Paulo Coelho: The Life Story

This Brazilian author has sold 35 million copies of The Alchemist and which has evolved into one of the most translated books in the world. This Brazilian author was told that his passion could not be achieved, because his parents believed that it would not get very far in Brazil. He started law school but then dropped out and started traveling, when coming back home he had begun writing pop and rock music lyrics with a well known Brazilian singer-songwriter Raul Seixas.

After awhile Coelho went to Spain and took a spiritual walk on the Santiago de Compostela, a road used in the Middle Ages by pilgrims that were traveling from France to Spain. This long journey had then inspired him to write his first book. Paul Coelho was born on August 24, 1947, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Being raised by devout Catholics, he attended Jesuit schools. He decided that he wanted to become a writer in his earlier years, but his parents had discouraged it seeing no future of it in Brazil.

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He was admitted into a mental asylum three times for going against his Catholic upbringing starting when he was 17.

He went to jail 3 times for political activism to which he was subjected torture.

He wrote a book called Hell Archives in 1982, but it was not very well received His second book, The Alchemist, established him as a major author on the international level and has been translated into 80 different languages. This book was written in 1987, one year after he had written his first book The Pilgrimage.

At first, the book attracted little attention until it was translated to French, to where it became a worldwide phenomenon in the early 1990s. He founded the Paulo Coelho Institute in 1996 which provides aid to impoverished children and elderly people.

Was presented with the World Economic Forum Crystal Award in 1999.In 2003, Reuters ranked him one of the 3 most successful writers in the world.The President of Bulgaria presented him with “The Honorable Award of the President of the Republic' in May 2006.

He has written up to 30 books and continues to write a book every two years. People believe that Coelho's books are inspiring and life-changing. Coelho says, 'When I write a book I write a book for myself; the reaction is up to the reader,' he says. 'It's not my business whether people like or dislike it.' I believe that his thinking is correct and that it does not matter whether people like or dislike what I have made. Technically he did not have to publish his book out into the world, but he did it anyway. Why? because he believed that people would like to know his thoughts after his spiritual journey. He relates to this day in time by being brave and spontaneous like most famous people are.