A Warrior’s Life: A Biography of Paulo Coelho
Paulo Coelho is a worldwide phenomenon. At a time when he is coming up to the fantastic achievement of 100 million copies sold worldwide across all his books, his fans will be delighted with the first ever official biography of Paulo, an in-depth look at his life and work, and what makes him the much-loved author he is today.Paulo's first official biographer, Fernando Morais, provides an exhaustive look at Paulo's fascinating and varied life, taking several years to research his subject, and interviewing everyone who knows Paulo. He weaves together the strands of Paulo's life, revealing the man behind the world-famous writer.Paulo Coelho was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in August 1947. Before he became internationally known and a worldwide bestseller, he had to overcome many obstacles. As a teenager, he was subjected to the brutality of electric shock treatment in the psychiatric hospital where his parents, who took his rebelliousness as a sign of madness, interned him three times. As a member of the esoteric underworld, he was put in prison for alleged subversive activities against the Brazilian dictatorship and subjected to physical torture.Later, Paulo joined forces with rock star Raul Seixas and together they composed songs that revolutionized Brazilian rock music. Hippie, journalist, rock star, actor, playwright, theatre director and producer of television programs, this whirlwind life came to an end in 1982, during a trip to Europe. In Dachau and later in Amsterdam, Paulo had a mystical meeting with "J", his new mentor, who persuaded him to walk the Road to Santiago de Compostela, a medieval pilgrim's route between France and Spain.In 1986 Paulo walked the Road to Santiago, and it was there that he reconverted to Christianity and found again the faith bequeathed to him by the Jesuit fathers of his school years. He would later describe this experience in his first book, The Pilgrimage. The following year, The Alchemist, established his worldwide reputation. The novel has already achieved the status of a universally admired modern classic. Now, for the first time, discover the true story of the man behind some of the world's most loved books.
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A WARRIOR’S LIFE
A Biography of
PAULO COELHO
Fernando Morais
For Marina, my companion on yet another crossing of the Rubicon
When the world fails to end in the year 2000, perhaps what will end is this fascination with the work of Paulo Coelho.
Wilson Martins, literary critic, April 1998, O Globo
Brazil is Rui Barbosa, it’s Euclides da Cunha, but it’s also Paulo Coelho. I’m not a reader of his books, nor am I an admirer, but he has to be accepted as a fact of contemporary Brazilian life.
Martins again, July 2005, O Globo
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1 Paulo today: Budapest – Prague – Hamburg – Cairo
CHAPTER 4 First play, first love
CHAPTER 5 First encounter with Dr Benjamim
CHAPTER 7 Ballad of the Clinic Gaol
CHAPTER 11 The marijuana years
CHAPTER 12 Discovering America
CHAPTER 14 The Devil and Paulo
CHAPTER 16 A devil of a different sort
CHAPTER 17 Paulo renounces the Devil
CHAPTER 21 First meeting with Jean
CHAPTER 22 Paulo and Christina – publishers
CHAPTER 23 The road to Santiago
CHAPTER 25 The critics’ response
CHAPTER 28 Becoming an ‘immortal’
IT’S A DREARY, GREY EVENING in May 2005 as the enormous white Air France Airbus A600 touches down gently on the wet runway of Budapest’s Ferihegy airport. It is the end of a two-hour flight from Lyons in the south of France. In the cabin, the stewardess informs the passengers that it’s 6.00 p.m. in Hungary’s capital city and that the local temperature is 8°C. Seated beside the window in the front row of business class, his seat belt still fastened, a man in a black T-shirt looks up and stares at some invisible point beyond the plastic wall in front of him. Unaware of the other passengers’ curious looks, and keeping his eyes fixed on the same spot, he raises the forefinger and middle finger of his right hand as though in blessing and remains still for a moment.
After the plane stops, he gets up to take his bag from the overhead locker. He is dressed entirely in black – canvas boots, jeans and T-shirt. (Someone once remarked that, were it not for the wicked gleam in his eye, he could be mistaken for a priest.) A small detail on his woollen jacket, which is also black, tells the other passengers – at least those who are French – that their fellow traveller is no ordinary mortal, since on his lapel is a tiny gold pin embossed in red, a little larger than a computer chip, indicating to those around him that he is a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. This is the most coveted of French decorations, created in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte and granted only at the personal wish of the President of the Republic. The award, which was given to the traveller at the behest of Jacques Chirac, is not, however, the only thing that marks him out. His thinning, close-cropped white hair ends in a tuft above the nape of his neck, a small white ponytail some 10 centimetres long. This is a sikha, the lock of hair worn by Brahmans, orthodox Hindus and Hare Krishna monks. His neat white moustache and goatee beard are the final touch on a lean, strong, tanned face. At 1.69 metres he’s fairly short, but muscular and with not an ounce of fat on his body.
With his rucksack on his back and dying for a cigarette, he joins the queue of passengers in the airport corridor, with an unlit, Brazilian-made Galaxy Light between his lips. In his hand is a lighter ready to be flicked on as soon as it’s allowed, which will not, it seems, be soon. Even for someone with no Hungarian, the meaning of the words ‘Tilos adohanyzas’ is clear, since it appears on signs everywhere, alongside the image of a lighted cigarette with a red line running through it. Standing beside the baggage carousel, the man in black looks anxiously over at the glass wall separating international passengers from the main concourse. His black case with a white heart chalked on it is, in fact, small enough for him to have taken it on board as hand luggage, but its owner hates carrying anything.
After going through customs and passing beyond the glass wall, the man in black is visibly upset to find that his name does not appear on any of the boards held up by the drivers and tour reps waiting for passengers on his flight. Worse still, there are no photographers, reporters or television cameras waiting for him. There is no one. He walks out on to the pavement, looking around, and even before lifting the collar of his jacket against the cold wind sweeping across Budapest, he lights his cigarette and consumes almost half of it in one puff. The other Air France passengers go their separate ways in buses, taxis and private cars, leaving the pavement deserted. The man’s disappointment gives way to anger. He lights another cigarette, makes an international call on his mobile phone and complains in Portuguese and in a slightly nasal voice: ‘There’s no one waiting for me in Budapest! Yes! That’s what I said!’ He repeats this, hammering each word into the head of the person at the other end: ‘That’s right –
