A Warrior's Life Part 15

For the launch of The Devil and Miss Prym The Devil and Miss Prym 4,000 invitations were sent out. The size of the crowd meant that the organizers of the event had to increase the security and support services. At the insistence of the author, one thousand plastic gla.s.ses of iced mineral water were distributed among those present, and he regretted that he could not do as he had in France, and serve French champagne. 4,000 invitations were sent out. The size of the crowd meant that the organizers of the event had to increase the security and support services. At the insistence of the author, one thousand plastic gla.s.ses of iced mineral water were distributed among those present, and he regretted that he could not do as he had in France, and serve French champagne.

To everyone's surprise, the Brazilian critics reacted well to The Devil and Miss Prym The Devil and Miss Prym. 'At the age of fifty-three, Paulo Coelho has produced his most accomplished work yet, with a story that arouses the reader's curiosity and creates genuine tension,' wrote the reviewer in the magazine epoca epoca. One of the exceptions was the astrologist Bia Abramo, in the Folha de So Paulo Folha de So Paulo, who was asked by the newspaper to write a review. 'Like his other books, The Devil and Miss Prym The Devil and Miss Prym seems to be a well-worn parable,' she wrote, 'that could have been told in three paragraphs, like the various little anecdotes that tend to fill his narratives.' seems to be a well-worn parable,' she wrote, 'that could have been told in three paragraphs, like the various little anecdotes that tend to fill his narratives.'

Any careful observer of the author at this time would have realized that his energies were focused not on the critics but on being given a chair in the Brazilian Academy. Paulo had no illusions and he knew, from someone else who had been rejected as a candidate, that 'it's easier to be elected as a state governor than to enter the Academy'. It was well known that some of the thirty-nine academicians despised him and his work. 'I tried to read one of his books and couldn't get beyond page eight,' the author Rachel de Queiroz, a distant cousin, told newspapers, to which the author replied that none of his books even started on page eight. The respected Christian thinker Candido Mendes, rector and owner of the Universidade Candido Mendes (where Paulo had almost obtained a degree in law), gave an even harsher evaluation: I have read all his books from cover to cover, from back to front, which comes to the same thing. Paulo Coelho has already had more glory heaped on him in France than Santos Dumont. But he's not really from here: he's from the global world of facile thinking and of ignorance transformed into a kind of sub-magic. Our very pleasant little sorcerer serves this domesticated, toothless imagination. This subculture disguised as wealth has found its perfect author. It isn't a text but a product from a convenience store.

Convinced that these views were not shared by the majority of the other thirty-seven electors in the Academy, Paulo did not respond to these provocative comments and went ahead with his plan. He courted the leaders of the several groups and subgroups into which the house was divided, lunched and dined with academics, and never missed the launch of a book by one of the 'immortals', as the members of the Academy are known. At the launch of his novel Saraminda Saraminda, Jose Sarney, who was also a favourite target of the critics, posed smiling for the photographers as he signed Paulo's copy, Paulo being the most sought-after by the hundreds of readers queuing to receive a dedication. The fact is that his objective had soon become an open secret. At the end of the year, the celebrated novelist Carlos Heitor Cony, who held seat 3 at the Academy, wrote in the Folha do Sul Folha do Sul: I wrote an article about the contempt with which the critics treat the singer Roberto Carlos and the writer Paulo Coelho. I think it's a miracle that the two have survived, because if they had been dependent on the media, they would be living under a bridge, begging and cursing the world. That isn't quite how it is. Each one has a faithful public, they take no notice of the critics, they simply get on with life, they don't retaliate and, when they can, they help others. I am a personal friend of Paulo Coelho, and he knows he can count on my vote at the Academy. I admire his character, his n.o.bility in not attacking anyone and in making the most of the success he has achieved with dignity.

From the moment the idea of competing for a chair at the Academy entered his head, Coelho had nurtured a secret dream: to occupy chair number 23, whose first occupant had been Machado de a.s.sis, the greatest of all Brazilian writers and founder of the Academy. The problem was that the occupant of this chair was the academic whom Paulo most loved, admired and praised, Jorge Amado. This meant that every time the matter came up he had to be careful what he said: 'Since the chair I want belongs to Jorge, I only hope to put myself forward when I am really old,' he would say, 'because I want him to live for many many more years.'

Already eighty-eight, Jorge Amado had suffered a heart attack in 1993 and, in the years that followed, he was admitted to hospital several times. In June 2001, he was taken into a hospital in Salvador with infections in the kidneys and right lung, but recovered sufficiently to be able to celebrate at home with his family the fortieth anniversary of his election to the Academy. However, only three weeks later, on the afternoon of 6 August, the family let it be known that Jorge Amado had just died. Chair number 23 was vacant. The news reached Coelho that night via a short phone call from the journalist and academic Murilo Melo Filho: 'Jorge Amado has died. Your time has come.'

Paulo was filled by strange and contradictory feelings: as well as feeling excited at the thought of standing as a candidate for the Academy, he was genuinely saddened by the death of someone who had been not only one of his idols but also both a friend and faithful ally. However, this was no time for sentimentality. Paulo realized that the race for a chair in the Academy began even before the lilies had withered on the coffin of the deceased inc.u.mbent. His first campaign phone call met with disappointment, though. When he called the professor and journalist Arnaldo Niskier, who occupied chair number 18 and was one of the first to have learned, months earlier, of Paulo's intentions, Niskier poured cold water on the idea. 'I don't think it's the right moment,' Niskier told him. 'It looks as if Zelia is going to put herself forward, and if that happens the Academy is sure to vote in her favour.' Zelia was the writer Zelia Gattai, Jorge Amado's widow, who had decided to compete for her late husband's chair.

