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Theme and subject matter of the alchemist
Thesis for how santiago in the alchemist is determined and adventurous
What is the legend of santiago the alchemist
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Throughout the interminable universe of literature, countless authors harness the usage of dynamic characters. In both fictional novels, The Pearl authored by John Steinbeck and The Alchemist written by Paulo Coelho, both authors exploit the uses and arts of dynamic characters. Firstly, The Pearl is an exquisite novel about how a man named Kino becomes incredibly desperate to fish a pearl in order to pay off his son’s medical treatment after a fatal scorpion attack. Momentarily, after Kino’s fortunate discovery of a massive, glorious pearl, he enters and emerges into an inescapable sphere of corruption, greed, and disillusion. Correspondingly, written by Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist displays a stunning plot of how a young boy of the name …show more content…
Santiago’s early behavior of transcendentalism are evident when he nullifies and rejects his parents’ longing for him to become priest, and instead decides to remain a shepherd of Andalusia and learn the indecipherable language of the world. When Santiago’s father tries to persuade Santiago that travelling with a herd of sheep does not impact and change a person, Santiago replies, “But I’d like to see the castles in the towns where they live,”… “Well, I’d like to see their lands, and see how they live” (Coelho 9). Santiago’s early rejections of becoming a priest and perusing his life as a shepherd clearly demonstrates that Santiago’s comprehension and understanding of life does not include the following a decided future, but exploring and discovering the world with own eyes. Furthermore, when Santiago decides to define his Personal Legend by voyaging to the Pyramids of Giza, he is faced and challenged with many hardships that will require critical thinking and extremely important verdicts. When, for example, held hostage by Moorish chieftains and given the daunting task to disintegrate the Moorish military camp by transforming into the wind, Santiago communicates with nature’s elements, “I learned the alchemist’s secrets in my travels. I have inside me the winds, the deserts, the oceans, the stars, and everything created in the universe. We were all made by the same hand, and we have the same soul” (Coelho 146). Eventually, Santiago learns that all aspects of biotic and abiotic existence are controlled by a creator, and maintained by the Soul of the World. Manifestly, Santiago’s adventures revolutionized him into a prudent, wise man and reflect the
In The Alchemist Paulo Coelho presents a character, Santiago, torn between following tradition and his Personal Legend. Santiago tries to live true to his Personal Legend, which is a path pursued by those who strive to fulfill their purpose in life. Yet throughout the novel tradition, a motif, presents itself as a roadblock holding Santiago back from reaching his dreams. Coelho juxtaposes tradition against Personal Legend to illustrate its purely individual nature and the necessity of the acceptance of change to reach one’s dreams and goals.
When an author uses imagery, it can have a positive effect not only on the story, but also the reader. Such effects make the reader feel more involved and keeps them interested, wondering what will happen next. In “The Alchemist”, the author uses imagery to guide the reader through Santiago’s journey. Santiago meets many people while exploring the sites ahead of him and searching for his treasure. Imagery allows a story to be shown instead of told. In the story, the author uses an abundance of imagery to create a more personal experience by extensively describing what characters look like, and allow the reader to become a character in the text.
In the time he spent with the Crystal Merchant he realized that it is important to continue moving forward. He learned all that he could from his sheep, so he sold them and through the continuation of his journey he met new people and was taught new things. With his newly found understanding of the world, Santiago realizes that achieving one’s Personal Legend does not necessarily guarantee a treasure of material wealth, however, one will almost certainly acquire treasure in the form of personal
In The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho continuously shows how Santiago conquers fear and is greatly rewarded for it. In order to get his treasure and achieve his personal legend he must first travel through the well-known dangers of the desert. It is an extremely expensive trip that many do...
When santiago was tested to turn into wind, he began to reach into the sandstorm and communicate with all the naturistic attributes.This represented his death. Santiago getting robbed for his gold & finding a solution to where his treasure was represented his rebirth in my opinion. “Tents being blown from their ties to the earth and animals were free from their tethers. The boy stood up shakily and looked once more at the pyramids. They seemed to laugh at him and he laughed back, his heart blasting with joy. This stage in santiago’s life represented resilience in its finest form, causing santiago to glide across this stage so profoundly. Santiago’s victory was a long time that was in deserving of coming. He deserved his treasure for believing in
Coelho incorporates many internal struggles into Santiago’s life in order to prove that they don’t restrain people from achieving their personal legend. Through the use of the hero’s journey, Santiago faces many internal struggles such as when he attempts to understand
Olympics Games Rio 2016 is on in full swing and the name Michael Phelps has cropped up several times during the past few days. Just recently he won his 19th Olympic gold medal. But getting there was not easy for him. I read an article recently about his journey so far and could find similarities in his journey to those of Santiago in The Alchemist.
A fascinating and intriguing novel, The Pearl shares the story of a man named Kino, and how greed can affect his life forever. When Kino finds the “Pearl of the World”, it affects everyone, not just him. John Steinbeck, the author of this novel, uses intricate literary devices in order to give the reader the sense of greed that engulfed Kino and his surroundings. Literary devices such as foreshadowing, symbolism, and characterization all help this story come to life. Kino’s family, his personality, and his town, all changed when one pearl landed in Kino’s hands.
