Mar 26, 2004 06:33 PM
2733 Views
(Updated Mar 26, 2004 06:34 PM)
And if you thought that I was going to write about the psychedelic Australian band, which plays trashy technical metal ? you are wrong!
I'm talking about a journey ?
... a journeywhere you follow your dreams
... a journeyto pursue one?s destiny
... a journeyfrom Spain to Egypt
The alchemist!
The alchemist bursts with optimism. It?s the kind of story that tells you everything is possible as long as you really want it to happen. And no, you wouldn?t find an overdose of philosophy and mysticism. I guess Paulo Coelho understands that people appreciate the most valuable things when they are told the simple way. It?s no use complicating stuff unnecessarily by throwing new-age principles. The definite plus of this book is that it?s simple yet inspiring.
This is a story that spells dreams and optimism, symbols and adventure. The story is about Santiago, a young shepherd from Andalusia who has a recurring dream and has the courage to follow it. Santiago, gets this vision asking him to find a treasure in Egypt. So he sets off to Spain and in his journey he comes across numerous spiritual messengers.
He first meets a gypsy woman who predicts that he would find a treasure is he follows his dream. The alchemist appears in front of him in the form of an old king. And what the king tells him is what echoes around the whole book? when you really want something to happen, the whole universe conspires so that your wish comes true. The whole of humankind desperately wants to believe the in the greatest lie in the world that at some point we lose the ability to control our lives, and become the victims of fate. So he kicks off with a brush of beginner?s luck and meets more interesting people.
Meets a crystal-seller who does not have the courage to follow his ?personal myth? and is doomed into a life of emptiness, misery, unfulfillment and doom. Fear of failure is the greatest obstacle of all. Santiago then comes across more unassuming figures like the camel driver and a well-read Englishman. It is from one of the Englishman?s book that he learns about alchemists ? who believed that when metal is heated for many years, it would eventually loose its individual properties and what will be left is ?the soul of the world?
Finally he meets the real alchemist on a moonless night. He then ventures into a journey of self-discovery and realizations, reading omens and most importantly he learns to listen to his heart. He then symbolically looks for a hidden treasure near the pyramids of Egypt.
The Alchemist appeals to everybody because we all can identify with the story, all of us have dreams and we are all dying for somebody to tell us that they may come true. I love the book for the wisdom, philosophy, simplicity of meaning and language.
Hey what a coincidence! This is my 30th review and I?m gonna die when I?m 30!
