Dear Readers,
As you know throughout the month of June we shall be discussing my new book “The Winner Stands Alone”.
Throughout the week, I will be accessing this page 2-3 times a day in order to answer your questions until June 30th. I want also for you discuss among yourselves – since I’m very curious to see your reactions to the book.
As you know one of the recurrent themes of my books is the importance of paying the price of your dreams. But to what extent can our dreams be manipulated? For the past decades, we lived in a culture that privileged fame, money, power – and most of the people were led to believe that these were the real values that we should pursue.
We all should be a “winner”. Not in the sense of someone who finally wins what is important to his/her life. Not in the sense that happiness is the most valuable gift on Earth – and it can be attained here and now, when your work fulfills your heart. We should be a winner in the sense that the system portraits a successful person: celebrity, influence, photos in glossy magazines, behaving like the masters of the universe.
Yes, you may reach the goal society has fed you – but will you be satisfied? Will you be whole? Will you be in peace? This cycle of possession never ends – because the moment that you think that you have reached your goal another desire creeps in.
Soon after I finished writing “The Winner Stands Alone”, the financial market collapsed. Will this lead us again to the real values? I really don’t know. What I do know is that we cannot continue to allow our dreams to be manipulated like they are as for some of the characters in the book.
So please join me in this monthly workshop into a world that is coming to an end. We will be talking about the characters of the book as well as the main themes that run through it.
I thought of writing a small introduction about each character but prefer to list them below – so that you may comment on them. I’m really eager to see how you feel in regards to each one of them, so leave – under each character – our opinions and questions. As you can see there’s also a section dedicated to the themes that are dealt in the book as well as a section to the writing style.
CHARACTERS
IGOR
EWA
HAMID
GABRIELA
JASMINE
THEMES
SUPERCLASS
GLITTER AND GLAMOUR
THE CELEBRITY SYNDROME
BROKEN DREAMS
THE BOOK
YOUR OPINION ON THE NARRATIVE STRUCTURE
In the month of July, another workshop will be organized, this time around “The Alchemist”.
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At last the curiosity took the best of me. I had decided not to get your latest novel, but today I went to the local library and borrowed it. Since the workshop will be over today, I might post another comment on ‘your space in my blog’, when I’m done reading it. May I mention, the librarian who offered to help me, had never heard of you or of any of your books! He did know his things about Dewey’s cataloger though. I told him you have sold more than a hundred million books, and the librarian widened his eyes and said; ‘oooo’. He told me the city is out of money and the library has been told; No more purchases. I was therefore delighted when I found they have two copies of ‘The Winner Stands Alone’, and one of them was there for me to borrow.
Dear Paulo,
Not to call you out, but rather to clarify something that bothered me. In your Novel “The winner stands Alone”
You wrote that god will not ask the soul its name by its Judgment. My question is that according to Jewish thought that is one of the questions that will be asked.
In order for the soul to remember its name before judgment. Jews choose a verse from the bible/prophets/ psalms etc. that begins and ends with the same letter of their name and say this verse at the end of a specific prayer 3 times a day, in order to remember their name when they are asked when they meet god.
My name is Dovid דוד my verse is from psalm 105- verse, because it ends with a Daled (forth letter of the Hebrew alphabet )and begins with a daled.
Also In the bible, god added to Sarah’s name from sarai to sarah so she can have more power. God added to Abrahams name from avrum to avraham. When moses sent out joshua out to spy in the wilderness, moses added also a letter. Each one were give the fifth letter of the Hebrew alphabet (the letter hey) which represents gods name.
I am writing this not to be oppositional but rather because we have actually been in touch before. I asked you if you take wisdom from the Talmud and Jewish thought. You replied that you did, so I was just wondering why you disregarded this point
You are a great inspiration to me my friends and family ;) Much love!!!!
x and o’s
Dovid “Alter”
For me it WSA was a difficult book to read due to the cold calculated violence of Igor ,and reading about the fragility of precious life and how easily some people can rob others of their chance to live their life . I found this theme upsetting.
Also Paulo described so well how devastating it can be when an individual places his/her dreams in the wrong hands.
I enjoyed the up close and personal look at the fashion industry and Cannes film festival.
Thank you for all your hard work over the years Paulo,
LOVE,
Breda
Hi Breda
What Mr. paulo is trying to say that there is no evil or good. Its your conscious. the backdrop of the fashion industry makes it very very stylish. However i think this i strue everwhere. I am a Hindu our releigion advait justifies that its ok to kill if you are doing it for good. Say a soldier kills for his country. I however am not sure whether its ok to kill just to prove a point. Further can one be evil and live a happy life if they believe its ok to be evil.
Wonder who can help?
draga paulo..sunt fericit pentru ca am reusit sa va citesc cartile..primele carti le-am citit cu ajutorul unei profesoare,care mi le-a imprumutat..apoi zahirul si alchimistul au invadat timpul meu liber pentru ca doream sa o termin mai rapid,sa aflu finalul povestii..dar iata ca acum trebuie sa astept aparitia acestei carti..o astept cu nerabdare si in tara mea….invingatorul …dumneavoastra sunteti cell care a contribuit la initierea mea in aceasta viata..am 17 ani si multe obstacole vor veni..dar stiu…datorita cartilor citite le voi trece cu bine…
draga paulo
am citit capitolele puse pe blogul dumneavoastra simi-au placut
aceasta carte este una interesanta..este a 6a carte pe care o citestc de-a dumneavoastra…dupa ce ati vorbit despre iubire in zahir si la raul piedra am sezut si am plans,despre aventuri in alchimist si despre intelepciune in veronika se hotaraste sa moara si in al cincilea mkunte,iata ca in aceasta carte vorbiti despre celebritate..toate acestea la un loc formeaza cea mai buna descriere a vietii noastre…
abia astept sa apara aceasta carte si in romania pentru a cumpara cat mai rapid…astept insa cu nerabdare si urmatoarele carti pe care le veti scrie…..
Dear Paulo,
I have just finished reading your book. I just don’t know where to start… The book left me with so many contradictory feelings that I don’t know if I utterly love it or hate it.
This is by far the most surprising and unexpected book I have read written by you.
I was revolted by mostly all the characters in the book! People unhappy with their lives instead of being grateful they’re alive. Between all the macabre characters, there was one that stole my heart. One whose light shone in the midst of all the ugliness happening. That was Jasmine.The level-headed nineteen-year-old who was able to say no, and is content with what she has.
That is a rare gift in our days. Thank you for reminding me that amidst a society driven by consumerism and conformism, there still are people who believe in the value of life, love, and individualism.
Thank you for another inspirational book.
I came across this article on blood diamonds
http://www.counterpunch.org/naylor03162007.html
Keith
Blood diamonds are back in the news!
Ian Smillie, the “grandfather” of the landmark Kimberley Process, which was set up to monitor the diamond trade and to stop flow of blood diamonds has resigned!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/exclusive-the-return-of-blood-diamonds-1718027.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8116239.stm
http://www.globalwitness.org/media_library_detail.php/774/en/blood_diamonds_time_to_plug_the_gaps_
According to the boyfriend of Neda whose death has so shocked the world, she loved poetry, especially Iran’s Rumi and America’s Robert Frost.