“Even if he never got to the Pyramids, he had already traveled farther than any shepherd he knew. Oh, if they only knew how different things are just two hours by ship from where they are, he thought. Although his new world at the moment was just an empty marketplace, he had already seen it when it was teeming with life, and he would never forget it. He remembered the sword. It hurt him a bit to think about it, but he had never seen one like it before. As he mused about these things, he realized that he had to choose between thinking of himself as the poor victim of a thief and as an adventurer in quest of his treasure. "I'm an adventurer, looking for treasure," he said to himself.” Santiago believes that he is an adventurer, looking for treasure, but he may not believe in himself still. Santiago is stuck between looking for the treasure or staying home thinking of himself as the poor victim of a thief. It does not matter how many people believe in him if Santiago does not believe in
Santiago had been rewarded with the treasure earned when completing his journey, “In my dream there was a sycamore growing out the ruin of the sacristy… there were precious stones, gold masks adorned with red and white feathers.” (Coelho 170). Santiago was able to accomplish his personal legend, which he had to go through many stages in the journey that got him closer to completing his goal. In this final stage of his journey was a good thing to accomplish, because he’s gone through all of the stages that had been placed there to challenge and see if he actually wants to accomplish it, so he did not give up and gained trust in himself to keep going. This is an important part of the journey because this had taught him to not give up and trust in his heart to accomplish his personal legend, such as when others believe that it is hard to accomplish what they want to complete and do in their life.
Although Melchizedek's actions were of pure heart, his desire for praise reveals a selfish aspect of himself. Finally there's the vanity in the Alchemist's expectations of Santiago knowledge of the language of the world. When Santiago questions his own ability to turn himself into the wind, the Alchemist replies with "Then you'll die in the midst of trying to realize your Personal Legend" (Coelho, Coelho, Clarke 1993). This shows the unnecessary danger that the Alchemist puts Santiago through to test and prove that what he's learned so far was a vital for him to reach the pyramids. This approach Is very aggressive but it unveils the overwhelming belief of Santiago that The Alchemist has to bet his own life on the abilities of Santiago. The novel shows that someone can’t move forward in life unless they relinquish themselves of their own narrow-minded thoughts and become open to new ones, however having a slight amount of vanity helps a person gain belief of their capabilities to progress in their journey because a small dose of vanity is essential to gaining conviction in not only finding but seizing a Personal
The fear of failure has been implemented into child-hood, as it is the most influential time in a persons life. Santiago’s society taught people from young ages, that your dreams are impossible to achieve. This thinking habit imposed by society would influence the child’s life by letting them grow up not believing in themselves or their abilities. This thinking habit was passed down to Santiago by his own father, who tried to talk him out of the one thing he truely wanted to do in life; travel. “ ‘People from all over the world have passed through this village, son,’ said his father. ‘They come in search of new things, but when they leave they are basically the same people they were when they arrived.’ ” (pg 9) Your family should support your dreams, but because society imprints false ideologies into people, Santiago’s father convinces him to give up on his dreams. Even though Santiago’s father wanted “to travel the world” (pg 9-10) too, he didn’t have the courage to do so which influenced his life by “having had to bury it, over dozens of years,”. Santiago was young and impressionable at the time, and so when his very own father doubted his ability to be able to achieve his dreams, Santiago too grew up to doubt himself. This then influenced Santiago to try to bury his own life callings when faced with his Personal Legend. He used excused, “But there’s a tribal war”, (pg 115) “I
To begin with, the fear of losing beloved things or people presents people with dilemmas that influence the continuation of their journey and they can only bypass these dilemmas by getting rid of the fear altogether. To begin, Santiago’s fear of losing everything he already earned makes him second guess his plans and therefore discourages him to continue his journey. Santiago expresses his doubts by stating that his “‘heart is a traitor…it does [not] want [him] to go on.’ ‘That makes sense,’ the alchemist answered. ‘Naturally it [is] afraid that, in pursuing [a] dream, [a person] might lose everything [they] [have] won’” (Coelho 145). Throughout the novel, Santiago learns to always listen to his heart, but in this situation if he did, it would result in abandoning his journey. The alchemist encourages Santiago to move on from this fear by stating that it is normal to feel scared, but not normal to give up on a dream because of a feeling. Santiago’s best solution in this situation is to conquer his fear of loss altogether and erase the doubts in his mind for a smoother journey. Next, the fear of losing life in the midst of the journey makes Santiago wonder if it is appropriate to risk his life to pursue a dream. Santiago learns how to handle this situation as “the camel driver had [once] said, to die tomorrow [is] no worse than dying on any other ...
Santiago is a complex character who learns a lot through the course of this story. He is a very good, humble man and loves Manolin, his apprentice. Santiago is a poor man and is regarded as bad luck by others because he was not caught a single fish in 84 days. One cannot help feel sorry for him because he is very alone. His wife died and the book suggested that he never had any children. Yet he was humble and did not complain at all about his hard life. Santiago is a very persistant and determined character. He fought the huge marlin that he had caught for three agonizing days desopite feeling intense pain. He often had contradictory feelings and thoughts. One that I found strange was when he felt sorry for the marlin while he joyfully pondered how much money he would get for selling the fish.
... the character of Santiago. He is not as determined as Ahab when it comes to his own nature. He is able to accept that humility and love do not take away his pride and in fact they are life sustaining. Ahab cannot give up the only thing he knows, his passions. Knowledge does not come in the face of a world that remains as mysterious and evil when we leave it as it was when we entered it. For Santiago, there is some measure of relief from the indifferent universe through the interdependence of human beings. Ahab never finds this measure of relief. Yet, they both retain some measure of dignity because they know they cannot conquer the universe but they do not let it conquer them either.