Alongside the many obituaries, the following morning, the newspapers announced the names of no fewer than five candidates: Zelia, Paulo, the astronomer Ronaldo Rogerio de Freitas Mouro, the humourist Jo Soares and the journalist Joel Silveira. When taking his daily walk along the promenade above Copacabana beach, Coelho heard one of the few voices capable of convincing him to door not dosomething: that of Chris. With her customary gentleness, she said that she had a bad feeling about the compet.i.tion: 'Paulo, I don't think you're going to win.'

This was enough for him to give up the idea. His candidature, which had not even been formally registered, had lasted less than twelve hours. Paulo sent a fax to Zelia expressing his sorrow at her husband's death, packed his bags and left with Chris for the south of France. The couple were going to fulfil their old dream of spending part of the year in Europe, and the place they had chosen was a region near Lourdes. One of the reasons for the trip was to look for a house to buy. While they were still hunting, their address in France was the modest but welcoming Henri IV hotel in the small city of Tarbes.

On Tuesday, 9 October, the two were in Odos, a small village 5 kilometres from Saint-Martin, where some months later they would choose to settle. As though tempted by the Devil whom he had long ago driven away, Coelho had decided to add to his property portfolio something more suited to a rock star than to a man of almost monastic habits (a millionaire monk, that is): a castle. The castle the couple had their eye on was Chateau d'Odos, where Marguerite de Valois, or Margot, the wife of Henri IV, had lived and died. However, the whole affair came to nothing 'If I bought a castle,' he said to a journalist, 'I wouldn't possess it, it would possess me.' That afternoon, he left Chris in the hotel in Tarbes and took a train to Pau, where he boarded a flight to Monte Carlo, where he was to be a member of the film festival jury. In the evening, he was having a coffee with the director Sydney Pollack, when his mobile rang.

On the other end he heard the voice of Arnaldo Niskier: 'Roberto Campos has just died. May I give the secretary of the Academy the signed letter you left with me putting your name forward for the first position available?'

'If you think it's the right time, yes.'

On his return to France a few days later, he stopped off at the chapel of Notre Dame de Pietat, in the small town of Barbazan-Debat, and made a silent prayer: 'Help me get into the Brazilian Academy of Letters.'

A few hours later, in his hotel room in Tarbes, he gave a long interview over the telephone to the reporter Marcelo Camacho, of the Jornal do Brasil Jornal do Brasil, an interview that began with the obvious question: 'Is it true that you're a candidate for the Brazilian Academy of Letters?'

He replied without hesitation: 'Absolutely.'

And the next day's Jornal do Brasil Jornal do Brasil devoted the front page of its arts section to the scoop. In the interview, Coelho explained the reasons for his candidature ('a desire to be a colleague of such special people'); dismissed his critics ('if what I wrote wasn't any good my readers would have abandoned me a long time ago, all over the world'); and vehemently condemned George W. Bush's foreign policy ('What the United States is doing in Afghanistan is an act of terror, that's the only word for it, an act of terror'). The campaign for the vacant chair was official, but Coelho told the journalist that, because of a very full international programme, he would not be back in Brazil for another two months, in December, when he would carry out the ritual of visits to each of the thirty-nine electors. This delay was irrelevant, because the election had been set for March 2002, following the Academy's end-of-year recess. devoted the front page of its arts section to the scoop. In the interview, Coelho explained the reasons for his candidature ('a desire to be a colleague of such special people'); dismissed his critics ('if what I wrote wasn't any good my readers would have abandoned me a long time ago, all over the world'); and vehemently condemned George W. Bush's foreign policy ('What the United States is doing in Afghanistan is an act of terror, that's the only word for it, an act of terror'). The campaign for the vacant chair was official, but Coelho told the journalist that, because of a very full international programme, he would not be back in Brazil for another two months, in December, when he would carry out the ritual of visits to each of the thirty-nine electors. This delay was irrelevant, because the election had been set for March 2002, following the Academy's end-of-year recess.

In the weeks that followed, two other candidates appeared: the political scientist Helio Jaguaribe and the ex-diplomat Mario Gibson Barbosa. Both were octogenarians and each had his strong and weak points. The presence in the compet.i.tion of one of the most widely read authors in the world attracted the kind of interest that the Academy rarely aroused. The foreign media mobilized their correspondents in Brazil to cover the contest. In a long, sardonic article published by the New York Times New York Times, the correspondent Larry Rother attributed to the Academy the power to 'transform obscure and aged essayists, poets and philosophers into celebrities who are almost as revered as soccer players, actors or pop stars'. Rother included statements from supporters of Coelho such as Arnaldo Niskier ('he is the Pele of Brazilian literature'), and added: Mr Coelho's public image is not that of a staid academic who enjoys the pomp of the Thursday afternoon teas for which the Academy is famous. He began his career as a rock 'n' roll songwriter, has admitted that he was heavily into drugs at that time, spent brief periods in a mental inst.i.tution as an adolescent and, perhaps worst of all, refuses to apologize for his overwhelming commercial success. Brazilian society 'demands excellence in this house', the novelist Nelida Pinon, a former president of the Academy, said in the newspaper O Globo O Globo in what was interpreted as a slap at Mr Coelho's popularity. 'We can't let the market dictate aesthetics.' in what was interpreted as a slap at Mr Coelho's popularity. 'We can't let the market dictate aesthetics.'

