The Alchemist

by Paulo Coelho

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The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

I joined a book club earlier this year and this was the first chosen book in the “Fiction” category, which will also include science and fantasy at some point. That aside, I wish I actually read what this book is about before attempting to read it to enter the discussion because it’s one thing disguised as another.

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The Alchemist felt more like a Self-Development or Self-Help book than anything else, and personally I hate those type of books. I find them boring, somewhat pretentious and a waste of my time when I can learn all those lessons and more from novels and actual human encounters. The Alchemist is about a boy named Santiago who is led on a journey to find his Personal Legend and throughout the book continues to meet others who already established their lives or are still searching like him. The concept of following your dreams is an important one for sure, it’s definitely not the most important thing in life, but it’s presented in this book as such with anything less being a lesser choice to make which is definitely not the case.

The way that message was delivered made the book feel pretentious, as if anyone not following their dreams or trying to hinder Santiago in some way (without it actually being a hinderance) is a terrible influence that must be ignored. But to be very honest, not every dream and the way you go about achieving said dream is to be ventured with disregard to the world and those around you. What use is achieving a dream when you can potentially end up losing everything important in the process?

I do wish that this book either went on all fantasy with its attempt at magical realism, or stayed completely magic less because the supernatural aspect to this book felt somewhat unneeded and made it silly with the ultimate message the author wanted to deliver. Although the thing I wish to have been omitted the most in this book is his inclusion of Islam in the plot, there are many many instances in this book where it shows how completely ignorant Paulo Coelho is of that religion. The fact that he is not a Muslim is an easy excuse to use, but with authors like Howard Andrew Jones around, it’s hard to be just as forgiving. I’ll of course be taking this chance to go through my spoiler filled notes in the comments below as soon as I’m done with this.

I mentioned above that following your dreams is an important lesson, although it’s not the most important one. The most important lesson in my not so humble opinion, is teaching and trying to integrate the idea of “Contentment is an inexhaustible treasure” instead. This doesn’t change the importance of perseverance and dreams, but it teaches the more important lesson of being content with what you have if it brings you happiness.

Final rating: 1.5/5