Or for that matter why does almost everyone like Coelho? And why is he such a huge bestseller??...Not that he has great language, not that writes of esoteric topics. There would be at least a million more writers who have the ability to express better and as many number of books which wanted to write on more exciting topics.
Yah, I have gotten madly in love with Coelho after Eleven Minutes and now The Zahir [till whatever portion I have completed]. That did get me into thinking what is it that makes me like him so much. And like every movie and book that I [all of us] really enjoy, I [we] feel I am the persons expressing using the author’s name. How many times, have we caught ourselves extrapolating the part of the protagonist and playing it well beyond the script!!!!
Eleven Minutes, I had started a few years earlier – but hadn’t finished as someone had flicked it from me or [more likely] probably I would have forgotten it in a seat pocket in- flight. It was always in my mind to go and pick Eleven Mins from Oxford and restart again – surprising I took a few dozen months to do it. But gosh! during the second read, the chemistry was almost instantaneous.
I think what the book does is to touch one’s core [a more dramatic representation would be to ‘touch one’s soul’] conditionings. How do I put it? This book - silently, elegantly, instinctively – makes people reach out to their inner selves. Makes people stand infront of the mirror – unabashedly, smilingly, accommodatingly. Allows people to soar in the skies. Carrying with themselves – no feel good Sooraj Barjatiya characters – just their true ownselves. That I think is the crux, as I see it.
Sensitive imageries, nice description, pearls of wisdom, romance and misery are all there. They heighten the sense of grip, but Coelho’s Eleven Mins is not a best seller for this. No way, there are many many books – most unknown, unread – that have tried to use this algo. The only algo that Coelho uses is perhaps, there is no algo. Let it come straight from the gut. He tries to go deep into his ownselves – through his characters – and presents the weakness of a character merely as a inevitable [and as I indicated earlier, unabashed] state of evolution. Thus giving the readers a sense of dignity and boundless soar.
That’s my take on the book and his creators. The Zahir it seems is another masterpiece, by the time I finish the book – it may just topple Eleven Mins as my favourite Coleho. [Digression - Worth sharing, for many moments I felt like wanting to let 11 mins, topple Herman Hesse’s Siddharth as my all time favourite. I had always held that Sid was my Gita, I always get a new meaning when I read it. Think the gems that Marie recounts in her diary, at the end of a chapter – are nothing short of real pearls of wisdom]. Very very coincidentally, I was myself thinking of a similar topic – trying to figure out how to treat it. And look at it, I find ‘The Zahir’ telling it the way I wanted to.
What I mean to say, is Paulo Coelho, uses universal idiom [read sensitivity and language] to express all that we feel and want to express. And many times, being waylaid by conventional and acceptable social mores, do not express the same to ourselves. Let alone the world. Thus letting our subtle, nuanced thoughts get lost in the folds of time. Coelho – emancipates them. And thus the appeal. He is the latest post modernist in view. Dignifies, human living, as it is. That’s the key.
I don’t know when I will restart ‘The Zahir’, I left this book behind in one flight. This time happily. I hope to buy it again soon and enjoy the chemistry. And hope Coelho will create as much magic in the subsequent pages as in first 85. I am lucky not to want to pre-empt a books’ denouement.
Interestingly, when I read Alchemist a few years back, I found it a good read – that’s all. No something I went gaga about. The reason, when I look back, is that probably am an incorrigible optimist anyways – this book didn’t give any new dimension. Though I liked the revalidation, it lacked orgasmic appeal as it didn’t evoke any thoughts wrapped within the folds of almost forgotten time by the extant context.
But I understand Alchemist has made waves for an entire mass of people, cutting across generations and countries. I think, the appeal it generated is because the sense of escape it generated [the same reason why Jonathan’s Livingstone Seagull made waves]. Probably the last straw it gave through magic. In a sense, again emancipating people. In that sense probably Alchemist is a bit different [I hope I am remembering the book right] from the other two books. This is more supernatural magic. The other two are magic of self realization & dignity. Different triggers to different degrees to different people. But guess the common theme is a sense of emancipation and soar. That’s the answer.
