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Loading... The Alchemistby Paulo Coelho
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will love Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. A lovely little story about finding your purpose in life and not being afraid to fulfill it. (  )colleenharker | Jul 8, 2009 |   In The Alchemist, a young shepherd dreamed of the pyramids in Egypt. The next morning, he met a mysterious king who told him to follow his dream, so he sold his sheep and moved to Africa in search of the pyramids. When he was robbed of his money, he had to find a way to earn more so he could continue to follow his dream. In the desert on the way to Africa, he found other people searching for their “Personal Legends” (i.e., their life-long dreams). One man was afraid to pursue his dream; one man was so distracted in searching for his dream that he missed seeing it right in front of him. The alchemist, a wizard who turns lead into gold, guided the young boy to the pyramids, teaching him how to read nature to find the meaning of the omens on his way to accomplishing his “Personal Legend.” The Alchemist has been termed a fable, a retelling of the story of everyone’s journey through life. In the end, I thought the writing trite and the underlying message saccharine. The author was aiming for a specific religious agenda, and it seemed forced and inappropriate to me. (The important principle of charity was strangely lacking throughout.) More thoughts on my blog rebeccareid | Jul 7, 2009 | Very much a fable, a very straightforward one about the importance of following one's dreams. I am against preachiness as a rule, but I do like fables, and this was so nicely told I couldn't dislike it.It seems a very popular book at the library. It is a bit odd to think of all those armchair travellers I see at the reserves desk identifying with and cheering on the Andalusian boy as he crosses the dessert. Like me. How many of us would leave our home and life for a dream? (  )krisiti | Jul 1, 2009 | I've only read it once. But I really couldn't grasp what was so spectacularly moving about this book. I'm going to give it a bit before reading it again and see if I can get it next time. BridgetMarie | Jun 30, 2009 | Not my sort of book, although it's good to have read it. (  )livrecache | Jun 27, 2009 | 0.047 seconds to build listing  no reviews | add a review
Amazon.com (ISBN 0007175256, Audio CD)Like the one-time bestseller Jonathan Livingston Seagull, The Alchemist presents a simple fable, based on simple truths and places it in a highly unique situation. And though we may sniff a bestselling formula, it is certainly not a new one: even the ancient tribal storytellers knew that this is the most successful method of entertaining an audience while slipping in a lesson or two. Brazilian storyteller Paulo Coehlo introduces Santiago, an Andalusian shepherd boy who one night dreams of a distant treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. And so he's off: leaving Spain to literally follow his dream.Along the way he meets many spiritual messengers, who come in unassuming forms such as a camel driver and a well-read Englishman. In one of the Englishman's books, Santiago first learns about the alchemists--men who believed that if a metal were heated for many years, it would free itself of all its individual properties, and what was left would be the "Soul of the World." Of course he does eventually meet an alchemist, and the ensuing student-teacher relationship clarifies much of the boy's misguided agenda, while also emboldening him to stay true to his dreams. "My heart is afraid that it will have to suffer," the boy confides to the alchemist one night as they look up at a moonless night. "Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself," the alchemist replies. "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." --Gail Hudson (retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:05 -0400) The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details. |
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