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The significance of Freuds theory
The significance of Freuds theory
The significance of Freuds theory
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The Alchemist is a story about a boy, named Santiago, who embarks on a journey to find a treasure. In order to find the treasure, Santiago has to overcome many obstacles such as wars, love, storms, etc. On his way to find the treasure, Santiago meets many people; some help him while bring him down. These experiences, however, make Santiago mature and motivated to reach his goal. Santiago’s behavior, such as his motivation, his fear, and his love can be explained by the Freudian psychological approach. First, Freud concluded that the unconscious mind governs our behavior. Throughout the novel, Santiago unconsciously reads the “language of the world” and acknowledges them after he matures. Santiago experiences the language of the world when he falls in love and communicates with the sheep and the wind. However, at that time he does not realize that the language of the world is not spoken. As he matures, he realizes that the Language of the world is not a verbal language, but a mental language that connects us with one another. As Santiago was thinking about how he communicated with the sheep, crystals, and the silence of the desert, he realized that “It was the …show more content…
Santiago’s dream symbolizes his passion to be successful. Santiago had a dream in which he is in the fields with his flock as a child transports him to the pyramids of Egypt where he searches for the treasure. However, every time Santiago is about the find the location of the treasure, he wakes up. According to Freud, dreams perform important functions for the unconscious mind and serve as valuable clues for our needs. It can be proven that Santiago’s dream represents “Signs are an individual language you develop with the divine energy” (Swarbrick). Hence, Santiago wanted to find the treasure and become wealthy in the first place, that is why he dreamed of it and overcame every obstacle to ensure his
The heart of a child is one free of fear. It is brave and courageous; uncontaminated by any sources of doubt. Therefore, during the tender age of childhood, one is able to form ideas that those older are unable to even entertain. It is only when one comes of age, that he faces predicaments which cause him to question whether his dream should be pursued. In such circumstances, the individual either comes to consider his dreams too impractical to achieve and chooses to submit to that uncertainty, or chooses to overcome his fears and pursue his dream. Such is apparent in various events throughout Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist. In several circumstances, individuals are faced with the option of conformity as it is depicted as the result of fearing
The knowledge and universal understanding derivative from a journey can leave the traveller positively enlightened. In Coelho’s story, Santiago is faced with recurring dreams which lead him to ‘’traverse the unknown’’ in search of a treasure buried in Egypt, the metaphor for universal connection, and in doing so, comes to the unrelenting realisation of spiritual transcendence. After arriving at the assumed geographical location of the treasure ‘’several figures approached him’’. They demand the boy keep searching for this treasure as they are poor refugees and in need of money, but as Santiago does, he finds nothing. Then, after relentless digging through the night ‘’as the sun rose, the men began to beat the boy’’ , finally relenting with the truth, Santiago reveals his dreams to the travellers. In doing so, Santiago finds out that these men had also been faced with recurring dreams measured around the place where the boy had undergone his own, both relative to hidden treasure. However the leader was ‘’not so stupid as to cross an entire desert just because of a recurrent dream’’. It is with this fact, tha...
In The Alchemist Paulo Coelho presents a character, Santiago, torn between following tradition and his Personal Legend. Santiago tries to live true to his Personal Legend, which is a path pursued by those who strive to fulfill their purpose in life. Yet throughout the novel tradition, a motif, presents itself as a roadblock holding Santiago back from reaching his dreams. Coelho juxtaposes tradition against Personal Legend to illustrate its purely individual nature and the necessity of the acceptance of change to reach one’s dreams and goals.
Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist is a story about a young shepherd who goes on a journey to the Great pyramids in Egypt in search of treasure to fulfil his personal legend. The boy meets people along the way who either help or hinder his ability to achieve his dreams. Through the contrasting views of The Crystal Merchant and the Englishman Santiago learns that many people pursue their personal legends only in their minds and that they all influenced Santiago’s personal legend; as a result of the characters’ outlook on life, Coelho conveys that everyone pursues their dreams either in life, or in their imagination, or through books.
Santiago guides his flock throughout the fields of Andalusia. He finds an old abandoned church and churchyard where he and his flock can spend the night. He sleeps on the stone floor using his book as a pillow. He anticipates his approach the Andalusian village where, one year prior, he met a merchant's daughter. Santiago and his flock approach the town. He has been herding this flock for two years. He often reflects about what he has learned from his sheep and what they have learned from him. He observes that the sheep depend fully on him to lead them to food and water. Not having to forage food for themselves, they have forgotten their instincts.
By Paulo Coelho there are many symbols throughout the novel that have deep, and specific meanings that helped Santiago throughout the journey of discovering his personal legend. In the beginning of the story Santiago is given two stones, one white and one black. The stones both represent different things but do the same thing during Santiago’s journey. “They are called Urim and Thummim. The black signifies ‘yes’, and the white ‘no.’ When you are unable to read the omens, they will help you do so. Always ask an objective question.” This quote means when ever Santiago is not sure of what to do that he is supposed to ask an objective question and pull a stone out of the bag. Urim and Thummim help Santiago make choices throughout the journey of discovering his personal legend. During a part of the journey the stones fell out of Santiago’s pocket. “He didn’t consider mending the hole - the stones could fall through any time they wanted. He learned that there were certain things one shouldn’t ask about, so as not to flee from one’s own destiny.” Santiago learned that there are choices that everyone has to make personally and not get others insight from. “I promise to make my own decisions.” Santiago made a promise that he would make his own decisions and not let Urim and Thummim make them for him. He realized that he was on his own person journey and that Urim and Thummim represented wisdom and guidance only if he was in the need of
The first two obstacles that Santiago faces are that his father tells him he can not do something that he wants to do and that he wants to pursue his personal legend, but he does not want to hurt those that he loves. For example, Santiago’s father said, “The people who come here have a lot of money to spend, so they can afford to travel. Amongst us the only ones who can travel are shepherds.” Everyone is told by their parents and friends that everything we want to do is impossible. Since Santiago did not have money to spend to travel his only choice was then to become a shepherd to fulfill his desire. T...
