Lost in Translation Reading Challenge

guest review: the alchemist

 

David from Absorbed in Words just posted this review of The Alchemist by Paolo Coelho. 

Have you read this one too? Email me the link to your review, and I will add it to this post. 

Tonight I’ll write a short, formal letter to my boss stating my intention to resign from the company. I’ll bring the letter with me to work tomorrow, and as I hand it over I’ll explain that I’ve decided to pursue my own “Personal Legend”. I’ll tell my boss that I had a dream—no, a vision even—that my place in this world is to be a writer, and if I don’t chase after this dream then it’d be like going against nature and my life would deem to be a failure. He won’t understand me right away, of course, so I’ll just tell him to get a copy of Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist and read it. 

Yes, that is what I will do after having read The Alchemist . . . if I really thought that life is all that simple. 

The book’s real message, I believe, goes beyond feeling a spark of inspiration or taking big leaps out on a whim. In fact, it wouldn’t really be wise for a reader to take the book in its plain, literal sense. For instance, it obviously would be irrational to believe that “when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you achieve it”. Perhaps more than half the world’s population have life stories that attest to how that isn’t the real case in our universe. And unlike “the alchemist” himself, many people wouldn’t think it fair that if a woman’s love is really “made of pure matter”, then a man can go away to concentrate on his own personal aspirations and expect that he “can always come back” to his woman who will patiently and selflessly await his return. Indeed, these wouldn’t be good lessons to absorb from the story. 

With several references to Biblical and Islamic precepts as well as ancient proverbs, the book is like a string of tied-up parables with the epic twist of an adventure story. And throughout the protagonist’s journey, he meets different characters offering different philosophies, and sometimes even contradicting points of view. An old king encourages the boy Santiago to follow his dreams, while another character teaches him about being truly happy by concentrating on the present. Contradicting as they may sound, both are actually lessons about having a positive attitude. Some lessons are outspoken in unadorned sentences while others are bound in mystery, almost entirely vague. And if you think about it, the book doesn’t really claim to teach a single absolute truth. Indeed in order to assimilate something good out of the story, one must look past the mystical elements and focus on how it should influence him personally. 

...and when each day is the same as the next, it’s because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises. —The Alchemist 

Coelho stated that The Alchemist is a “metaphor” of his own life. Much like the story’s protagonist, he already had a job from which he took pride and pleasure in doing, a woman whom he surely loved, and as well as other necessities in life for which to be content with. What he didn’t have, however, was the fulfillment of his dream. His “Personal Legend”, as it’s constantly called throughout the book. I guess for some, the idea relates to their concept of destiny, or for others perhaps their so-called purpose in life. Others might simply call it their ambition, or lifelong aspiration. But whatever it is, Coelho’s story endeavors to inspire the reader to pursue it. And this is what the novel is ultimately all about—to have the passion, the courage, the faith and the unfailing determination to follow something you believe in. The book also teaches that in our pursuit to find our life's treasure, what we pick up along the journey—the people we meet and the experiences we get—is sometimes even more valuable than what we had set out to look for, and the original treasure becomes more of a trophy for what we've already accomplished. 

That’s the point at which most people give up. It’s the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one ‘dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.’ —The Alchemist 

In any case, this of course does not make the book unique. Coelho’s allegorical novel is essentially a romanticized self-help book. What actually makes it good, however, is the story itself. The story of Santiago's quest is simple and pleasant. But like any good fable, the book’s simplistic form is only somewhat of an innocent deception that masks its highly philosophical quality. The short prologue by itself is a lovely story. Retelling the tale of Narcissus with an amusing twist, the book begins with a wonderful lesson from an unlikely story—the lesson that if we reflect the beauty of others, allowing them to see through our eyes that they are special, we too in effect make ourselves beautiful and special. 

All in all, The Alchemist is an entertaining read that, more often than not, will leave its reader in a delightfully good mood. 

The Alchemist - Gift Edition is a hardcover edition that contains colorful illustrations by artist James Noel Smith and comes with an elegant bookcase. 

Producer Harvey Weinstein announced plans for a Hollywood film adaptation of The Alchemist. It is reported that Laurence Fishburne will both direct and star on the film.

guest review: blindness

 

Jackie from Farm Lane Books just posted this review of Blindness by Jose Saramago. 

Have you read this one too? Email me the link to your review, and I will add it to this post.

Translated from the Portuguese by Giovanni Pontiero 

Blindness is the most powerful book I have ever read. From the beginning, to the end my adrenaline levels were high, and my heart was beating so fast you’d have thought I’d been out running! 

Blindness is a terrifying account of what could happen to us, if we were all to lose our sight. The book begins with one man suddenly losing his vision while waitng at traffic lights in his car. Someone offers to help the blind man back home, and it isn’t long before he becomes blind too. It quickly becomes obvious that the blindness is highly contagious, and so all the blind people, and those who have been in close contact with them, are rounded up and sent to an old mental hospital. Trapped in this old building, with an increasing number of people, conditions quickly deteriorate. Fights break out over the small amount of food, sanitation becomes almost non-existent, and it isn’t long before people are dying. 

