Best Book Review : The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

 

The alchemist Book Review

By Paulo Coelho

Paulo wrote The Alchemist in 1987, it hit the book stores in 1988 and has sold over 30 million copies since then. The book itself has become an important part of the literature in 20^th century. It has been translated in 67 languages.

  

Paulo starts the book with a story. The alchemist picks up a book, bought by someone in the caravan. Going through the pages he finds the story of narcissus, Alchemist knew the legend of the narcissus, but it didn’t end the way it does. Author of the book, says that a young boy named Narcissus, knelt down daily beside a lake to contemplate his own beauty. He was really fascinated by himself, that one morning he fell into the river. After Narcissus, death the lake’s fresh water turned salty tears, when asked by goddesses of forest about weeping of the lake, the lake replies how it weeps for narcissus, goddesses think it might be because lake really adored him for his beauty, but the lake replies, it weeps for narcissus but it never realised he was beautiful because it used to contemplate his own beauty in his eyes. The alchemist was amused by the story.

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The story revolves around a shepherd boy name Santiago. One day he arrives at an abandoned church with his flock. He sees a dream about a hidden treasure in Egypt. He later meets a gypsy woman who interprets his dream to be prophecy. She asks one tenth of the treasure he would find. Before he starts his journey, Santiago meets king of Salem, Melchizedek. He was an old man, who told Santiago about discovering his destiny. He tells him about good and bad omens and that its shepherd’s duty to discover his personal legend.

He gives him two stones, Urim and Thummim, to help him interpret omens.

The boy sells his flock and travels to Africa to realise his destiny. On arriving in Africa, he meets up with a boy who robs him of his savings and he was left with nothing. After sometime he starts working at a crystal shop, he works there for 11 months until he earns enough to go back to Spain and start his life again as a shepherd. But he decides to go to the pyramid. He joins a caravan travelling to Egypt.

He meets an Englishman who wants to learn alchemy, he lends Santiago his books which talked about turning any metal into gold. After travelling for weeks, the caravan reaches an oasis and decides to stay there because a war was happening nearby. In the oasis, Santiago falls in love with an Arab girl named Fatima. Their journey comes to a hold when caravan leader gathers the travelers and tells them that tribal warfare prevents them from continuing their journey.

Santiago wanders from the oasis to the desert and, sees two hawks fighting in the sky and has a vision of an army entering the oasis. He shares the vision with the chief of the oasis as attacking an oasis is violation of the rules of desert. Later on Santiago meets with a black- garbed, veiled man with a sword. The alchemist the Englishman wanted to meet. The tribal chieftain arms his men and soon the oasis gets invaded.  After the fight, the alchemist offers to travel with boy across the desert to the pyramids.

Soon both of them enter a tribal warzone and are held captive, eventually they are freed and allowed to continue their journey. But the alchemist says that he need to go back to the oasis and Santiago must travel alone from here after to discover his personal legend.

On reaching at the Egyptian pyramids, he begins to digs but find nothing. Thieves find him and beat him up, he tells them about his dream and one of the thief recounts his own dream about buried treasure in an abandoned church.

After returning to Spain, the boy goes back to the church where he had the dream about the treasure and digs to find the treasure he dreamt about.

The story, is about not giving up on his dream, trusting his heart throughout his journey and being humble enough to learn every new thing he was taught by the world.

 

I remember finishing the book and feeling everything happens for a reason. The alchemist is an experience in itself. Finely written, beautiful storyline and overall inspiring.

The story deals with the journey of achieving your dream, how one should listen to their heart and follow the omens laid by the universe throughout the journey.

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FAQs

1.               What is the hidden message in The Alchemist?

In the novel, Santiago follows a dream he had in an abandoned church. He follows his dream, his intuitions and finds the treasure he has been looking for.

The book describes how everything is connected in this world from our destiny to our actions to reach our destines. It also shows how human experiences are interlinked with the world around us. The book talks about how fear is a bigger obstacle than the obstacle itself. Alchemist says to Santiago, “tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.”

2.               Is The Alchemist worth a read?

The Alchemist is definitely worth a read, it really makes you think about your own destiny. Reading it is an experience in my opinion. When we are children we believe we can be anything we want but as we grow up our courses change and we stop pursuing our destiny which we once thought was ours. The alchemist gives you back that confidence you had as a child to follow your dreams. A mindful reader can take away many things from the book.

3.               What is the narcissus story mentioned in The Alchemist?

In the prologue of the book, author mentions a story about the legend of narcissus, it follows the theme of the original one but it has an amusing twist. I personally loved it.

A beautiful boy named Narcissus, so captivated by his own beauty sees his own reflection in the surface of a lake that he falls into and drowns. The lake in return is in love with its own self, in the eyes of Narcissus before he dies.