Ignoring all the intrigues, Paulo did what he had to do. He wrote letters, visited all the academicians (with the exception of Padre Fernando avila, who told him curtly that this would not be necessary) and received much spontaneous support, such as that of Carlos Heitor Cony and ex-president Sarney. On the day of the election, involving four successive ballots, none of the three candidates obtained the minimum nineteen votes required under the rules. As tradition directed, the president burned the votes in a bronze urn, announced that chair number 21 was still unoccupied and called for further elections to be held on 25 July.

That evening, some hours after the announcement of the result of the first round, a group of 'immortals' appeared at Paulo's house to offer the customary condolences. One of themCoelho cannot remember precisely whosaid: It was very good of you to put yourself forward as a candidate, and our short time together has been most enjoyable. Perhaps on another occasion you could try again.

Since he had received a modest ten votes as opposed to the sixteen given to Jaguaribe, the group was somewhat taken aback by their host's immediate reaction: 'I'm not going to wait for another opportunity. I'm going to register my candidature tomorrow. I'm going to stand again.'

It's likely that the date of the new election was of no significance to the majority of the academicians, but Coelho saw in it an unmistakable sign that he should put himself forward as a candidate: 25 July is the feast day of St James of Compostela, the patron saint of the pilgrimage that had changed his life. Nevertheless there was no harm in asking for confirmation from the old and, in his opinion, infallible I Ching. He threw the three coins of the oracle several times, but they always gave the same result: the hexagram of the cauldron, synonymous with certain victory. The I Ching had also made a strange recommendation: 'Go travelling and don't come back for a while.' He did as he was told.

Paulo flew to France, installed himself in the hotel in Tarbes and for the following three months conducted his campaign with mobile phone and notebook in hand. When he arrived, he saw on the Internet that he was only going to have one opponent in the contest: Helio Jaguaribe. Christina recalls being surprised by Paulo's self-confidence: 'I discovered that Paulo had negotiating skills about which I knew nothing. His sangfroid in taking decisions and talking to people was a side of him I didn't know.'

Although many of Paulo's supporters thought it risky to run his campaign from a distance, the I Ching insisted: 'Do not return.' The pressure to return to Brazil grew stronger, but he remained immovable. 'My sixth sense was telling me not to go back,' the writer recalls, 'and faced by a choice between my sixth sense and the academicians, I chose the former.' But the campaign began to get serious when one of his supporters started canva.s.sing votes during the Thursday afternoon teas using a seductive argument: 'I'm going to vote for Paulo Coelho because the corn is good.' In the jargon of the Academy, 'good corn' was a metaphor used to refer to candidates who, once elected, could bring both prestige and material benefits to the inst.i.tution. From that point of view, the 'immortal' argued, the author of The Alchemist The Alchemist was very good corn indeed. There was not only his indisputable international fame, evidenced by the extraordinary interest in the election shown by the foreign media: what softened even the most hardened of hearts was the fact that the millionaire Paulo Coelho had no children, something which fuelled the hope that, on his death, he might choose the Academy as one of his heirsas other childless academicians had in the past. was very good corn indeed. There was not only his indisputable international fame, evidenced by the extraordinary interest in the election shown by the foreign media: what softened even the most hardened of hearts was the fact that the millionaire Paulo Coelho had no children, something which fuelled the hope that, on his death, he might choose the Academy as one of his heirsas other childless academicians had in the past.

Unaware that there were people with an eye on the wealth it had cost him such effort and energy to acc.u.mulate, three weeks before the election, Coelho returned to Rio de Janeiro. There, contrary to what the oracles had been telling him, he was not greeted with good news. His opponent's campaign had gained ground during his absence and even some voters whom he had considered to be 'his' were threatening to change sides.

On the evening of 25 July 2002, the photographers, reporters and cameramen crowding round the door of the building in Avenida Atlantica in Copacabana were invited up to the ninth floor to drink a gla.s.s of French champagne with the owners of the apartment: Paulo had just been elected by twenty-two votes to fifteen. Jaguaribe appeared not to have taken in his defeat, and was not exactly magnanimous when expressing his dismay at the result. 'With the election of Paulo Coelho, the Academy is celebrating the success of marketing,' he moaned. 'His sole merit lies in his ability to sell books.' To one journalist who wanted to know whether he would be putting his name forward again, Jaguaribe was adamant: 'The Academy holds no interest for me any more.' Three years later, though, once he had got over the shock, he returned and was elected to the chair left vacant by the economist Celso Furtado. A year after that, it was the turn of Celso Lafer, the foreign minister, who took the chair left vacant by Miguel Reale.

If, in fact, any of the 'immortals' really had voted for Paulo Coelho in the hope that 'the corn' would be good, they would have been bitterly disappointed. In the first place, the international spotlight that followed him around never once lit up the Academy, for the simple reason that he has attended only six of the more than two hundred sessions held in the Academy since his election, which makes him the number one absentee. Those who dreamed that a percentage of his royalties would flow into the Academy's coffers were also in for a disappointment. In his will, which Paulo has amended three times since his election, there is no reference to the Academy.