‘The Road Not Taken’ by Robert Frost is featured in The Winner Stands Alone.
I have just received a package by mail. I have been waiting for this package ever since my sister told me she was sending it! It’s my birthday gift. After sharing the same room for 31 years, I left my paternal home looking for adventure, and she left it to embark on her own adventure, which is married life, that was three years ago.
I opened up the package, and to my surprise, she has sent me your book “The winner stands alone”. It was a very nice surprise, indeed, and I was touched that she remembered after all this time, my favorite author.
I am going to start it right away, and share my thoughts with everyone. On the other hand, I can’t wait for July’s workshop, for “the witch of portobello” is one of my favorite books.
Furthermore, I decided to share this with you, because I think that I have been blessed by a true and faithful love, that of a sister.
God bless you Paulo and keep those beautiful inspirational books coming.
Dear Paulo,
I have only started reading your latest book, so I cannot comment on it yet.
Morevoer I am struggling at the moment to make a decision regarding my future career. I have always loved to work with languages and I am thinking of giving up my office-job in order to start working as a free-lance-translator. However, I am still worrying that it might not pay enough to cover my fixed-costs. This is my main obstacle. But then I re-read “The Alchemist” and I find so many positive answers to my questions. You and your characters, having always confidence in yourselves and continuing your path… When listening to my heart, I already know the answer for myself. But deep inside me there is still this other voice, that says, “you might take a wrong decision”. I have wanted to have this dream come true for many years, and I have also prepared for it over the last few years (saved a little for the beginning, maintained my networks…)
Sometimes it seems so difficult to make the right decision. Why is it easy to give a good advice to a friend, but so hard, when it is about yourself? I think I should go for it. What do you think?
As you said in an earlier reply to someone else “in order not to let die my soul”. Actually I know the answer…
Thank you for all your books!
Love,
Claudia
Hi Paulo, Hi to everyone in the workshop, pretty good so far!
I would like to tell you that I have been reading this book, quite slowly, because I always stop my books, I am not good at reading fast! But I am very interested in what will happen after 9:20 pm in your story =) I feel the most interesting character is Igor. Why did he get to conclusion that sacrifices like those have to be done in order to show signs of his big love!
I had a very important relationship in my life before, I am only 25, and Ive already been heartbroken. I sometimes feel like I didn’t do enough to make that person to feel what I was feeling for him. With him, I learned so many things and I still feel like I want to do the things that we both dreamed together. Im still fighting, but unfortunately not with him anymore.
I don’t know how I didn’t realize that he wasn’t for me or i wasn’t for him, It took me nearly a year to leave him go from my soul.
Love is so powerful, and i appreciate you always write about it. And my hope is that the power of love still remains in me, and I could feel free and really open minded to show all the fire I sometimes hide inside of me, to someone that will be free to receive it and see all those good things inside of me! I am latina, so I am very dramatic, but I do like my complicated and dramatic life! Also as Virgo (like you) I do not want to get married as all my friends want…I’ll be happy with having love, that’s it! But Who knows…I always think about what you mention in you books: “God moves in mysterious ways”
I wish we all humans could find the balance in our lives, that we shouldn’t have to go so far the evil side to obtain a goal, as Igor did…there must be a limit for everything, because, otherwise we would keep killing each others. By our own, we should know what limit this is, and get far away from the extremes…I’d like to know what do you think Paulo! =)
Have a nice day! xoxo
Marbe
I have just finished reading the book.
In the final pages, I was quite surprised by the fact that, while Ewa says those (fake) words of love to Igor, Hamid thinks about anything… but not about his wife’s real feelings for her previous husband.
Was he so sure about Ewa’s heart that he had no doubt at all about it, or what was going on there made those words totally unimportant?
Love,
Rossana Curri
Dear Rossana,
I guess he was so sure of his own love for Ewa, unconditional love, all the rest did not matter at all.
Love
Luce
Va a salir en espanol en agosto. Gracias!
Queridos amigos: Alguno de ustedes sabe si el libro the winner stands alone ya ha sido traducido al español? y mas importante aún, si ya esta de venta en centroamerica?
Cuando supe que el hablar idiomas me daba un ventaja sobre las demás personas pense que por el resto de mi vida podia comprar cualquier libro en cualquiera de los idiomas que hablo. Que de ahi en adelante no tendria que preocuparme mas por traducciones infieles o esperas largas hasta que los libros lleguen a mi pais….. ¡Que tonterias las que piensa uno cuando es adolescente! Ahora, despues de muuuuuuchos libros en diferentes idiomas me doy cuenta que las mejores novelas deben reservarse unicamente para la primera lengua (en mi caso español) y que, aun cuando verdaderamente tengo una ventaja al dominar varios idiomas, no hay mejor manera de disfrutar el tiempo que acostada comodamente en la terraza o sentada en un café, abrir mi libro y leer en el idioma que mis padres me heredaron…. !es casi como estar en el cielo!!!! Si alguien sabe de la existencia de esta traducción en especial por favor dejenme saber.
At the weekend I went to the Picnic Festival in Guildford, part of their summer festival season. It used to be called the Ambient Green Picnic, a celebration of alternative culture, but the local council took offence at the word ‘ambient’, as it might attract the wrong people, as would the wrong type of music! The festival was a pathetic parody of what went before. No longer there were the vast range of stalls. It was not the fault of the organisers, it was the local council placing restrictions on what could take place. Allowing people to think is not to be allowed, it would be like denying the masses in Brave New World their soma. Far better to let them watch trash TV, no thinking allowed. [see Picnic Festival 2009]
Several of the stalls in the healing area invoked the help of angels. Chatting with Rachel who said she worked with Sanctuary of Angels we had an interesting discussion on Paulo Coelho and angels. We were then joined by her Spanish friend who was into living food, food that you eat raw. She informed us that ten years ago she had walked the Road to Santiago. I recommended that she read The Pilgrimage, as Paulo Coelho had walked el Camino de Santiago ten years earlier. I suggested they both checked out Warrior of Light by Detelina Petkova and the wonderful art by talented Russian artist Dasha Balashova.
Lewis Carroll, author of Alice in Wonderland, lived in Guildford. He travelled to and from Oxford by train. I walked to the festival along the river as this is a more pleasant route than walking along a busy main road. I passed Alice on the riverbank reading a book with her sister.
I was listening on Saturday to Weekend Woman’s Hour (highlights of the week’s broadcasts). Two items caught my ear.
A fitness instructor to the famous discussed how to shed fat and get into shape. Men have fat cells around their stomach, women fat cells around their arms and thighs. To be rid of the fat you need hard workouts to burn off the fat. Then exercise to tone the muscles. He said you need to do both, as they compliment each other.
