want to stress the reality of madness or the madness of reality. Onno and Max are bosom friends and Onno takes up with Ada after Max destroys his own relationship with her by some words of amazing crudeness. Ada's pregnancy is clothed in doubt as to which of the two men is the father of the extraordinarily beautiful child born while she is in a coma following an auto accident. Max is the scientist-astronomer while Onno is the linguist paleographer. They and their conversations are brilliant if never quite serious. Quinten, Ada's child, is brought up by Max and Ada's mother, Sophia. These two have a sexual liaison lacking in several of the features that would make it an affair. After failing in politics and in linguistics, Onno drops out of life and ordinary reality and disappears, while Max finds something like an answer to the question of the origin of the universe and then gets zapped into eternity by a meteorite. Quinten goes on the archetypal quest for his father, (is Onno really his father?) which is the symbolic quest for God or the idea of God. His mother, in a coma seventeen years and a living sign of death, is nearly unknown to him. Symbolically he turns his back on "mother nature," on the corruption of nature from which new life springs in never ending cycles, and he undertakes the search for meaning.
Those of us who think our prime obligation in life is to grow progressively out of the ignorance into which we were born sometimes ask ourselves if the seemingly endless task is really worth it. Our ignorant associates and rellies seem to be no less "happy" than we whose main thrust is the acquisition of culture. But every now and then we receive a surprise reward for our efforts, like when we read a novel grounded solidly in ideas, culture, science, art, spirituality, one whose plot contains a wealth of examples of ambiguity or absurdity.
Rating: 
Summary: An overrated, hackneyed book.
Review: I found it a struggle to continuously overlook the misogynist, elitist attitude. The main male characters, Onno and Max, have a style of intellectual banter that I enjoy to participate in. But the character of the boy child Quinten is just too much. A child with an intellect of an adult smells of an adult author assigning pretensions to a child. And of course that's exactly what happened. But the worst part is when the author's opinion of women becomes clear and we see what sort of character the women possess. We have one musician = Ada, one librarian = Helga and a housewife = Sophia. Not one of them enjoys any intellectual discussion, not one of them is evident as having an original thought and all of them are quite at home cleaning or cooking in the kitchen. P. 50 Onno speaking with Ada
"Aha," he said, and went over to her. "Woman's intuition." He hugged her clumsily. "Sorry about that. Women have everything - brains, feeling, willpower - but only men have intuition. That's why there's no female creation of any importance, and that isn't because they've always been confined to the kitchen, because even the best cooks are men. One is forced reluctantly to accept the fact. But they can do one thing that men can't do, and that is give birth to men. That's more than enough." P. 418
Sophia looked at the paper pattern that she was pinning to a piece of cloth. Max and Onno could see that she had to concentrate for a moment: these kinds of conversations tended to pass her by. Probably, she thought it was all boyish nonsense. P. 453
While Sophia and Helga were busy in the kitchen, as in Onno's view befitted women, the gentlemen went on talking about the subject of "historical astronomy" founded by Quinten. Of course such women existed. But the story takes place in the early 60's through till the 80's. Excuse me, but this was also the time of outspoken women. Women who no longer went down on their knees before men. No more 'yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir'. Women who declared that they have always had an intellectual and cultural history independent to that of man. And all that Harry Mulisch can come up with is these three women!
Rating: 
Summary: overblown and overwritten
Review: I have no doubt the writer is talented and intelligent, but why does he have to keep trying to prove it on every page? The book starts out great. In fact I purchased it after borrowing it first and wanting a copy for myself. MISTAKE! The characters were so poorly drawn that when I finished I still couldn't match the name of the two main characters. And the female lead is one of the most stereotyped women I've ever read in a "well respected" novel. The prose is sometimes funny but eventually goes on and on trying to impress. It's a thinking man's, thinking man's soap opera. This would have been much better 200 pages shorter.
Rating:
Summary: chewed out
Review: I've read the book untill appr. page 400, then I just couldn't stomach it anymore. You can just hear Mulisch brag thrue every sentence. The sentences he makes are art, but to fill a book with good sentences does not necessairily make it a good book. It realy annoyed me that all the men in the book are intelligent and all the woman are stupid and die quickly. When you know a littlebit more about Harry Mulisch you just know that the author is speaking here. The book is very discriminating for women! Never the less, I did like "de aanslag" and "de elementen" (the elements?) written by Mulisch. The elements is a relative short novel, with a lot of philosophy and a great plot. But if he would have lengthened this book by adding another 700 pages, the result would probably have been like 'the discovery of heaven.' Not a sympathetic book!