Enjoying a honeymoon period following his victory, and being hailed by an article in the weekly American Newsweek Newsweek as 'the first pop artist of Brazilian literature to enter the Academy, the house which, for the past 105 years, has been the bastion of the Portuguese language and a fortress of refined taste and intellectual hauteur', Coelho began to write his speech and prepare for his invest.i.ture, which was set for 28 October. He decided to go to Brasilia in person to give President Fernando Henrique his invitation to his inauguration. He was cordially received at Pla.n.a.lto Palace, and was told that the President had appointments in his diary for that day, but would send a representative. While waiting for his plane at Brasilia airport, he visited the bookshop there and saw several of his books on displayall of them produced by Editora Rocco and not one by Objetiva. At that moment, he began to consider leaving Objetiva and going back to his previous publisher. as 'the first pop artist of Brazilian literature to enter the Academy, the house which, for the past 105 years, has been the bastion of the Portuguese language and a fortress of refined taste and intellectual hauteur', Coelho began to write his speech and prepare for his invest.i.ture, which was set for 28 October. He decided to go to Brasilia in person to give President Fernando Henrique his invitation to his inauguration. He was cordially received at Pla.n.a.lto Palace, and was told that the President had appointments in his diary for that day, but would send a representative. While waiting for his plane at Brasilia airport, he visited the bookshop there and saw several of his books on displayall of them produced by Editora Rocco and not one by Objetiva. At that moment, he began to consider leaving Objetiva and going back to his previous publisher.

At the inaugural ceremony, the guests wore black tie while the academicians wore the uniform of the house, an olive-green gold-embroidered cashmere jacket. To complete the outfit, the 'immortals' also wore a velvet hat adorned with white feathers and, at their waist, a golden sword. Valued at US$26,250, the uniform used by Paulo had been paid for, as tradition decreed, by the Prefecture of Rio, the city where he was born. Among the hundreds of guests invited to celebrate the new 'immortal' were Paulo's Brazilian publishers, Roberto Feith and Paulo Rocco. The polite remarks they exchanged gave no hint of the conflict to come. The episode in the bookshop at Brasilia airport had brought to the surface concerns that had, in fact, been growing for a while. Something similar had occurred some months earlier, when Paulo's agent Monica, on holiday with her husband yvind in Brazil, decided to extend their trip to Natal, in Rio Grande do Norte. Monica discovered that there were no books by Coelho on sale anywhere in the capital of Rio Grande (which at the time had more than six hundred thousand inhabitants), not even in the bookshop in the city's international airport.

However, the author had far more substantial reasons to be concerned. According to his calculations, during the period between 1996 and 2000 (when Objetiva launched The Fifth Mountain The Fifth Mountain, Veronika Veronika and and The Devil and Miss Prym The Devil and Miss Prym), he had lost no fewer than 100,000 readers. The book whose sales he used as a reference point for this conclusion was not his blockbuster The Alchemist The Alchemist but but By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept, which was the last book published by Rocco before his move to Objetiva. What he really wanted to do was to leave Objetiva immediately and go back to Rocco; there was, however, a problem: the typescript of his next novel, Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes, was already in the hands of Objetiva and Roberto Feith had already suggested small changes to which the author had agreed.

As so often before, though, Paulo let the I Ching have the last word. Four days after taking his place in the Academy, he posed two questions: 'What would happen if I published my next book, Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes, with Editora Objetiva?' and 'What would happen if I published my next book and my entire backlist with Rocco?' When the three coins had been thrown, the answer didn't appear to be as precise as the questions: 'Preponderance of the small. Perseverance furthers. Small things may be done; great things should not be done. The flying bird brings the message: It is not well to strive upward, it is well to remain below. Great good fortune.' On reading this response, most people would probably have been as confused as ever, but for Paulo Coelho the oracle was as clear as day: after seven years and four books, the time had come to leave Objetiva and return to Rocco.

Annoyed by the news of the change, and particularly by the author's decision to take with him a book that was ready for printing, Roberto Feith decided that he would only release the typescript of Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes if Objetiva were reimbursed for the production costs. Paulo saw this as a threat and unsheathed his sword: he took on a large law firm in Rio and prepared for a long and painful legal battle. He announced that he was going back to Roccothe publisher who, he stated, would launch if Objetiva were reimbursed for the production costs. Paulo saw this as a threat and unsheathed his sword: he took on a large law firm in Rio and prepared for a long and painful legal battle. He announced that he was going back to Roccothe publisher who, he stated, would launch Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes during the first few months of 2003and left for Tarbes with Chris, leaving the Brazilian publishing market seething with rumours. Some said that he had left Objetiva out of pique, because Luis Fernando Verissimo was now their main author. Others said that Rocco had offered him US$350,000 to return. during the first few months of 2003and left for Tarbes with Chris, leaving the Brazilian publishing market seething with rumours. Some said that he had left Objetiva out of pique, because Luis Fernando Verissimo was now their main author. Others said that Rocco had offered him US$350,000 to return.