Fashion magazines influence what women buy. That featured leads to sales increases of three hundred to four hundred percent. We have seen this in action. When Paulo Coelho launched a range of t-shirts with Mango as a fundraising exercise, two days later they became the Mango number one selling item worldwide. [see Paulo Coelho t-shirts from Mango]
The previous evening I listened to Any Question, a political discussion programme which can be interesting depending who is on. It was broadcast live from the London School of Fashion, which it was claimed was the leader in sustainable fashion. This to me seemed an oxymoron. I can see sustainable clothes, the use of organic cotton, non-toxic dyes, garment workers paid a living wage, clothes designed to last and to be easily recycled when at the end of their life, but surely fashion itself, where you are obliged to change your entire wardrobe every few months is not sustainable, is not good for a planet of limited resources. At least one fashion chain in the UK sells clothes so cheaply (it is regularly accused of using sweatshop labour) that it is regarded as selling disposal clothes. The clothes are destined for landfill as they cannot easily be recycled. [see Disposable clothes]
On the same programme a discussion was held on the National Health Service in London spending millions of pounds of public money on cosmetic surgery to satisfy women’s vanity! For genuine health reasons yes, but for vanity no.
Trash TV, with its mediocrity, dumbing down and celebrity culture, is the opiate of the masses. There are though exceptions, which is why YouTube has been so successful and why conventional TV is facing diminishing audiences and total collapse.
We used to have Victorian freak shows, now we have reality TV.
For the last few years I have gone to BeyondTV, Cannes it is not, though sadly I did not make it last year. BeyondTV is alternative culture, the quirky and the serious. Showing can be anything from documentaries of a few minutes length, cartoons and animations to full length documentary films. [see BeyondTV International Film Festival 2007]
We have seen, or are seeing, democratisation of the media. The dinosaurs, be they existing broadcasters or the major studios, do not like it. We saw the same when Galileo and Martin Luther clashed with the dinosaur of its day, the Catholic Church. Some years later, Charles Darwin had the same problem.
There is no monopoly no ownership on ideas.
We are seeing this today in Iran. The young and the not so young are taking to the streets. This may be the first digital revolution. And let us hope they bring down the evil regime and its suppression of women. At the weekend, the Supreme Being ordered his thugs onto the streets in a blatant show of force to crush dissent and intimidate with violence peaceful protest.
Dissidents 30 years ago in the Soviet Bloc had to have their ideas smuggled out on paper or maybe cassette, then these ideas slowly filtered back.
The media savvy in Iran are using the Internet. Before there was the clampdown on Western media, the protesters on the streets were holding up their banners, not in Persian, but in English. They did this because they knew their messages would be broadcast around the world and back into Iran. Now they are using social networking sites, filming on the streets with their mobile phones.
When the CIA mounted a coup against Hugo Chavez, the people of Venezuela took to the streets. They did not need leaders, it was a grassroots movement kept informed by sms. The first mobile phone counter-coup.
I have been using the Internet for well over ten years when few were aware of its existence. There was this exponentially expanding pool of common knowledge. I did not just stick my toe in, I embraced it wholeheartedly. But I was also willing to be a contributer too, first with my own web site, then contributing to Indymedia UK, then more recently contributing to blogs like this one.
Occasionally, the mainstream media produces something worthwhile, but it is the exception not the norm. Channel Four recently had an excellent Dispatches documentary on the US indiscriminate killing of civilians in Afghanistan and the cover-ups that followed . Even the big studios occasionally produce something worthwhile like Blood Diamond which has already had a mention.
Once Church and state had a monopoly on information and with control of information comes power. The invention of the printing press did for that. Look at what Thomas Paine managed to achieve.
Now we have the Internet. We have websites, we have blogs, we have social networking sites, we have independent news sites like Indymedia.
When I publish my thoughts on the net, the only ‘production costs’ are my time (which is priceless), the small amount of electricity I use (with associated CO2 costs to the planet) and possibly a small charge if I use a net caf.
When an an industry like the film industry starts attacking its customers, treating them like criminals, we know they are in trouble. I object strongly that when I buy a DVD, yes buy, I am forced to watch a video clip that implies I am a criminal. The irony is that if I was watching a pirate copy it would lack this video clip.
Vested interests will always be that. In his brilliant novel My Name is Red, Orhan Pamuk has illuminators defending their stylized methods that take decades to perfect defending the use of their techniques to illuminate religious texts only.
Vested interests stand like King Canute defying the tide to come in. [see Pirate Bay case exposes corporate greed]
Where would Elizabethan England have been without its pirates, men like Sir Francis Drake and Sir Walter Raleigh? Men knighted for their services to Queen and country.
As a writer, as a thinker, as a musician and artist, is not sharing ones ideas with others of paramount importance, does not making money come secondary? No one is suggesting artists should starve in their garrets, though suffering is said to be good for the soul. Yes, they should make money, otherwise they cannot follow their dreams. And can we be said to be true human beings if we do not follow our dreams, communicate with the Soul of the World?
Paulo Coelho is ahead of the game. The Winner Stands Alone was part published on this blog before it was made available in print. How this has affected sales would be difficult to establish as who knows what the sales would have been otherwise. He has a blog where he and readers can interact. This workshop is another example. He has even granted space for readers to publish their own short stories. Pirate Coelho directs to free downloads. [see Speech for the Opening of the Frankfurt Book Fair]
The Winner Stands Alone is the antithesis of trash TV. It makes people think, it makes them ask questions, it raises awareness. Through this workshop people are able to interact, ask questions, put forward their own thoughts and ideas. Unlike the couch potatoes slumped in front of a TV screen they are not passive consumers or fashionistas or cult followers of celebrity.
One measure of a great novel is that it makes people think, has an impact on society.
Paulo,
I found this book to be absolutely wonderful. I love Igor’s character. But I question, Why did you choose for him to kill his ex-wife? Besides the feelings he expressed, of course. whats the idea you wanted to convey by him killing what he wanted the most throughout the whole book?
& I must add, that you are the reason I read novels. I’ve always been a huge reader of Spanish poetry but novels never interested me until a friend recommended The Alchemist. I thank you.
An abundance of love,
Greci-
Just wanted to thank you, Paulo, for being so incredibly generous. You truly are amazing! In a world where so many are greedy to fill their already overflowing coffers (as exemplified in the article you cited on twitter: http://bit.ly/7SEhB), you stand out like a shining beacon to us all.
I went today to buy WSA at the bookstore. Can’t remember the last time I bought a hardcover book. I was shocked: $26! I very much wanted the book, but had to leave without it. And it isn’t that I didn’t feel the book is worth it or didn’t want to pay what was asked, but simply that, if I did, I would have been using my grocery money. In the end, I just couldn’t justify it and decided to wait instead for the paperback.
On the way home, I stopped at the used bookseller, hoping to find a copy. The store owner was doubtful – she never heard of Paulo Coelho. But, in response to my insistence that he is a very well known author, she went to the “Q” section to see if the book might be there. I had to tell her, No, Coelho is spelled with a “C.” No luck! There were no books by Coelho, only lots of paperbacks with covers depicting women with much cleavage, swept up in the embrace of their muscle-bound heroes.
The book is available online, and for much less, I know. But I don’t even have a bank account, much less a credit card. (I often don’t have money in my wallet, and certain no “extra” money for keeping in a bank account.) Buying online is not an option for me.