There are many obstacles in everyday life, but none as detrimental to ones future as fear. Fear can cause people to not only avoid achieving their goals in life but it also forces them to think about it throughout every day. Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist shows that those who wallow in fear will never achieve their personal legend, and those who conquer fear will achieve anything they strive for. Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist is a commonly analyzed and criticized piece of literature. One of these articles is Rejendra Kumar Dash’s “Alchemy of the Soul: A Comparative Study of Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha and Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist”. Dash’s article is a literary criticism of the different parts of the character’s journey in The Alchemist. He talks about, in his article, how the theme in The Alchemist is found through analyzing the different parts of Santiago’s journey and what those parts mean. Another one of these articles is Lily Hasanah’s “Decision Making in Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist”. Hasanah’s article is a literary criticism of the main character in The Alchemist, Santiago. She searches for the theme in The Alchemist through analyzing the decisions, and the outcomes of those decisions, made by Santiago. Paulo Coelho provides access to his theme, for the most part, though the actions and adventures of the main character, Santiago. Although this is the method of delivery he had in mind, Dash and Hasanah view the delivery of his theme differently.
Santiago is a shepherd trying to pursue his personal legend. His personal legend is the recurring dream about the hidden treasure at the foot of the Egyptian pyramids. In his dream he starts playing in a field with his sheep, when a child appeared and began to play with the animals. This was strange to him because sheep are afraid of strangers, but the sheep and children play along just fine. Then a child grabbed his hands and took him to the foot of the Egyptian pyramids. He begins his journey locally trying to find answers from a gypsy and a man named
In the book the Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, Santiago’s call to adventure was to travel the world , experience life, and find his hidden treasure. This meant he would stop at nothing until he achieved so. This troublesome stage is a period where santiago is tested to grab his dream before it leaves without him.“I’m not going to charge anything now, but I want one tenth of the treasure if you find it.”This stage was very confusing for Santiago because he didn’t know why or how foreign people knew about his personal legend. Santiago chooses to pursue his legend due to a fortune-seer’s knowledge. This significance of this stage so prominently prone to santiago’s view from the inside, he finally chose to go because he knows that everything happens
He first struggles internally when he wants to understand the dream he is having repeatedly. During the call to adventure in the hero’s journey, Santiago heads to an old gypsy in order to understand the dream he has. However, after listening to the interpretation, Santiago decided to “never again believe in dreams” because the gypsy only told him things he had already known (Coelho 17). This internal struggle, which sets the stage for the rest of Santiago’s struggles, had restrained Santiago for some time because he wasn’t able to pursue his personal legend if he didn’t believe in it, However, he later overcomes this struggle and continues on his path to achieving his personal legend. Santiago struggles internally later when he meets with the chief of a camp in the desert who tells him that he wants to see him turn into the wind. The alchemist, a man Santiago met to help him achieve his personal legend, told the chief that Santiago will be able to turn himself into the wind to show his powers, and if he can’t, “[they’ll] humbly offer [them] [their] lives” (Coelho 145). Santiago has never turned himself into the wind, so he has to dig deeply within in order to find the
"They come in search of new things, but when they leave they are basically the same people they were when they arrived. They climb the mountain to see the castle, and they wind up thinking that the past was better than what we have now. They have blond hair, or dark skin, but basically they're the same as the people who live right here." Santiago’s father is saying that no matter how much Santiago travels, or how much of the world he sees he will come back the same person. Santiago’s father is an important person in his life. Without his father believing in him Santiago might not believe in himself either. Santiago seems to know what he wants in life, but with his father practically telling him it is wrong he might not succeed. Santiago needs others believing in him or he will not have the motivation to succeed in finding the treasure. Not only does Santiago need others believing in him, but he needs to believe in himself as
They travel together to find the treasure. Throughout the journey, Santiago encountered many difficulties and fear was one of them. This is what the alchemist told Santiago, “Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself”(Coelho 134). Fear leads to disbelief towards your dreams. People always see the negativity in action.
Likewise, before Marquez mentions Santiago plan he mentions Santiago was going to die to show the role fate plays in our lives. In addition, Santiago had dreams before the day he died and his mother Placida Linero was good at interpreting other people's dreams but she was unable to interpret her son’s dream accurately. Marquez shows we can not always see our fate by writing, ¨she had a well-earned reputation as an accurate interpreter other people's dreams [...] but she hadn´t noticed any ominous augury in those two dreams of her son´s, or in the other dreams of trees he´d described to her on the morning preceding his death.¨ By providing this vivid detail to the readers Marquez wants to show the power of fate. He shows that even people who think they know what is going to happen have no power over fate. In this case, he shows this through Santiago Nasar mother’s inability to interprete the future of her son. Most of the people in town knew the twin brothers
The Theme of “The Alchemist,” by Paulo Coelho is, always follow your dreams and listen to your heart. At the start of the novel Santiago does not know what he should do when he is confronted by his dream. But by the end of the novel Santiago completely trusts his heart to guide him though life. Santiago’s story shows him learning and living out the theme of the novel.