Hero's Journey In The Alchemist

Every fairy story, except some special ones, always recount about the “hero’s journey” In Paulo Coelho’s book The Alchemist, Santiago portrays the common hero and his journey to complete his date with destiny. Paulo Coelho specifically shaped his book around a hero’s journey so that the reader would be able to understand the journey of Santiago with self-awareness and self-knowledge. Paulo Coelho followed these common story traits so that the reader can see their reflection in the character being portrayed, because the hero’s journey is easy to identify and the idea of collective unconscious is easy to follow. A hero is most often male, is poor, always judged by his actions, and is prepared to die for his ideals which is Santiago. Santiago is a shepherd and is currently infatuated with the daughter of a merchant that he sells wool to. Sadly, Santiago is too poor to marry the merchant’s daughter. The …show more content…
He meets the English man who was trying to find the Alchemist in the desert. His personal legend was to find the alchemist and he did achieve it. He goes through the desert with the caravan. Then the hero meets the third mentor which is the Alchemist. While in the desert, Santiago goes through a complete metamorphosis. Santiago begins to listen to his heart; he gains the ability to commune with the universe, and finds the love of his life. But as soon as Santiago meets his love the trials begin, the first being to leave his love to finish his personal legend. The second trial requires Santiago to use the universal language and commune with the collective conscious in order to turn himself into the wind and save himself. 【include why the turning into wind was so transformative for Santiago, the death and rebirth】 The third and last trial for Santiago is to hold onto faith; faith that as long as he keeps digging he with find his treasure. However he at last know that the treasure was under the church in Spain where he started his