I am saying this not to complain or to elicit sympathy in any way, but merely to illustrate that not everyone has money to spend freely on books, especially hardcover books. It seems to me that you are able to understand this, Paulo, and this is what amazes me. I just downloaded the first chapters of WSA directly from your website for FREE. Thank you for being so generous to your readers and so eager to share your work with us. This is very refreshing in a world so full of greed, an environment wherein many artists are so concerned that someone is going to read their work or listen the the song they’ve recorded without contributing to their already enormous profits. When someone does, they call it “piracy” (a polite term for “stealing”). And maybe it is, on some level, but many of these artists and entertainers who are complaining so loudly are worth millions. And I don’t think that they always take the time to consider or even have the ability to comprehend the motivations of the “thieves.” Some people do “steal” songs or other artistic works with the intention of trying to make a profit off of reselling them. But then there are other people, like myself, who simply want to enjoy what the artist has created and yet truly do not have the money to pay for it.
It is one thing to say, “I don’t really feel like spending my money on this book (or this CD). I’d rather spend my money on something else.” But it is another thing to say, “Okay can either buy this book, or I can buy food for myself and my daughter to eat.” Sometimes, it seems, people have so much that they cannot comprehend what it means to have to make such decisions. They live at such a high economic level that they are completely out of touch with the reality that many others face on a daily basis.
Somehow, Paulo, although you have much, you have not been blinded by that plenty. Thank you for being you – truly a renegade, but an admirable renegade, a modern-day Robbin Hood!
Sincerely,
Savita
Savita dear… You will get the book eventually, I know it. Your words brought back to me the time when I was a student and had to count every penny, to have enough money to buy the most necessary groceries to survive. Twice a year when student loans arrived, it was much better for awhile. It must have been close to that time, I met a wonderful artist from Jerusalem. Her name is Sara Gilboa. I believe she now lives in Oslo. I cannot find much information about her online. Anyway, she makes these most beautiful pictures, abstract, but in heavenly colors, very playful technique, oil pastels. She explained to me how she had the Gate to Jerusalem in mind, when creating one picture, and she told me she goes to Jerusalem as often as she can, to get inspiration for her art. So, of course, I couldn’t resist, and just HAD to have one of her pictures. One in very warm orange colors. Gorgeous. She gave me a good price, as I was a student, but still it was an awful lot of money for me. At that time, I was going through some conflicts with my own mother, who at that time was divorced from my father. I met Sara Gilboa, through my father, who ran a gallery. What happened was, when I showed my mother the picture, I felt so guilty, for still having advantage from my father, when my mother didn’t receive anything from him anymore, so when I saw how much my mother liked the picture, in a flash I just decided to give, this treasure of mine to her. My mother was in heaven of course! And there I was left without this lovely picture, I had imagined on my wall. Oh well. Later, Sara Gilboa, was back in Israel (At that time it was quite an effort for her to get permission to leave her home country, so she couldn’t often come to Norway). She had given me her address, and I wrote her a letter and told her about how the beautiful warm colored Jerusalem abstract picture, ended up on my mothers wall. Well, don’t you know. A few weeks later I received an answer. There, in a big brown envelope from Jerusalem, she sent me a new painting for free! To this day, now warm turquoise colored, more abstract, but still heavenly picture, hangs on my wall. You can understand what this gesture means to me I’m sure. God Bless Sara Gilboa!
I spend a small fortune on books, or what is a small fortune to me, when I have no money, or no money to spare.
I try not to buy new, and scour the secondhand bookshops and snap up every Paulo Coelho I find. That is why no one else can find them. It is not though greed on my part. I then give them away!
Hardbacks are very expensive, which is why I rarely buy them, which is why I wait until the paperback comes out, and even then, I wait until it appears in the secondhand shops.
For The Winner Stands Alone, I made an exception. In England it is £15, but luckily I found it in a discount bookshop at a third off, so I picked it up for £10. Had I bought it on-line, I could have got it for £7-50 post free, which is less than the paperback would cost. Maybe I could have got it even cheaper if there are secondhand copes floating around.
My copy is now in Moscow. I no longer have a copy.
I also asked my local library to get a copy.
BookCrossing is one way to make more copies available. Those who can afford to, buy an extra copy and pass it on for others to read. If you register your copy on BookCrossing, you can give your thoughts and provide a link to this workshop.
I was in Guildford today. I browsed the secondhand bookshops and picked up
– By the River Piedra I Sat down and Wept [see BCID 7302494]
– The Fifth Mountain [see BCID 7302512]
– The Pilgrimage [see BCID 7302526]
I could also have picked up The Alchemist, but it was dog-eared.
In anther shop I found
– The Cellist of Sarajevo by Steven Galloway [see BCID 7302554]
which I highly recommend.
All books have already been registered on BookCrossing.
BookCrossing is a good idea, but sadly their website is crap.
Hi Robbin Hood,
I have felt the same struggle that you do. I do find it generous that the first few chapters were found online.
Have you looked for the book at your local library. It is an alternative to purchasing the book online or the hardcover price.
I ordered it from my library and it took only a few days for them to receive it. Alas despite having it I did not get a chance to read it. I however downloaded it to my iphone, my best friend and have been reading it non stop.
I think find reading Paulo Coelho to be extremely inspirational. I find myself thinking he is speaking directly to me when I read his stories.
I feel like I am connected to Paulo not only because we share the same last name, or speak the same native tongue; but because we both have the same questions.
The first time I heard of Paulo Coelho was during a job interview. I had been referred to work for an Attorney by my boyfriend. The Attorney was hesitant to hire me because I did not speak fluent Spanish and she had a predominately Spanish clientele. I assured her that Portuguese and Spanish were very similar and if she gave me the chance I would sore. I was comfortable understanding the language, but was very shy in speaking it.
Despite her hesitation, I was hired and the reason was that her best friend had given her a book to read by a gentlemen named Paulo Coelho called the Alchemist. She asked me if I had ever heard of him and I replied no. She said that she believes that her friend gave her the book to find me. She could have found me despite the book, but the coincidence was to strong for her to ignore. She hired me and I worked for two years.
I eventually read the book and become a fan of Paulo ever since. I have read most of his books and writings. Every time I start to read one of Mr. Coelho’s books I drift away from my reality. I forget about my problems and begin focusing on myself rather than the world around me.
I am inspired by him and believe that I to will write something for all to read.
At the moment I am content that I can write something for my two little boys to read.
If you are on http://www.paulocoelho.com you will see that he has some wonderful stories and books there available to download and read.
I have found that I have read the Alchemist in English and Portuguese and if needed could read it in Spanish.
I am so glad that he has been able to touch so many people of all different backgrounds.
It was by chance that I discovered Paulo Coelho and it is by choice that I continue to be a fan.
I work in real estate and everyday I find people like yourself trying to find out what is more important to do, to feed their children or to pay a creditor.
I have successfully helped people rise above, but not all the time do I receive happy ending. However by reading Paulo Coelho I see that there are more important things in life than just what I am facing at the moment, and I need to choose my battles.
I have faith in all working out and have tried to project the optimism that all will be the way I picture it.
I find that Paulo does believe in the energy you produce will come back to you. I believe in the law of attraction.
I am trying to practice it everyday and trying to teach my children the same path.
I know that I may be struggling now, but I see that my path is going to be restored and all will be fine.
I take comfort in Mr. Coelho’s words and enjoy reading it over and over.
I would love to see an animated version to read to my four and two year old of one of his books.
