Coelho

Helloo and welcome to the group and to LT. I knew I'd found a kindred spirit when you used the word 'misfortune' to describe your experience with The Alchemist but if that's really the worst book you've ever read you might want to try The Shack, just so you know things can actually get worse! I may not agree with them but I do have some slight respect for people who genuinely believe in a proper religion (provided they have genuinely thought it through) but this pseudo-spiritual nonsense makes my flesh crawl. Your mention of a 'certain kind of religionist' tells me you would probably love the amazing 'Storm' by the even more amazing Tim Minchin - with my apologies to everyone else who has seen it posted here a million times already - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HhGuXCuDb1U. Hope to continue to see you around.

Hi, I agree. Shallow and platitudinous.

#4 It's not even fun - believe me!

Iv just had the misfortune of reading The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho which was quite simply the worst book iv ever read.

You've obviously not read The Celestine Prophecy yet.

Dreaded double post.

#1: Have never read "The Alchemist" but was living in São Paulo Brazil when it came out in Portuguese and was on the shelves in local shops. I remember an article in Veja magazine which acknowledged Coelho's popularity but compared him very unfavourably with Jorge Amado another Brazilian writer. I've read several of his (Amado's) books (in translation) and enjoyed them although they're probably not to everyone's taste. But they give a flavour of Brazilian life and religion - the orixas and candomble feature prominently in several of them. And agree totally with what booksloth (#2) has to say about "The Shack" - I burn't it as I was too ashamed to Oxfam it.

I got a copy of The Alchemist for Christmas last year. I guess it's one of those books thought to make a good present. It may just rest on the bottom of my TBR pile until crushed into pulp.

Comparing Amado to Coelho is like comparing bacon to bacon bits.

#10 Ah, but bacon bits are better than nothing and I'm not sure I could say the same for Coelho ;-)

Paulo Coelho I put in the same category as Kahlil Gibran and his spiritual brother Kehlog Albran.

I had the same feeling about 'By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept: A Novel of Forgiveness' by P.Coelho. Seems like some people still think it to be necessary to convert the world. Another author like that is E.E. Schmitt but then he’s some kind of a priest.

Uh oh. Looks like I'll be dumping it in the give-away box unread now.

I did not have that response to it. I don't think it's great, but I did not loathe it. I had to consider it as fable rather than as parable, though, or I would have loathed it, and I'm mildly amazed I was able to do so. (I also did not find Malick's Tree of Life confusing or maddening, to my similar amazement. I must be getting soft.)

Has anyone else read The Master: The Way to Fulfilment by Chao-Hsiu Chen? I found it equally superficial.

What's the difference between a fable and a parable?

And why we need to be knockin' Kahlil?

>17 Jesse_wiedinmyer:

To me, a fable is just a story but one pervaded with a nebulous magic or mysticism, and a parable is a story you're supposed to learn something from. (I know what Æsop called his book, but he was a jerk.)

Parables throw lessons at you parabolically.
Fables are simply fabulous.