Things only began to calm down when Chris, on her daily walk with Paulo, advised him to bring an end to the conflict with Feith. 'It looks as though you want a fight more than he does! What for? Why?' she asked. 'Do what you can to see that it ends amicably.' After some resistance, Paulo finally gave in. He stopped in front of a crucifix and asked G.o.d to remove the hatred from his heart. A few weeks later, after some discussion between representatives of the two parties, Feith not only released Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes but also returned to Paulo the four t.i.tles in his backlist that Paulo wanted to go to Rocco. There was just one point on which the owner of Objetiva dug in his heels: he refused to allow the insertion of his suggestions in the Rocco edition and in any foreign versions. This obliged Monica to take back the copies of the text that had already been sent to translators in several countries. The problem had been resolved, but Coelho and Feith haven't spoken to each other since. but also returned to Paulo the four t.i.tles in his backlist that Paulo wanted to go to Rocco. There was just one point on which the owner of Objetiva dug in his heels: he refused to allow the insertion of his suggestions in the Rocco edition and in any foreign versions. This obliged Monica to take back the copies of the text that had already been sent to translators in several countries. The problem had been resolved, but Coelho and Feith haven't spoken to each other since.

The book that had caused the uproar had its origins some years earlier, in 1997, in Mantua, in the north of Italy, where Coelho had given a lecture. When he arrived at his hotel, he found an envelope that had been left by a Brazilian named Sonia, a reader and fan who had emigrated to Europe in order to work as a prost.i.tute. The packet contained the typescript of a book in which she told her story. Although he normally never read such typescripts, Coelho read it, liked it and suggested it to Objectiva for publication. The publisher, however, wasn't interested. When Sonia met him again three years later in Zurich, where she was living at the time, she organized a book signing such as probably no other writer has ever experienced: she took him to Langstra.s.se, a street where, after ten at night, the pavement teems with prost.i.tutes from all parts of the world. Told of Coelho's presence in the area, dozens of them appeared bearing dog-eared copies of his books in different languages, the majority of which, the author noted, came from countries that had been part of the former Soviet Union. Since she also worked in Geneva, Sonia suggested a repet.i.tion of this extraordinary event in the red light district there. That was where he met a Brazilian prost.i.tute whom he called Maria and whose life story was to provide the narrative for Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes: the story of a young girl from northeastern Brazil who is brought to Europe in order, she thinks, to be a nightclub dancer, but who, on arriving, discovers that she is to be a prost.i.tute. For the author, this was 'not a book about prost.i.tution or about the misfortunes of a prost.i.tute, but about a person in search of her s.e.xual ident.i.ty. It is about the complicated relationship between feelings and physical pleasure.'

The t.i.tle he chose for the 255-page book is a paraphrase of Seven Minutes Seven Minutes, the 1969 best-seller in which Irving Wallace describes a court case involving an attempt to ban a novel about s.e.x. Seven minutes, according to Wallace, was the average time taken to perform a s.e.xual act. When Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes was published in the United States, a reporter from was published in the United States, a reporter from USA Today USA Today asked Paulo why he had added four minutes. With a chuckle, he replied that the American's estimate reflected an Anglo-Saxon point of view and was therefore 'too conservative by Latin standards'. asked Paulo why he had added four minutes. With a chuckle, he replied that the American's estimate reflected an Anglo-Saxon point of view and was therefore 'too conservative by Latin standards'.

Eleven Minutes was launched in Brazil during the first quarter of 2003 and was received by the media with their customary ironyso much so that a month before its launch the author predicted the critics' reaction in an interview given to was launched in Brazil during the first quarter of 2003 and was received by the media with their customary ironyso much so that a month before its launch the author predicted the critics' reaction in an interview given to Istoe Istoe: 'How do I know that the critics aren't going to like it? It's simple. You can't loathe an author for ten of his books and love him for the eleventh.' As well as not liking Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes, many journalists predicted that it would be the author's first big flop. According to several critics, the risque theme of the book, which talks of oral s.e.x, c.l.i.toral and v.a.g.i.n.al o.r.g.a.s.ms, and sadom.a.s.o.c.h.i.s.tic practices, was too explosive a mixture for what they imagined to be Paulo Coelho's average reader. Exactly the opposite happened. Before the initial print run of 200,000 copies had even arrived in Brazilian bookshops in April 2003, Sant Jordi had sold the book to more than twenty foreign publishers after negotiations that earned the author US$6 million. Three weeks after its launch, Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes was top of the best-seller lists in Brazil, Italy and Germany. The launch of the English edition attracted 2,000 people to Borders bookshop in London. As had been the case with the ten previous books, his readers in Brazil and the rest of the world gave unequivocal proof that they loved his eleventh book as well. was top of the best-seller lists in Brazil, Italy and Germany. The launch of the English edition attracted 2,000 people to Borders bookshop in London. As had been the case with the ten previous books, his readers in Brazil and the rest of the world gave unequivocal proof that they loved his eleventh book as well. Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes went on to become Paulo Coelho's second-most-read book, with 10 million copies sold, losing out only to the una.s.sailable went on to become Paulo Coelho's second-most-read book, with 10 million copies sold, losing out only to the una.s.sailable Alchemist Alchemist.

CHAPTER 29.