There is one woman who has not gone blind; she lied in order to stay with her husband. At first it seems as though she is the lucky one, but as time goes on this is not necessarily true. Would it be better to be blind than to see the horrors that are all around her? 

This book is worryingly realistic. What would our governments do if there was an epidemic of blindness? How quickly would society break down? I thought I’d be able to cope without electricity, but when you stop to think about the infrastructure, you realise how soon you’d run out of food, and water. It’s enough to make me want to move to the country and become self sufficient as soon as possible! 

This book took a little bit of time to get used to. The characters are all nameless, and there is little punctuation to break up the paragraphs, so the text is unusually dense. It was, however, completely gripping from beginning to end. I’m not sure I can say that I enjoyed reading it though. It will stay with me for a long time, and is a powerful statement about the fragility of our society, but I’m not sure enjoyable is the right word! 

Highly recommended, as long as you can cope with the stress!

guest review: the history of the siege of lisbon

Claire from Kiss a Cloud just posted this review of The History of the Seige of Lisbon by Jose Saramago

Have you read this one too? Email me the link to your review, and I will add it to this post.

Sigh. I have a new favourite author. I don't think it's possible for me to be anything but subjective on the matter of this book, but I'll try. 

I spent a whole week reading this, not because it was tedious and uninteresting. On the contrary, it was gorgeous and brilliant. It took me awhile because it did pose some challenges. For one, the sentences ran on and on, some half a page, others even over a page, but not in a bad way. These sentences weren't just stream-of-consciousness prattle, rather, they included all dialogues, all narratives, and other asides, separated only by commas. It was easy to get mixed up on who was saying what. I had to go back more than a few times. But eventually I got the hang of it. And it was challenging, yes, but so enjoyable. 

The story revolves around one proof-reader who altered a word in a book about the history of the siege of Lisbon that he was proof-reading. He was found out, and the book came out corrected, bearing its proper historical content. However, he sets out to write his own story, on account of that altered word, and upon that we are presented with another interpretation, a detailed one, of the siege of Lisbon, as told by the proof-reader, according to his imaginings. These imagined historical tales, along with current details of his reality, and ruminations on his character, run side by side in the paragraph-long sentences, going back and forth from present tense to past, from conversations to narrations. It can get confusing at first, but as I got into the story I kind of saw why Saramago was doing that. 

It allowed me, the reader, to get enmeshed in the story so much more than if it had been written the conventional way. Oftentimes it would lead me to misunderstandings, thinking so-and-so said this phrase, when it really was the other who said it. But it only added to my involvement in the story. These misunderstandings, though not deliberate, seemed to be part of the whole idea that everything flows into everything else. To quote a line from the afterword, this 'demonstrates Saramago's contention that history and fiction are constantly overlapping.' 

With regards to the writing, let me just say that it is nothing short of brilliant. His writing reminded me partly of Umberto Eco and partly of Milan Kundera, a cross between the two. But it's also entirely original. It's no small feat to make buttering a toast be surrounded with so much drama, but that's what Saramago does so remarkably well throughout the book. He lingers on small instances and stretches them and suspends them in time that it left me no choice but to be lazy and languor in the moments. It felt almost like being in The Matrix. Consider this bit when the proof-reader was getting up in the morning: 

It was not yet eight o'clock when Costa rang the doorbell. The proof-reader, who had slept badly as one disturbing dream followed another, was at last sleeping heavily, at least this was what that part of him which had reached a level of consciousness that allowed him to think concluded, namely that this deep sleep finally prevailed, given the difficulty of awakening the other part, despite the insistent ringing of the doorbell, four times, five, now a prolonged ringing which went on and on, as if the mechanism of the button had jammed. Raimundo Silva realised, naturally, that he would have to get up, but he could not leave one half of himself in the bed, perhaps even more, what would Costa say, in all certainty it is Costa, now that the police no longer drag us out of bed in the middle of the night, yes, what will Costa have to say if he sees only half of Raimundo Silva appear, perhaps the Benvindo half, a man should always go in his entirety wherever he is called, he cannot allege, I've come with part of myself, the rest got delayed on the way. The bell went on ringing, Costa starts to get worried. Such silence in the house, finally the awakened part of the proof-reader manages to call out in a hoarse voice, I'm just coming, and only then does the part which is asleep begin to stir, but with reluctance. Now, precariously reunited, unsteady on legs which could belong to anyone, they cross the room.. 

Isn't that beautiful? And also, for me, the sweetest surprise was (just because I didn't read the blurbs first) the love story in this, something I didn't quite expect. 

~oOo~ 

Some other favourite passages: 

Throughout the journey from the publishing house back to his apartment he had managed not to think, some find this impossible, but Raimundo Silva has mastered the art of floating vague ideas, like clouds that stay apart, and he even knows how to blow away any idea that gets too close, the important thing is that they should not come into contact thus creating a continuum or, something worse, if there is electricity in the mental atmosphere, with the inevitable storm bringing thunder and lightning. For a few moments he had allowed his thoughts to dwell on Senhora Maria, but now his brain was vacant once more. 

~oOo~ 

Raimundo Silva looked and looked again, the universe murmuring beneath the rain, dear God, such sweet and gentle sorrow, may we never be without it, not even in moments of happiness.