I love the readings from grandparents to children (sorry is I have the title wrong). Those stories are wonderful and uplifting.
I find that alot of the programs on television and books that are pushed to not focus on the spiritual side of things. I am trying to teach my children that they need to follow their feelings and not be afraid to show them.
Being brought up Catholic like Mr. Coelho I respect all the traditions, but sometimes question some of the rules. I am originally form Portugal so believe heavily in the saints like Our Lady of Fatima, and find it hard to follow any other doctrine, but am deeply intrigued about the eastern teachings.
I am exploring all options and always keep the options open for my children and one day they will make their own choices.
I want to thank you Mr. Coelho for a wonderful gift of storytelling and a wonderful online community you have created.
May you continue to be one of the most read writers.
I have only a few more books to read and eagerly wait for you to produce more works.
Muito Obrigado,
Veronica Coelho
BookCrossing
Books by Paulo Coelho
http://www.bookcrossing.com/search/?title=&titleExact=1&author=Paulo$20Coelho&authorExact=1&category=&isbn=&bcid=&status=0&screenname=&limit=0
The Winner Stands Alone
http://www.bookcrossing.com/search/?title=The$20Winner$20Stands$20Alone&titleExact=1&author=&authorExact=1&category=&isbn=&bcid=&status=0&screenname=&limit=0
Keith
Estou achando muito interessante ler os comentários e poder sentir o livro de outras maneiras.
Na verdade terminei de reler pela terceira vez. A primeira vez que li O ´Vencedor está Só a minha opinião foi completamente difente da segunda e da terceira, porque eu vi em todos os personagens centrais, como se fossem, todos, personagens principais ou seja cada um que morria pra mim acabava sendo como “o vencedor está só”. Conclusão : quando terminei de ler a primeira vez não havia entendido nada.
Já na segunda e terceira vez, agora, a minha análise dos fatos e personagens mudaram totalmente. Eu acabo concluindo que ninguém teve um sentimento de amor por si, pelo outro ou por qualquer coisa.
Igor começou só, concluiu suas manipulações só e terminou só.
Achei um livro bem cinematográfico, nas três vezes que li.
Minha curiosidade é em relação aos horários desde o começo do livro, tendo na soma sempre “onze”, mas no penúltimo capítulo passado das onze – “onze-onze”. Foi o único capítulo cuja soma não deu os onze.
Achei um livro diferente, mas dentro de uma realidade atual.
Beijos,
Mari
I quite like Igor. Not because he goes round killing people but for his cynical disdain of the world around him. I could not have expressed these thoughts better myself.
Sheela Nandini has picked out some interesting quotes from The Winner Stands Alone. I have to admit I was doing this mentally as I was reading the book, but did not make any physical notes. My copy has subsequently found its way to Moscow.
One quote is of particular relevance to the recent exchange between myself and Rossana Curri
This could not be more true. Though not entirely true, as notice is taken if it enhances what is beneath. For example a tight t-shirt or a low-cut blouse.
Many years ago I will always remember a girl saying she always felt naked beneath my gaze as she said I had eyes that undressed her.
My comment on appraising a person in 20 seconds, the 20 seconds was taken off the top of my head, but it is not a matter of hours or days, the process happens very rapidly.
It is not the only the men doing this. The two girls in the tent where the film distributer gets killed are eying up the black guy wanting to get him into bed.
Yes Sheela, it may have been me you responded to on Paulo Coelho t-shirts from Mango. I was not offended by anyones comments, therefore you may sleep easy at night.
Thinking of t-shirts. A few days ago, I climbed up the hill in the old part of Lincoln. I looked down and outside Readers Rest (a rabbit warren of a bookshop), I saw a group of Chinese. What struck me was a lovely white t-shirt one of the girls was wearing. Across the front the words
What could be more appropriate for the works of Paulo Coelho?
I then found her again outside Lincoln Cathedral where I had dropped in to see if I could locate the almost impossible to find Capturing Lincoln Cathedral, a collection of pictures of the Cathedral in its various moods. I complimented her on her t-shirt and suggested she might like a Paulo Coelho t-shirt from Mango. [see Paulo Coelho t-shirts from Mango]
A couple of days ago I wrote in response to Rossana Curri on the soul-destroying jobs of a friend in the Czech Republic in the same situation and the painful e-mail she wrote to me a couple of years ago. I opened my e-mail yesterday to find she had written to me again in a similar vein. At least I think she has. She had attached a hand-written letter which I sadly cannot read and if I call her she will not answer her phone.
She lacks the courage to be herself. She knows she can come and live in my house, but she lacks the courage to take the risk.
I am so sorry for your friend, Keith…
I hope she will find her courage soon!
Thanks for your support.
Love,
Rossana Curri
Technical issues: Trying to watch the videos in the sidebar, but no matter what I do, the sound remains too low to hear. Anyone have any suggestions on how to remedy this?
Dear Savita,
indeed, the sound is low. The only way my team found to remedy this was to use headphones. let me know if this helps.
Much love
Paulo
I have the same problem using Skype. I find the analogue input lacks sufficient gain. You can get around this by using a digital mike that feeds into the usb port.
Failing that: check the gain settings (they are usually set too low) and turn them, get a more sensitive microphone, put the mike closer.
Dear Sheela,
thank you for passing on these valuable quotes. Have you seen some of the e-cards my team made for the WSA?
http://paulocoelhoblog.com/e-cards-en/
Love
Paulo
I mentioned in a previous post on Igor a book The Good Soldier something, a brilliant satire on the futility of the First World War, but could not remember the full title or the author.
Tuesday I was browsing in Readers Rest, an excellent if somewhat pricey second hand bookshop in the old part of Lincoln. There on the shelf was The Good Soldier Svejk by Jaroslav Hasek!
Strange. I have never seen this book in a bookshop before. May, I was discussing it with a friend from the Czech Republic. Me, I have never read the book, but I was aware of it from a brilliant dramatisation on BBC Radio 4 a year or so ago.
I mentioned in a previous post in response to Rossana Curri. that kids would die before their parents. I then came across an article in a local paper that reinforced what I was saying.
One in ten kids in Lincolnshire is clinically obese! Overweight kids make up almost ten percent of the school intake when kids start school aged four or five. By the time they reach the age of 10 or 11, that figure had doubled! This means they have a much greater chance of developing Type 2 diabetes. [see Fat stats: Ten percent of our kids are obese]
Type 2 diabetes only used to effect people later in life. A generation ago, we would not have seen kids with Type 2 diabetes. We are seeing a sharp increase in Type 2 diabetes due to obesity and the figures may well underestimate the problem due to the lack of diagnosis and early detection. [see Healthier lifestyle is key to dealing with diagnosis]
Dear Paulo,
Half an hour ago I finished reading “The Winner” This is first book of yours that it took more than week that it took to finish. Reading it I felt somehow as in high school when reading obligatory heavy classics. Some evenings I had to leave it as it became oppressing.
Some passages were written as documentary showing uneasy and unhealty state of some parts of society (I am not judging the way they live, neither you do, everybody have choice) and you described painfuly,clearly and trasparently rat race that world of red carpet is.
For me Hamid, Gabriela and Jasmine choose less travel road all of them finishing differently.
