News on the Alchemist
Frankfurt (Reuters) – Paulo Coelho ranks with JK Rowling and John Grisham as one of the world’s most successful writers and now Hollywood is at last bringing his cult classic “The Alchemist” to the silver screen.
The Brazilian author believes that “Matrix” star Laurence Fishburne will do justice to the book, the tale of an Andalusian shepherd who takes to the desert in search of treasure.
“I am confident he can make a good movie. He is directing, he wrote the screenplay and he is acting as the Alchemist,” Coelho told Reuters at the Frankfurt Book Fair where he is publicising his erotic new novel “Eleven Minutes”.
Coelho, who met Fishburne in London, said: “He is a nice guy and very sensitive. He is a person that I really trust.”
British actor Jeremy Irons and U.S. pop icon Madonna also play leading roles in the film, which has an $80 million (48 million pounds) budget.
Warner Bros Pictures plans to start filming in Jordan by the end of this year for scheduled release in 2004.
The bearded Brazilian author has climbed steadily to reach the rarefied ranks of multimillion-selling novelists.
The first edition of the Alchemist in 1998 sold only 900 copies and its publisher decided not to reprint. But a larger publisher picked it up two years later.
“At the end of the day it is a mystery — how can I sell 55 million copies in so many countries and have such a faithful readership,” he asked.
But the 56-year-old writer is certainly no shrinking violet about the statistics.
“They made some research about two years ago. I was in third place. Rowling was in first place, the second was Grisham and I was third. I think that I am now probably selling more than John Grisham.”
“Coelhomania” erupted among his devoted fans who queued for up to six hours in Berlin and London at recent signing sessions.
Celebrity fans abound. Of “The Alchemist,” Madonna said: “It is a beautiful book about magic, dreams and the treasures we seek elsewhere and then find on our doorstep.”
But critics have torn into his “mind, body and spirit” literature, saying he spouts trite and simplistic truisms about finding your inner path. “Spiritual twaddle,” wrote one British critic.
Coelho is unperturbed. “I read critics but I don’t listen to them. But I am glad they exist because they provoke me and they provoke my readers.
“They are tough but I am tough also. An angry, polemical reaction is always a compliment. Otherwise it would be a no man’s land.”
His latest book is called “Eleven Minutes” because its heroine, a Brazilian prostitute working in Switzerland, calculated that is how long sex takes on average.
The book, inspired by the manuscript left at his hotel once by a prostitute working in Europe, certainly does not hold back on the steamy and sado-masochistic sex.
But Coelho is well pleased with the results — “I have never had such a reaction from my readers — it was very positive.”
Source: Paul Majendie/Reuters