The Zahir PAULO AND CHRIS spent the first few months of 2004 working on making the old mill they had bought in Saint-Martin habitable. The plan to spend four months there, four in Brazil and four travelling had been scuppered by the suggested programme Monica had sent at the beginning of the year. Sant Jordi had been overwhelmed by no fewer than 187 invitations for Paulo to present prizes and partic.i.p.ate in events, signings, conferences and launches all over the world. If he were to agree to even half of those requests there would be no time for anything elsenot even his next book, which was just beginning to preoccupy him. spent the first few months of 2004 working on making the old mill they had bought in Saint-Martin habitable. The plan to spend four months there, four in Brazil and four travelling had been scuppered by the suggested programme Monica had sent at the beginning of the year. Sant Jordi had been overwhelmed by no fewer than 187 invitations for Paulo to present prizes and partic.i.p.ate in events, signings, conferences and launches all over the world. If he were to agree to even half of those requests there would be no time for anything elsenot even his next book, which was just beginning to preoccupy him.

He had been working on the story in his head during the second half of the year, at the end of which time just two weeks were enough for him to set down on paper the 318 pages of O Zahir O Zahir, or The Zahir The Zahir, the t.i.tle of which had been inspired by a story by Jorge Luis Borges about something which, once touched or seen, would never be forgotten. The nameless main character, who is easily recognizable, is an ex-rock star turned world-famous writer, loathed by the critics and adored by his readers. He lives in Paris with a war correspondent, Esther. The narrative begins with the character's horror when he finds out that she has left him. Written at the end of 2004, in March of the following year, the book was ready to be launched in Brazil and several other countries.

However, before it was discovered by readers around the world, Brazilians included, The Zahir The Zahir was to be the subject of a somewhat surprising operation: it was to be published first in, of all places, Tehran, capital of Iran, where Coelho was the most widely read foreign author. This was a tactic by the young publisher Arash Hejazi to defeat local piracy which, while not on the same alarming scale as in Egypt, was carried out with such impunity that twenty-seven different editions of was to be the subject of a somewhat surprising operation: it was to be published first in, of all places, Tehran, capital of Iran, where Coelho was the most widely read foreign author. This was a tactic by the young publisher Arash Hejazi to defeat local piracy which, while not on the same alarming scale as in Egypt, was carried out with such impunity that twenty-seven different editions of The Alchemist The Alchemist alone had been identified, all of them pirate copies as far as the author was concerned, but none of them illegal, because Iran is not a signatory to the international agreements on the protection of authors' rights. The total absence of any legislation to suppress the clandestine book industry was due to a peculiarity in the law, which only protects works whose first edition is printed, published and launched in the country. In order to guarantee his publishing house, Caravan, the right to be the sole publisher of alone had been identified, all of them pirate copies as far as the author was concerned, but none of them illegal, because Iran is not a signatory to the international agreements on the protection of authors' rights. The total absence of any legislation to suppress the clandestine book industry was due to a peculiarity in the law, which only protects works whose first edition is printed, published and launched in the country. In order to guarantee his publishing house, Caravan, the right to be the sole publisher of The Zahir The Zahir in the country, Hejazi suggested that Monica change the programme of international launches so that the first edition could appear in bookshops in Iran. in the country, Hejazi suggested that Monica change the programme of international launches so that the first edition could appear in bookshops in Iran.

Some days after the book was published, it faced problems from the government. The bad news was conveyed in a telephone call from Hejazi to the author, who was with Monica in the Hotel Gellert in Budapest. Speaking from a public call box in order to foil the censors who might be bugging his phone, the terrified thirty-five-year-old publisher told Coelho that the Caravan stand at the International Book Fair in Iran had just been invaded by a group from the Basejih, the regime's 'morality police'. The officers had confiscated 1,000 copies of The Zahir The Zahir, announced that the book was banned and ordered him to appear two days later at the censor's office.

Both publisher and author were in agreement as to how best to confront such violence and ensure Hejazi's physical safety: they should tell the international public. Coelho made calls to two or three journalist friends, the first he could get hold of, and the BBC in London and France Presse immediately broadcast the news, which then travelled around the world. This reaction appears to have frightened off the authorities, because, a few days later, the books were returned without any explanation and the ban lifted. It was understandable that a repressive and moralistic state such as Iran should have a problem with a book that deals with adulterous relationships. What was surprising was that the hand of repression should touch someone as popular in the country as Paulo Coelho, who was publicly hailed as 'the first non-Muslim writer to visit Iran since the ayatollahs came to power'that is, since 1979.

In fact, Coelho had visited the country in May 2000 as the guest of President Mohamed Khatami, who was masterminding a very tentative process of political liberalization. When they landed in Tehran, and even though it was three in the morning, Paulo and Chris (who was wearing a wedding ring on her left hand and had been duly informed of the strictures imposed on women in Islamic countries) were greeted by a crowd of more than a thousand readers who had learned of the arrival of the author of The Alchemist The Alchemist from the newspapers. It was just before the new government was about to take office and the political situation was tense. The streets of the capital were filled every day with student demonstrations in support of Khatami's reforms, which were facing strong opposition from the conservative clerics who hold the real power in the country. Although accompanied everywhere by a dozen or so Brazilian and foreign journalists, Coelho was never far from the watchful eyes of the six security guards armed with machine guns who had been a.s.signed to him. After giving five lectures and various book signings for from the newspapers. It was just before the new government was about to take office and the political situation was tense. The streets of the capital were filled every day with student demonstrations in support of Khatami's reforms, which were facing strong opposition from the conservative clerics who hold the real power in the country. Although accompanied everywhere by a dozen or so Brazilian and foreign journalists, Coelho was never far from the watchful eyes of the six security guards armed with machine guns who had been a.s.signed to him. After giving five lectures and various book signings for Brida Brida, with an audience of never fewer than a thousand, he was honoured by the Minister of Culture, Ataolah Mohajerani, with a gala dinner where the place of honour was occupied by no less a person than President Khatami. When the seventy-year-old Iranian novelist Mahmoud Dolatabadi turned down an invitation to be present at the banquet given in honour of his Brazilian colleague, of whom he was a self-confessed admirer, he referred to the limitations and the fragility of Khatami's liberalization process. Hounded by the government, he refused to fraternize with its censors. 'I cannot be interrogated in the morning,' he told the reporters, 'and in the evening have coffee with the president.'