Sunday
May 30, 2010
BBSR
Yah, I have gotten madly in love with Coelho after Eleven Minutes and now The Zahir [till whatever portion I have completed]. That did get me into thinking what is it that makes me like him so much. And like every movie and book that I [all of us] really enjoy, I [we] feel I am the persons expressing using the author’s name. How many times, have we caught ourselves extrapolating the part of the protagonist and playing it well beyond the script!!!!
Eleven Minutes, I had started a few years earlier – but hadn’t finished as someone had flicked it from me or [more likely] probably I would have forgotten it in a seat pocket in- flight. It was always in my mind to go and pick Eleven Mins from Oxford and restart again – surprising I took a few dozen months to do it. But gosh! during the second read, the chemistry was almost instantaneous.
I think what the book does is to touch one’s core [a more dramatic representation would be to ‘touch one’s soul’] conditionings. How do I put it? This book - silently, elegantly, instinctively – makes people reach out to their inner selves. Makes people stand infront of the mirror – unabashedly, smilingly, accommodatingly. Allows people to soar in the skies. Carrying with themselves – no feel good Sooraj Barjatiya characters – just their true ownselves. That I think is the crux, as I see it.
Sensitive imageries, nice description, pearls of wisdom, romance and misery are all there. They heighten the sense of grip, but Coelho’s Eleven Mins is not a best seller for this. No way, there are many many books – most unknown, unread – that have tried to use this algo. The only algo that Coelho uses is perhaps, there is no algo. Let it come straight from the gut. He tries to go deep into his ownselves – through his characters – and presents the weakness of a character merely as a inevitable [and as I indicated earlier, unabashed] state of evolution. Thus giving the readers a sense of dignity and boundless soar.
That’s my take on the book and his creators. The Zahir it seems is another masterpiece, by the time I finish the book – it may just topple Eleven Mins as my favourite Coleho. [Digression - Worth sharing, for many moments I felt like wanting to let 11 mins, topple Herman Hesse’s Siddharth as my all time favourite. I had always held that Sid was my Gita, I always get a new meaning when I read it. Think the gems that Marie recounts in her diary, at the end of a chapter – are nothing short of real pearls of wisdom]. Very very coincidentally, I was myself thinking of a similar topic – trying to figure out how to treat it. And look at it, I find ‘The Zahir’ telling it the way I wanted to.
What I mean to say, is Paulo Coelho, uses universal idiom [read sensitivity and language] to express all that we feel and want to express. And many times, being waylaid by conventional and acceptable social mores, do not express the same to ourselves. Let alone the world. Thus letting our subtle, nuanced thoughts get lost in the folds of time. Coelho – emancipates them. And thus the appeal. He is the latest post modernist in view. Dignifies, human living, as it is. That’s the key.
I don’t know when I will restart ‘The Zahir’, I left this book behind in one flight. This time happily. I hope to buy it again soon and enjoy the chemistry. And hope Coelho will create as much magic in the subsequent pages as in first 85. I am lucky not to want to pre-empt a books’ denouement.
Interestingly, when I read Alchemist a few years back, I found it a good read – that’s all. No something I went gaga about. The reason, when I look back, is that probably am an incorrigible optimist anyways – this book didn’t give any new dimension. Though I liked the revalidation, it lacked orgasmic appeal as it didn’t evoke any thoughts wrapped within the folds of almost forgotten time by the extant context.
But I understand Alchemist has made waves for an entire mass of people, cutting across generations and countries. I think, the appeal it generated is because the sense of escape it generated [the same reason why Jonathan’s Livingstone Seagull made waves]. Probably the last straw it gave through magic. In a sense, again emancipating people. In that sense probably Alchemist is a bit different [I hope I am remembering the book right] from the other two books. This is more supernatural magic. The other two are magic of self realization & dignity. Different triggers to different degrees to different people. But guess the common theme is a sense of emancipation and soar. That’s the answer.
Sunday
May 30, 2010
BBSR
i guess i like Paulo Coelho for the same reason....we can seldom express the grey sides of our thoughts,personalities for the fear of them being treated as black or evil....
ReplyDeleteThis guy has the courage to do that......
i like this piece