...s parents had very different plans for their sons future. They anted him to be an engineer and tried to stifle his desires to devote himself to literature. Their intransigence and his discovery of Henry Millers Tropic of Cancer aroused Paulos spirit of rebellion, and he began routinely to flout the family rules. His father took this behaviour as a sign of mental illness and, hen Paulo as seventeen, he tice had him committed to a psychiatric hospital, here Paulo underent several sessions of electroconvulsive therapy.Shortly after this, Paulo became involved ith a theatre group and began orking as a journalist. In the eyes of the comfortably-off middle classes of the time, the theatre as a hotbed of immorality. His frightened parents decided to break their promise not to confine him again and hat him readmitted to hospital for the third time. hen he came out, Paulo as even more lost and more enclosed in his on private orld. In despair, the family called in another doctor ho told them Paulo isnt mad and he shouldnt be in a psychiatric hospital. He simply has to learn ho to face up to life. Thirty years after these experiences, Paulo Coelho rote Veronika Decides to Die.According to Paulo Veronika Decides to Die as published in Brazil in 1998. By September, I had received more than 1,200 e-mails and letters describing similar experiences. In October, some of the subjects discussed in the book - depression, panic attacks, suicide - ere addressed at a conference that ent on to have national repercussions. On 22nd January of the folloing year, Senator Eduardo Suplicy read out some extracts from my book at a plenary session and managed to get approval for a la that had been doing the rounds of the Brazilian Congress for ten years - a la prohibiting arbitrary hospitalisation.After this period, Paulo returned to his studies and it looked as if he as finally going to follo the route his parents had prepared for him. Not long afterards, though, he dropped out and ent back to the theatre. This as in the sixties, and the hippie movement had exploded onto the orld scene. These ne trends took root even in Brazil, ruled at the time by a repressive military regime. Paulo ore his hair long and made a point of never carrying his identity card for a time, he took drugs, anting to live the hippie experience to the full. His passion for riting drove him to start a magazine, of hich only to issues ere ever published.Around this time, the musician and composer, Raul Seixas invited Paulo to rite the ords to his songs. Their second record as a huge success and sold more than 500,000 copies. This as the first time Paulo had earned a large amount of money. Their partnership continued up until 1976. Paulo rote more than sixty songs ith Raul Seixas, and together they changed the Brazilian rock scene.In 1973, Paulo and Raul became part of the Alternative Society, an organization that opposed capitalist ideology, defended the individuals right to do hat he or she pleased, and also practised black magic. He later described these experiences in The Valkyries 1992.During this period, they began publishing Kring-ha, a series of comic strips, calling for more freedom. The dictatorship considered these subversive, and Paulo and Raul ere detained and imprisoned. Raul as soon released, but Paulo as kept in for longer because he as considered to be the brains behind the comic strips. His problems did not end there hoever to days after his release, Paulo as seized as he as alking don the street and taken to a military torture centre here he remained for several days. According to him, he only escaped death by telling them that he as mad and had already been admitted to mental hospitals three times. He started physically harming himself hen his kidnappers ere there in the room, and, in the end, they stopped torturing him and let him go.This experience marked him deeply. At tenty-six, Paulo decided that he had had enough experience of life and anted to be normal. He got a job at the record company, Polygram, here he met the oman ho ould later become his ife.In 1977, they moved to London. Paulo bought a typeriter and started riting, ithout much success. The folloing year, he returned to Brazil, here he orked as an executive for another record company, CBS. This only lasted three months, after hich he separated from his ife and left his job.In 1979, he met up ith an old friend, Christina Oiticica, hom he ould later marry and ith hom he still lives.The couple travelled to Europe here they visited several countries. In Germany they ent to the concentration camp at Dachau. There Paulo had a vision in hich a man appeared to him. To months later, he met that same man in a caf in Amsterdam and spent a long time talking to him and exchanging vies and experiences. The man, hose identity Paulo has never revealed, suggested that he should return to Catholicism. Paulo started studying the symbolic language of Christianity. He also proposed that Paulo should alk the Road to Santiago a medieval pilgrims route beteen France and Spain.In 1987, a year after completing that pilgrimage, Paulo rote his first book, The Pilgrimage The Diary of a Magus. The book describes his experiences during the pilgrimage and his discovery that the extraordinary occurs in the lives of ordinary people. It as published by a smallBrazilian publishing house and, although it received very fe revies, it sold quite ell.In 1988, Paulo rote another, very different book The Alchemist. This as a highly symbolic book, a metaphor of life, hich reflected his eleven years spent studying alchemy. The first edition sold only 900 copies, and the publishing house decided not to reprint.Paulo ould not give up the pursuit of his dream. He got a second chance he found a bigger publishing house, Rocco, that as interested in his ork. In 1990, he published Brida, in hich he rote about the gift that e all carry ithin us. The publication of this book, hich, this time, received plenty of press attention, took The Alchemist and The Pilgrimage to the top of the bestseller lists. The Alchemist ent on to sell more copies than any other book in the history of Brazil, and even made it into the Guinness Book of Records. In 2002, the Portuguese literary revie, Jornal de Letras, the great authority on literature and the Portuguese literary market, declared that The Alchemist had sold more copies than any other book ritten in Portuguese in the entire history of the language.In May 1993, HarperCollins published 50,000 copies of The Alchemist, hich as the largest ever initial print run of a Brazilian book in the United States. At the launch, the executive director of HarperCollins, John Loudon, said It as like getting up at dan and seeing the sun rise hile the rest of the orld still slept. ait until everybody else akes up and sees this too. Paulo as overhelmed by HarperCollins enthusiasm for the book. This is a very special moment for me, he said. His editor ended the launch by saying I h...
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