Some weeks after The Zahir The Zahir's publication in Iran, 8 million copies of the book, translated into forty-two languages, arrived in bookshops in eighty-three countries. When it was launched in Europe, the novel came to the attention of the newspapersnot in the political pages, as had been the case with the Iranian censorship, but in the gossip columns. In the spring of 2005, a question had been going round the press offices of the European media: who was the inspiration behind the book's main female character, Esther? The first suspect, put forward by the Moscow tabloid Komsomolskaia Pravda Komsomolskaia Pravda, was the beautiful Russian designer Anna Rossa, who was reported to have had a brief affair with the author. When he read the news, which was reproduced on an Italian literary website, Coelho was quick to send the newspaper a letter, which his friend the journalist Dmitry Voskoboynikov translated: Dear readers of Komsomolskaia Pravda Komsomolskaia PravdaI was most intrigued to learn from your newspaper that I had an affair with the designer Anna Rossa three years ago and that this woman is supposedly the main character in my new book, The Zahir. The Zahir. Happily or unhappily, we shall never know which, the information is simply not true. Happily or unhappily, we shall never know which, the information is simply not true.When I was shown a photo of this young woman at my side, I remembered her at once. In fact, we were introduced at a reception at the Brazilian emba.s.sy. Now I am no saint, but there was not and probably never will be anything between the two of us.The Zahir is perhaps one of my deepest books, and I have dedicated it to my partner Christina Oiticica, with whom I have lived for twenty-five years. I wish you and Anna Rossa love and success. is perhaps one of my deepest books, and I have dedicated it to my partner Christina Oiticica, with whom I have lived for twenty-five years. I wish you and Anna Rossa love and success.Yours Paulo Coelho In the face of this quick denial, the journalists' eyes turned to another beautiful woman, the Chilean Cecilia Bolocco, Miss Universe 1987, who, at the time, was presenting La Noche de Cecilia La Noche de Cecilia, a highly successful chat show in Chile. On her way to Madrid, where she was recording interviews for her programme, she burst out laughing when she learned that she was being named as the inspiration for Esther in The Zahir The Zahir: 'Don't say that! Carlito gets very jealous...' The jealous 'Carlito' was the former Argentine president, Carlos Menem, whom she had married in May 2000, when he was seventy and she was thirty-five. Cecilia's reaction was understandable. Some years earlier, the press had informed readers that she had had an affair with Coelho between the beginning of 1999 and October 2000, when she was married to Menem. Both had vehemently denied the allegations. Suspicions also fell on the Italian actress Valeria Golino.

However, on 17 April 2005, a Sunday, the Portuguese newspaper Correio da Manh Correio da Manh announced on its front page that the woman on whom Paulo had based the character was the English journalist Christina Lamb, war correspondent for the announced on its front page that the woman on whom Paulo had based the character was the English journalist Christina Lamb, war correspondent for the Sunday Times Sunday Times. When she was phoned up in Harare, where she was doing an interview, she couldn't believe that the secret had been made public. She was the 'real-life Esther', the newspaper confirmed. 'All last week I fielded phone calls from newspapers in Spain, Portugal, Brazil, South Africa, even Britain, asking how I felt being "Paulo Coelho's muse",' she said in a full-page article in the Sunday Times Review Sunday Times Review, ent.i.tled 'He stole my soul' and with a curious subt.i.tle: 'Christina Lamb has covered many foreign wars for the Sunday Times Sunday Times, but she had no defences when one of the world's bestselling novelists decided to hijack her life.'

In the article, the journalist says that she met Coelho two years earlier when she was chosen to interview him about the success of Eleven Minutes Eleven Minutes. At the time, the writer was still living in the Henri IV hotel. This was their only meeting. During the following months, they exchanged e-mails, he in the south of France and she in Kandahar and Kabul, in Afghanistan. Coelho so enjoyed Christina's The Sewing Circles of Herat The Sewing Circles of Herat that he included it in his 'Top Ten Reads' on the Barnes & n.o.ble website. When she checked her e-mails in June 2004 she found, 'among the usual monotonous updates from the coalition forces in Kabul and junk offering p.e.n.i.s enlargement', a message from Coelho with a huge attachment. It was the Portuguese typescript of his just completed book that he included it in his 'Top Ten Reads' on the Barnes & n.o.ble website. When she checked her e-mails in June 2004 she found, 'among the usual monotonous updates from the coalition forces in Kabul and junk offering p.e.n.i.s enlargement', a message from Coelho with a huge attachment. It was the Portuguese typescript of his just completed book The Zahir The Zahir, with a message saying: 'The female character was inspired by you.' He then explained that he had thought of trying to meet, but she was always away, so he had used her book and Internet research to create the character. In the article published in the Sunday Times Sunday Times, she describes what she felt as she read the e-mail: I was part astonished, part flattered, part alarmed. He didn't know me. How could he have based a character on me? I felt almost naked. Like most people, I guess, there were things in my life I would not wish to see in print. [...]So with some trepidation I downloaded the 304-page file and opened it. As I read the ma.n.u.script I recognized things I had told him in Tarbes, insights into my private world, as well as concerns I had discussed in my book.The first paragraph began: 'Her name is Esther, she is a war correspondent who has just returned from Iraq because of the imminent invasion of that country; she is thirty years old, married, without children.'At least he had made me younger.