Rating:
Summary: Mulisch, Pedant... writes a book.
Review: One thing is certain about 'The Discovery of Heaven': it is a book that will leave stray bits and pieces in your memory for a long time after you have read it; love it or hate it, it won't leave you feeling indifferent. What amazed me most is that this enormously complex and contrived epic, which at times seems to wander off to nowhere, is entirely justified by its finale. There is a clear parallel here: the protagonists live their lives with a feeling of helplessness towards the inevitability of events -- political downfalls, comas, untimely deaths -- and towards life's apparent lack of meaning; but for the reader, who shares the helplessness for most of the book, all becomes clear at the end. The parallel that Mulisch wants to get across is actually a deeply religious one: all the seemingly random events of our lives and all the little and big tragedies we go through are a part of a Greater Plan over which we have little or no control, but which makes sense in the grand schema. Personally I am not religious, so the author's willingness of pushing such a moralistic agenda bothered me a little; however, on a purely literary basis, this book is ver close to being masterpiece, despite some excessively slow passages and some degree of self-complacency. It is in any case a wondrous epic of majestic proportions, something we can only marvel at.
Rating:
Summary: The Discovery of Heaven
Review: The Discovery of Heaven by Harry Mulisch is the story of how a supreme being completes a heavenly task. The book begins, in the prologue, with dialogue between two higher beings about a mission that has been completed. One being is telling the other that his task has been competed and the other wishes to know how it was done. Therefore the book is the story of how this secretive mission was completed. I found this story to be very interesting and suspenseful while at the same time quite complex. It deals with many philosophical points of view mainly revolving around reality and perception of the world. I did find that this book was somewhat slow going, it took me nearly a month to complete the 730 pages. Also I did fail to grasp some of the book simply because of it's heavy ties to the dutch culture. Still a very wonderful book, and well worth the read.
Rating:
Summary: My Favorite, Ever.
Review: This book is fantastic because it never, not once, talks down to the reader. Sometimes, yes, it talks above you. But, not in a baddish way. It's more with a wink and a nod to let you know that they know that you know....everyone is let in on the joke. Brilliant and quick and witty and fun and seriously meaningful. My favorite book of all time, without a doubt.
Rating:
Summary: quite impressive
Review: This book is pretty big page-wise but actually is very smooth reading. Very interesting plot and a well-crafted one. Mulisch seems to have a relatively depressing view of humanity, however - I wouldn't reccomend this to anyone looking for a happy story. This book is both profound and unforgiving.
Rating:
Summary: Mulisch, Pedant... writes a book.
Review: This book should deal with anything, as the author claims... and it probably does, but is has nothing to do with Literature. 736 pages long 'The Discovery of Heaven' takes the reader for an idiot, a fool. Mulisch tries to convince the reader on a higly pedantic way, on every single page of this book, that he knows everything and, on top, that he can explain it in a very simple way. His technique can be compared to that of a teacher who's trying to disclose his ignorant pupils highly demanding topics such as The Conception of The World (as Mulisch calls it himself), Religion, Mathematics, Astronomy, Music, History, Politics, etc. For each of these realms of art or science you can find better introductions, less pedantic, less vulgarizing, more refined in approach and at last more informing, here at Amazon.com. It seems so that Mulisch knows something about almost anything possible, but nothing really thoroughly. If you strip this book of all the educational, though vulgarized, information for imbeciles, hardly anything is left. There's a higly improbable story with nothing really in it. I found one beautiful line in the book (of someone spreading out a towel), and that's it. The story is often told compellingly, and it reads well, but the characters don't really live, they don't have flesh and bones. That probably explains why the film was rather a flop (although there are more than enough other reasons for that as well). On top, this story could be told in much less words. I was left very disappointed finishing this book, especially after reading the other reviews and the high acclaim this novel has got. Has Mulisch blinded the masses with his pedantic 'knowledge' and improbable story? I just don't get it. After all I rate this book with one star, because it really reads well. Readers who are searching for a good book of Literature, won't be satisfied with this one. Grab a classic! Note : Mulisch is most read by adolescents (as you can read elsewhere on the web), searching for answers...
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