THE ALCHEMIST

The Alchemist is a book written by Paulo Coelho. It was first published in 1988. The Alchemist was originally written in Portuguese and has since then translated into 67 languages. It has sold 65 million copies in more than 150 countries. It has been translated into English by Alan R.Clarke. The Alchemist tells us about following our destiny. It is the story of a boy who follows his destiny and eventually comes over a large sum of treasure. There are a wide array of characters in this book with suitable predicaments and appropriate settings. The story starts with Santiago, a boy who is a shepherd, who arrives at a wrecked church for shelter. He has about 60 sheep from which he has to take care of. He uses his reading book as his pillow and sleeps soundly. He wakes up before sunrise to start his journey. He wants to go to a village to shear his sheep but more important than that, he wants to talk to a girl he had become fond of. But before reaching there, he visits a gypsy. He is scared there as he had heard stories about gypsies who steal money from people by fooling them but he calms himself on seeing a crucifix of Jesus on the wall. The gypsy chants and Santiago allows her to interpret a dream he was having twice in a week. The gypsy interpreted that Santiago had to go to the pyramids to look for a treasure hidden there, on the condition that Santiago had to give her one-tenth of the treasure for this interpretation. Santiago walks out, thinking it all as a waste of time and sits in a bench. He tries to read a new book he had just exchanged for the old one, when an old man sits next to him. He introduces himself as Melchizedek, the king of Salem, and advices the boy to follow his destiny and go to the Pyramids. In order to seek his treasure, Santiago must follow the omens which will provide help in his journey. Santiago gives Mechizedek a tenth of his flock for this advice as well as two stones, Urim and Thummim. These two stones will give guidance to the boy by giving the answer yes or no. Santiago sells the rest of his flock and leaves for Africa. He knows that the Pyramids are in Egypt and that Egypt is in Africa.

He arrives at the narrow streets of Tangier sitting in a bar. He looks for a guide who can escort him to the Pyramids. At last, he finds a man who can speak Spanish and who can help him. Santiago, in order to be polite, does not ask for the money he had just given to his guide for safekeeping. Instead, he just watches the man. But this soon proves to be a mistake as a diversion of his attention concludes to the man running away with all of the boys money. The boy resumes his journey with renewed hope and strides on top of a hill to a crystal shop, where he finds a good-hearted crystal merchant. The crystal merchant gives the boy a job on cleaning his crystals in return for a high commission rate. The boy proves to be an omen for the man and the shop soon progresses. After working for an year with the crystal merchant the boy has enough money to buy twice as much flock as he had last time and go back to being a shepherd in Spain. The omens soon tell him to go to the Pyramids and the boy accepts. Santiago goes to the Pyramids by means of a Caravan. During the journey, he meets an Englishman who teaches him things about Alchemy, the Language Of The World as well as about the Soul Of The World. A battle between two tribes requires the caravans to lodge in an Oasis. Here he meets Fatima, a girl who Santiago thinks his soul has bonded with. Santiago sees a vision where the Oasis gets attacked. The report and approval of this vision lead to Santiago becoming very rich as well as becoming the counselor of the Oasis. The Alchemist meets with Santiago and helps him to reach the Pyramids. Along the way he gets captured by one of the war tribes from which Santiago had to give money as well as talent to get away with. He speaks with the desert, the wind, the sun as well as with the hand that wrote all and then transforms himself into the wind. After getting out of this predicament, the Alchemist and Santiago arrive at a monastery where the Alchemist shows his abilities to transform lead into gold. The Alchemist leaves the boy to his journey himself. On arriving at the Pyramids, he gets to know that his treasure is actually in the church where he had slept with his sheep before he even met with the gypsy. Santiago goes back to Spain to find a large sum of treasure waiting for him from which one-tenth has to be given to the gypsy for the interpretation and then he has to go back to Fatima.

My analysis towards the book is obvious. This is a perfect example of a boy following his destiny and observing the ambient omens. The boy leaves his family and the future of a priest to be a traveler. He had then sold his entire flock just to go to Egypt to look for his treasure. He then leaves Fatima as well as the post of the counselor of the oasis. People reading this book will be intrigued by its wide array of examples and concepts. One important point of following our destiny is Beginners luck. As the alchemist says, Everyones destiny starts with Beginners luck and ends with the victors being severely tested. The author has achieved his purpose of telling us what we want to know. The book is extremely interesting and I would surely advise it to everyone. Some of the strengths of this book is that its examples are supposedly real. The message which is trying to be conveyed is easily reachable. The message to be conveyed is understandable. The book tells us a great deal of alchemy, the language of the world, the soul of the world and truth of the secrets to change lead into gold. (The secret to change lead into gold, according to the book is that previous people only looked for gold and that was their mistake. In order to transform lead into gold, a person must transform himself. This book is truly without a doubt a bestseller.