Under torture you are as if under the dominion of those grasses that produce visions. Everything you have heard told, everything you have read returns to your mind, as if you were being transported, not toward heaven, but toward hell. Under torture you say not only what the inquisitor wants, but also what you imagine might please him, because a bond (this, truly, diabolical) is established between you and him ... These things I know, Ubertino; I also have belonged to those groups of men who believe they can produce the truth with white-hot iron. Well, let me tell you, the white heat of truth comes from another flame.

Eco has also written academic texts children's books and many essays. He is best known for his groundbreaking 1980 novel Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose) an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction biblical analysis medieval studies and literary theory. Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross (Italian pronunciation: [umˈbɛrto ˈɛko]; born 5 January 1932) is an Italian semiotician essayist philosopher literary critic and novelist.

His most recent novel Il cimitero di Praga (The Prague Cemetery) released in 2010 was a best-seller. Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross (Italian pronunciation: [umˈbɛrto ˈɛko]; born 5 January 1932) is an Italian semiotician essayist philosopher literary critic and novelist. He is founder of the Dipartimento di Comunicazione at the University of the Republic of San Marino President of the Scuola Superiore di Studi Umanistici University of Bologna member of the Accademia dei Lincei (since November 2010) and an Honorary Fellow of Kellogg College University of Oxford.