If I have to choose between the main caracters who is winner I shall say Hamid though it may sound ilogical because he is dead.
But does death means you are not winner when whole your life testifies opposite ?
Does winner means person who obtains the most or person who has all because he has the life he choosed ?
Desperate race and superficiality take its tol from people with celebrity syndrome but it is like flood or oil stain on the water that is taking ground through young adlescents.
Visibility, visibility, visibility is all that matters and the cost and way to reach it is not important.
Superclass ? Who are they ? Who makes them Superclass ? Who has right to be considered as unique in making better world, I would say.
Igor: looser,fighter, psyhopath with power – dreadful combination
Ewa : looser, weak, false, unstable, oportunist – causa chaos
Hamid : Winner deffinitely because path he chooses, the force he has to follow his dream, to change and reinvented himself, love he lived and ultimately even in death.
Gabriela: looser, not because of the film that will not come true but because of obsession she lives her dream.
Jasmine/Christine: looser because you can not build dream on wrong base (witness of the crime), fighter all the same….
And precious words, I quote just few of them :
- NO
- The planet is, was and always will be stronger then us. We can’t destroy it; if we overstep the mark, the planet will simply erase us…
- …sleeping sickness. What we should also know is that a similar desease exists that attack the soul…
Thank you !
Love
Luce
Good way of seeing things dear Luce. Hamid is very humble, his story reminds me of Santiago.
love
Sheela
Dear Paulo
Thank you for this workshop. I think it is just fantastic to be able to give your views on the book and to learn even more by the comments of others. It is of course such an honour to be able to communicate with you and for you to give us more of an insight.
I feel blessed and excited by all this..I love interaction.
love to you Paulo
Paulo,
What do you think of Poland?Sincerely, please
Hello dear Sheela,
Your analysis is Excellent! Our Magus never fails with his books! Precisely what the world needs today!
love,
Sheela
A great post Sheela. I see the rabbit hole, a tunnel, bats and Vampires!! It’s quite exciting. I think Igor must have been stuck there, and didn’t get to see the light before killing everyone off!
Rossana Curri wrote of having to do a soul destroying job ….
Sadly there are too many people in this position. They are forced by family and friends, by their economic circumstances, by the soul-destroying Job Centres where they are forced to sign on when they find themselves unemployed, to follow a path that is not part of their dreams, that given a free choice it is not what they would wish to do. Few are like the black model Jasmine and follow the path less travelled. Few have the courage to be different.
Paulo Coelho has touched upon this many times. Books that spring to mind are Veronika Decides to Die and the conversations he had with Juan Arias recorded in Paulo Coelho: Confessions of a Pilgrim.
I have a friend who wrote a very painful e-mail to me a couple of years ago of how she was studying economics and foreign affairs at a prestigious university in Prague. She is very intelligent, but it is not what she wants to do. She would rather be an artist, study astrology. Whether her art is good I do not know. Think of Brida and you get the picture. She felt it was what was expected of her. Now she is working at the Ministry of Education in Prague. She is bored stiff, does not like the work, but needs the money as she has decided to buy a flat which she cannot afford.
Young lawyers are enticed into corporate law firms with promise of huge salaries, a partnership. They work long hours, burn themselves out, to be replaced by the next eager wet-behind-the-ears young lawyers. The only beneficiaries are the partners and their corporate clients.
Too many people are ripping off their fellows because they need the money to maintain their own lifestyles. Lifestyles that are killing the planet.
We are all brainwashed into feeling we have to be clones of the celebrities that we see pictures of everyday, that to show ‘success’ we have to have our designer clothes and other goodies of the consumer societies, if not we are washed up nobodies.
Few people have the courage of Santiago in The Alchemist to follow their dreams. They work and work on their treadmill thinking that one day I will get off and enjoy myself, take early retirement, but they never do. Like Igor, the time is never right. It is always put off until tomorrow, only tomorrow never comes.
Although many of the themes are there, The Winner Stands Alone is different from what has gone before. If this workshop is anything to go by, it is making people question what is happening around them, waking them up to the degree they are being manipulated. Maybe they will change, maybe they will change the people around them.
Many people do soul-destroying jobs to maintain their lifestyle (and I am not thinking of those who are earning less than a dollar a day to stay alive). Change the lifestyle and you do not need the money. If you do not need the money, you do not have to do that soul-destroying job.
Society is us, is made up of individuals and the relationships between those individuals. If we change, then we can work on changing those around us.
As Paulo Coelho has already said in this workshop in response to a comment from Nora:
That is how our natural world works. The plants and animals that make up an ecosystem change that ecosystem to suit themselves. That is how Gaia works in controlling the biosphere in which we all live, though thanks to our meddling it is likely to flip some time real soon into another stable state that rids the earth of mankind. Compared with the dinosaurs we have only been around in a blinking of an eye.
There are little green shoots emerging here and there. Mention has been made of Happy Days with a link to an article in the New York Times (something I have yet to check out).
http://happydays.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/07/the-joy-of-less/?em
Transition Towns is another example of these little green shoots.
I was pleased to see the positive comments from everyone to my earlier thoughts on organic and the Slow Food movement.
There was a report a few years back in The Ecologist on organic food production in Cuba. There is also a more recent film on Cuba.
Thanks to the blockade the Americans maintain around Cuba and with the loss of cheap oil from Russia (though there is now cheap oil coming in from Venezuela) Cuba has had to face up to what we will all have to face up to one day, a world without oil. Agriculture is divided, or was divided, into three zones, that still dependent on oil, that in transition, and that organic. The organic is as productive if not more productive than the oil zone, the transition zone is less productive. Cuba also has city gardens. Havana is so productive that it has a surplus of food!
As previously mentioned, Vandana Shiva has done a lot of work on organic food production.
It is not though just the use of oil. We are losing many of our food varieties. In a fast changing world, with global temperatures rising, it is important that we maintain our genetic diversity, maintain our seed heritage, something peasant farmers have been doing since man first learned how to harvest his crops. [see Seed varieties at risk]
An excellent though very expensive book is Fatal Harvest, edited by Andrew Kimbrell.
Each spring, though sadly not this year, I go to Seedy Sunday in Brighton. We swap seeds. Something we can all do. [see Seedy Sunday Brighton 2008]
I have lawns, well really patches of grass, which I mow by hand. It gives me exercise and somewhere to sit in the summer under the shade of the trees. No herbicides or fertilisers are used. Part of the garden is used for growing food. Part is a wild woodland area. Lawns are second best to growing food, but vastly superior to paving over which causes many problems: loss of wildlife, water runoff, more extreme temperature variation. We even counter global warming by locking up carbon in our gardens! [see Gardens under threat]
I walk through urban areas and it is as though people hate soil. Everything gets paved over. And even those who have soil, seems to hate anything that is alive.
Industrial agriculture is not just destroying the natural world, it is destroying us, destroying our souls. We are what we eat. [see You are what you eat]
Paulo Coelho touched on this in The Devil and Miss Prym.
There are counter movements. Slow Food, farmers markets, celebrations of local food.
One example of the celebration of local produce is the Alton Food Festival, held in the relatively unpsoilt market town of Alton. [see Alton Food Festival 2008]
I love this quote from Association Kokopelli, the best way to fight the multinationals is to bypass them!
