The Alchemist: In Pursuit of a Legend by Perry

The Alchemist: In Pursuit of a Legend by Perry - February 2015 Scholarship Essay

In the serenity of the Andalusian landscape, in the peacefulness of his daily wanderings as a shepherd, and amidst the constant expectation and excitement that plagues the avid traveler, Santiago is a boy well satisfied with his life. However, when he meets a gypsy and a king who tell him of a treasure that awaits him at the Egyptian pyramids and urge him to leave everything to fulfill his mission and realize his Personal Legend, Santiago sets out upon the greatest journey of his lifetime. In his renowned book The Alchemist, Brazilian author Paulo Coelho invites his readers to embark on the same quest, receive the same advice, and consider the same decision that Santiago must make: the choice to pursue one’s goal in life, however difficult, or to live life having given up in return for something easier to acquire. Though this book is important for everyone to read, it holds special significance for young adults, who stand on the brink of discovering themselves, their dreams, and the world that is just now within their reach. Coelho’s message to his readers in The Alchemist, though simple, is vital to all high school students as they make the choices that will shape their futures: every person should chase their dream to completion, no matter how many obstacles face them.

In The Alchemist, Coelho outlines two stages of realizing a personal legend that every young person, like Santiago, will likely encounter. The first is recognizing and rejecting the obstruction that Coelho calls “the world’s greatest lie.” “‘Everyone, when they are young, knows what their Personal Legend is...they are not afraid to dream, and to yearn for everything they would like to see happen to them in their lives’” (Coelho, 20). Unfortunately, thousands of young people all over the globe are told that their dreams and goals are impossible, even before the pursuit begins. The boy in Zimbabwe is told he cannot go to university because he has no money. The girl in the USA is urged to turn from her ambition to become a journalist in the Middle East because it is dangerous and will make little money. And almost as often as this advice is given, it is received: the boy comes to believe his dream to attend a university is a lost cause, while the girl begins to think hers an unwise pursuit. “What is the world’s greatest lie?’” Santiago asks the king in The Alchemist. “‘It’s this’” the king answers, “‘that at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate’” (Coelho, 18). People are able, he writes, to fulfill a dream at any age, but if there is no confidence in the control that one over one’s circumstances, how can the journey even begin? Paulo Coelho’s first instruction to young people, especially, is to recognize this view for what it is – a lie – and reject it.

The second stage, according to Coelho, is the journey itself: actualizing the dream and taking the first step to achieving one’s personal legend. For Santiago, it is selling his sheep and giving up his life as a shepherd, the only life he knows. Often, this is the hardest part: it is easy to hold on to one’s dreams while they are still only dreams, but once the time comes for one to begin actualizing it, the first step is difficult, even when there is confidence. Most young people in high school have a goal, such as becoming a doctor, becoming first violin in the Berlin Orchestra, or even something as small as making a difference in someone’s life. Even if the dream and the confidence to begin are there, the actual process of beginning can be daunting. But Coelho urges his young readers to take the first leap ahead, however difficult. Giving the journey up at the first sign of difficulty and leaving it for something easier is, for Coelho, a tragedy. Santiago had many opportunities to leave and reached many points at which he could have reasonably decided that the cost was too high, and the journey too difficult to justify. But he did not. If the dream is worthy of pursuit, the completion of it will be well worth the trek, however easy or difficult it was: “Life really is generous to those who pursue their Personal Legend…” (Coelho, 166).

Though Coelho’s novel is peppered with lessons of self discovery and discovery of the world, his illustration of the stages of the journey that people must embark on is one that high-school students can greatly benefit from. At this crucial point in their lives, when their goals remain largely unfulfilled, Coelho’s advice is an invaluable treasure. If the world’s greatest lie is recognized and denied, the confidence garnered, the steps taken and the obstacles overcome, a dream can be actualized, and the one who pursues it to the end will become stronger and wiser because of it.