Happy guerrilla gardening! [see Seeds of Dissent]
You are one of my favorite writers.
Your idea of reaching out to your readers through Facebook is simply genius. How many times have I wished to interview a writer whose writings have touched my very being? Tolstoy, Saramago, Victor Hugo..
Finally my wish has come true.Thank you1
I will be looking for this book tomorrow and posting my questios as soon as possible.
Dear Nilda,
thank you for the message. I can’t wait to see your thoughts in the blog.
Much love
Paulo
Dear Paulo,
now I am already somewhere in the middle of the book – reading the chapter Savoy, the policeman at 16.07 …. – really very interesting to read about inside of each the performer, about their dreams, their ways, how they get into present situations, where they are and that everybody is just playing a role …like we are.
So as all of your book, The winner … especially, makes me think about myself much more intensive as usual. And than I do not know what to do… Everyday wake up at around 6.15 , go to the same office, sitting and working – producing funny and useless papers – for my boss,for his boss, my colleaugues, the managers etc … coming home in the evening, be tired, not have time for really important things, etc. But what else can I do ? We should mounthly pay our obligations – as everybody of course. It is very trivial, but we need money, for everyday life … so I can not just say Good bye office, good bye all of my superiors , I finish !!! It is not easy, and sometimes I dislike it very much, but tomorrow, again, I will wake up and have to go to work… ( and only very deep inside hope, that a miracle could maybe happen one day to me )
Have a nice evening!
Love
Monika
Further to comments from Rossana Curri …
I am pleased to hear you are feeling much healthier. You will now find you are in a virtuous circle. As you say, you did a 20km walk which you could not have done before. Having done the walk, you feel better.
On Saturday I climbed a church tower. Hard work and my legs ached the next day, but it was worth it for the view.
Impressions are formed in about the first 20 seconds. Men see a woman, myself included, and think, yes, I’d like to make love to her. We may change our minds later or regret our mistake. Our animal instinct see a ‘healthy’ partner to mate with to produce healthy offspring, survival of the fittest, survival of the race.
Thank you, Keith… I did not know about those 20 seconds, but it’s really interesting.
The last sentence of yours are especially intriguing: “Our animal instinct see a ‘healthy’ partner to mate with to produce healthy offspring, survival of the fittest, survival of the race”.
I will keep that in mind, and try not to blame men that are only interested in the way I look.
Thank you.
Love,
Rossana Curri
I was pleased to hear that Karla after reading The Winner Stands Alone you had second thoughts about buying an expensive purse you did not need. Let us hope more people follow your good example. Encourage your friends to read The Winner Stands Alone.
Is Ewa bad, or is she bad as seen through the eyes of Igor? People drift apart. Understanding turns to misunderstanding. Trust turns to mistrust. Love turns to hate.
Apart from drawing on the observations of the guy who coined the term ‘Superclass’, Paulo would also have been able to have made his own observations at Cannes and Davos.
Like Karla, I also enjoyed Eleven Minutes. My lovely Russian friend Alissa recommended that I read Eleven Minutes. She said I would enjoy it. It is a very powerful novel.
Hi Paulo,
I found the book very interesting. Though I wonder how would you classify happiness which everyone is looking around. Isnt it your own perspective …where given a situation a person might feel happy where as other person may not ?
The happiness is most times linked to our desires…and they never seem to end i guess.One accomplished so other and it goes in infinite loop. Some cherish happiness where as others never have a time to celebrate small wins….they always have something more important and which they feel will make them more happy. Or there sense of achivement lasts for a very brief period and then they start worrying about next thing in line.I dont feel this way but then at times it feels like I am not ambitious enough…or to say more appropriate thats how society makes you feel like.
Regards
Parsh
Dear Parsh,
you are totally right when you say that happiness depends on our desires.
I believe that the more you base your happiness on material things, the least you are able to free yourself from them. Things start chasing you in a way.
Much love
Paulo
true freedom is freedom from desires !
does not mean one will be free of desires but only that those desires are not binding. not a bondage. desire is a thousand headed hydra.
happiness is something which comes to you when u are not pursing it madly. when u are romancing with happiness.
being ambititious as per society’s defination is the greatest tool to enslaven you, so let’s all be-aware. afterall if i want to grow flowers of so many varieties to enjoy my morning rituals some more, it is hardly an ambition, hardly a desire.
paulo cannot be wrong and carlonena – would be thankful if u could share your moments meditating in mountains when u were young, we may lear something from your expereinces.
love
aditya
I am quite often in your country. I am the godfather of a beautiful girl calle Marysia
Dear Mr. Coelho,
“The winner stands alone” is one of the best books I’ve read for you. Honestly, I totally agree with the fact that winning a certain goal does not mean happiness. We will always have this missing part that we need to satisfy and, in the process, we forget to enjoy what we already have.
Losing love (or not finding it) is the most painful experience. We can be rich and powerful but without love we are just poor and weak souls.
Some people don’t find happiness easily in their lives. They have to fight for every single moment of it. Therefore, when they find a source of happiness, (or that’s what they might think) they grasp it and refuse to let go. The problem is that when it is gone, a person might lose his/her sanity. In the process, those people lose their souls, hearts, minds, or health. That’s why some of them fail to find love again or live in deap depression that eats their health.
All charecters in your book were trying to find happiness. None of them found it except for Yasmin. It could be because she is still young and ready to give up everything for true love. All I know that happiness and love come hand in hand and they are at best in their simplest represntation.
Life got very complicated that’s why winning will never satisfy us. we need to go back to simple reality not to be lonely winners; rather to become happy individuals.
Thank you again for your inspiring books. You affected my life and my way of thinking in many ways. You are a winner and with all of this global love, you are not alone.
Sincerely,
Dear Esperanza,
thank you for the touching analysis of the book. It reminds me of this passage by St Paul in his letter to the Corinthians :
“If I speak in human and angelic tongues 2 but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal.
And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.
If I give away everything I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, is not pompous, it is not inflated,
it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury,
it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails. If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.
For we know partially and we prophesy partially,
but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.
When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things.
At present we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.
So faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”
Love
Paulo
Dear Paulo,
I have a one question.What do you think of Poland?Sincerely, please.
ce frumoasa ar fi viata daca oamenii in loc de nume ar avea un cuvant care sa-i defineasca…si ce interesant ar fi daca si l-ar alege singur…bun…dar ia stati…ce ar fi daca toti ne-am alege un cuvant,care sa ne defineasca complet….pentru mine as alege Terra,iar pentru tine Soare….pentru ca asa este,ma invart in jurul tau,indiferent de locul unde ne aflam……pentru ca timpul ne gaseste intotdeauna impreuna….daca ar fi sa aleg alte cuvinte,pentru tine as alege zahir,sau frumusete,iar pentru mine as alege pasiune sau nebunie…..daca nici acestea nu ar reusi sa ne descrie,atunci eu as fi marea,iar tu te-ai numi vant..pentru ca fara vant,marea nu este niciodata o forta,fara vand nu ezista valuri….iubirea,speranta,supunerea….fiecare parca s-ar potrivi…dar stai,acuma stiu…numele tau este de neschimbat,pentru ca este mai important decat soarele,decat planeta si universul in care traim….iar pentru mine,as alege numele tau,pentru ca el reprezinta speranta mea in aceasta lume necunoscuta si plina de probleme… toti suntem dependenti de ceva.unii sunt dependenti de cafea,bauturi,muzica,jocuri filme.eu sunt dependent de lumina ochilor tai,de frumusetea zambetului tau..de aceea,te rog,grabestete si vino spre mine… http://adikady2009.blogspot.com/
ps:acestea sunt cuvinte pentru persoana cea mai importanta din viata mea..acum intrebre…daca nici asa nu o intereseaza sentimentele mele pentru ea,ce sa mai fac?cum o pot cucerii…..
I found this video on youtube by Lady GaGa and it reminded me of some of the things we are talking about here!
Enjoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMvrNO9fUM0
Dear Paulo,
I have just finished The Winner Stands Alone and I must say that it is very unlike your other books, but I enjoyed reading it very much.
My question is, why is it that you are holding a workshop on the book, and did you do this for your other books as well?
love and blessings,
Kristina
Dear Kristina,
this is my first workshop on the blog. I will hold another one in July – I’m still deciding in which title I will do it.
I am really enjoying doing this with all of you.
Much love
Paulo
Posts are now backwards way on!
Igor survived the trauma of being sent to fight in Afghanistan, many did not.
People are sent to fight in wars, on their return home they are abandoned with no support.
Soldiers returned from the First World War suffering shell shock. They were abandoned to beg on the streets. Many did not survive the trenches, if they were not killed in action, they were executed for ‘cowardice’.
A classic novel, a black satire, of the futility of the trench warfare in WWI, is The Good Soldier something or other. I can never remember the full title nor can I ever remember the Czech writer. Maybe someone would care to elaborate. Also worth reading A Whispered Name by William Brodrick.
During the Second World War, crew of bomber planes were publicly humiliated, stripped of their insignia for lack of moral fibre. Patrick Bishop may mention this in his book Bomber Boys.
Soldiers returned from Vietnam with no support in place. Many went on the rampage. Many of the veterans of Vietnam went to Russia to give help and support to veterans of Afghanistan.
During the parade to celebrate British victory regaining the Falkland Islands from Argentina, then Prime Minister Maggie Thatcher banned the injured soldiers from participating in the parade as it would project the wrong image.
In Aldershot (proud boast ‘Home of the British Army’), families are evicted with only a few weeks notice from their Army homes should their partner be killed or be forced by injury out of the Army.
No one wanted the war with Iraq, it has led to a sharp rise in terrorism. A million people took to the streets of London but the war went ahead anyway on a pack of lies.
Not long after the war started, I was in London and had dinner with about a dozen people who had been in Iraq. These included Iraqis, US soldiers, a journalist, a volunteer, an Italian aid worker whose colleague was kidnapped then released. I heard of the abuses by the Americans, lack of cultural respect by the Americans to Iraqis, of how inadequately ill-equipped were the Americans, of one American who when he got home was stalking someone with a gun, then at the last moment realised what he was doing. [see Occupation and Resistance in Iraq]
One of the people I was with Christian Parenti has written an excellent account of his time in Iraq, The Freedom: Shadows and Hallucinations in Occupied Iraq. Unlike most people who sit holed up in the Green Zone and have not a clue what is going on, or are embedded with the military, Christian Parenti was out in the field. As was the other people I was with.
Another lady I had the privilege to meet, Peggy Gish, was aware of the atrocities at Abu Ghraib prison long before it became widely publicised. I strongly recommend her very moving account of her time in Iraq, Iraq: A Journey of Hope and Peace. [see Eyewitness Iraq]
I read only a couple of days ago of a soldier who had served in Iraq going on the rampage with a Samurai sword. He was suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. He had been given no support on his return from Iraq. [see Sword-wielding soldier 'traumatised after Iraq']
In his defence in Court his lawyer said:
We have to break the cycle that sends young men like Igor to fight pointless wars on behalf of corrupt politicians and their corporate masters. Wars that are for profit, be it civil wars in Africa for blood diamonds and other natural resources or the occupation of Iraq to control their national assets.
If Rossana Curri (earlier post) has lost 20 kg in the last few months and she is now seen as ‘attractive’, I say ‘well done’, maybe she will also have gained something on the way, her self-respect, maybe self-confidence too.
There seems to be some confusion between health and well being and those who engage in plastic surgery and botox injections.
I see kids who are almost as wide as they are tall, who stuff themselves with junk food, who get no exercise be it of the mind or body, who will die before their parents.
I know some very attractive women, who are also nice to be with. I know others who are fashion and celebrity obsessed, nice to look at but who I would tire of within a few minutes.
If we do not look after ourselves, no one else will do it for us.
I see people get in their car just to drive down the road to pick up a newspaper. Use a power mower for mowing the grass. They then get into their car for a trip down the gym for some exercise!
I walk and cycle everywhere, use public transport (though I wish it was better than it is). I use a push mower to mow my lawns, much more satisfactory than using a power mower. I used to have an old Victorian mower, but sadly no more. I try to be careful what I eat. I do some stretching exercises every day. I also use a Powerball, which I highly recommend.
http://www.powerballs.com/
A few days ago I went up and over the top of a hill, down the other side and walked in the countryside for the afternoon. The next day I could barely move, which only goes to show how unfit I am. Yesterday I went for a long walk along a river, along an old abandoned railway line which has been converted into a cycle track, at the end of my day, I had to walk up a hill. Surprisingly I did not feel as tired the next day. I must be getting fitter!
By chance, I happened to be in Lincoln when they had a farmers market. Only a handful of stalls due to lack of publicity, lack of support from the local council. Maybe no more than a half a dozen stalls. Tragic when you consider Lincoln is the county town of Lincolnshire, an agricultural county. I bought some lovely fresh bread and a box of strawberries (there is nothing to beat English strawberries).
Dear Keith, I had to lose weight for health reasons, and I am happy I did, for I do feel better now: I can do so many things that I could not do any longer.
A few days ago, for example, I walked 20 km, and still felt great after that.
What I cannot understand is why people’s attitude had to change so much after that: I am still the same person, why should they act so differently?
How can external appearance influence so much the way other people relate with you?
When I was bigger, everyone was a friend: I felt free to be as cheerful and nice as I felt like being, and I used to get along well with anyone. People used to talk to me about their life, emotions, feelings, problems…
I still used to behave the same when I lost weight… But I found out that my nice approach was often misunderstood, and that most of men could not really see “ME” behind my “beauty”: nobody – except old friends – is interested in what i have to say or what I feel any longer. They just admire me.
Paulo, does it happen the same when you become famous? Some people can only see the famous person, and disregard the man behind that?
Love,
Rossana Curri
Thank you, Barbara: you are such a great inspiration to me!!
I wish you will soon write the book that is there in your heart, ready to come out… let it come to life, and blossom.
Love and gratitude,
Rossana Curri
Thank you, too Rossana. And thank you for all the kind words. You have also been an inspiration to me.
Good luck with everything.
Love, Barbara
am o intrebare :aceasta carte cand va aparea si in romania?
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