What had at first seemed amusing ('I was starting to enjoy the idea that the heroine was based on me, and now here she was disappearing on page one,' Christina wrote) was becoming uncomfortable as she read on: I was slightly concerned about his description of how Esther and her husband had met. 'One day, a journalist comes to interview me. She wants to know what it's like to have my work known all over the country but to be entirely unknown myself...She's pretty, intelligent, quiet. We meet again at a party, where there's no pressure of work, and I manage to get her into bed that same night.'

Astonished by what she had read, Christina told her mother and her husbanda Portuguese lawyer named Paulo: Far from sharing my feeling of flattery, he was highly suspicious about why another man should be writing a book on his wife. I told a few friends and they looked at me as though I was mad. I decided it was better not to mention it to anyone else.

If the Correio da Manh Correio da Manh had not revealed the secret, the matter would have ended there. The revelation would not, after all, have caused any further discomfort for the journalist, as she herself confessed in her article: had not revealed the secret, the matter would have ended there. The revelation would not, after all, have caused any further discomfort for the journalist, as she herself confessed in her article: Once I got used to it, I decided I quite liked being a muse. But I was not quite sure what muses do. [...] I asked Coelho how a muse should behave. 'Muses must be treated like fairies,' he replied, adding that he had never had a muse before. I thought being a muse probably involved lying on a couch with a large box of fancy chocolates, looking pensive. [...] But being a muse is not easy if you work full time and have a five-year-old. [...] In the meantime, I have learnt that going to interview celebrity authors can be more hazardous than covering wars. They might not shoot you but they can steal your soul.

The book seemed destined to cause controversy. Accustomed to the media's hostility towards Coelho's previous books, Brazilian readers had a surprise during the final week of March 2005. On all the news-stands in the country three of the four major weekly magazines had photos of Coelho on the cover and inside each were eight pages about the author and his life. This unusual situation led the journalist Marcelo Beraba, the ombudsman of the Folha de So Paulo Folha de So Paulo, to dedicate the whole of his Sunday column to the subject.

The 'case of the three covers', as it became known, was deemed important only because it revealed a radical change in behaviour in a media which, with a few rare exceptions, had treated the author very badly. It was as though Brazil had just discovered a phenomenon that so many countries had been celebrating since the worldwide success of The Alchemist The Alchemist.

Whatever the critics might say, what distinguished Paulo from other best-sellers, such as John Grisham and Dan Brown, was the content of his books. Some of those authors might even sell more books, but they don't fill auditoriums around the world, as Paulo does. The impact his work has on his readers can be measured by the hundreds of e-mails that he receives daily from all corners of the earth, many of them from people telling him how reading his books has changed their lives. Ordinary letters posted from the most remote places, sometimes simply addressed to 'Paulo CoelhoBrazil', arrive by the sackload.

In February 2006as if in acknowledgement of his popularityCoelho received an invitation from Buckingham Palacefrom Sir James Hamilton, Duke of Abercorn and Lord Steward of the Household. This was for a state banquet to be given some weeks later for the President of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, by Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip during the President's official visit to Britain. The invitation made clear that the occasion called for 'white tie with decorations'. As the date of the banquet approached, however, newspapers reported that, at the request of the Brazilian government, both President Lula and his seventy-strong delegation had been relieved of the obligation to wear tails. When he read this, Coelho (who had dusted off his tails, waistcoat and white tie) was confused as to what to do. Concerned that he might make a blunder, he decided to send a short e-mail to the Royal Household asking for instructions: 'I just read that President Lula vetoed the white tie for the Brazilian Delegation. Please let me know how to proceedI don't want to be the only one with a white tie.'

The reply, signed by a member of the Royal Household, arrived two days later, also by e-mail: Mr. Coelho:Her Majesty The Queen Elizabeth II has agreed that President Lula and members of his official suite need not wear white tie to the State Banquet. However, that will be just a small number of people (less than 20). The remainder of the 170 guests will be in white tie, so I can rea.s.sure you that you will not be the only person wearing white tie. The Queen does expect her guests to wear white tie and you are officially a guest of Her Majesty The Queen, not President Lula.

CHAPTER 30.

One hundred million copies sold SOME WEEKS AFTER HANDING HIS PUBLISHERS the typescript of the typescript of The Witch of Portobello The Witch of Portobello, which he had finished a week prior to the banquet at Buckingham Palace, Coelho was preparing for a new test. Two decades had pa.s.sed since 1986, when he had followed the Road to Santiago, the first and most important of the penances imposed by Jean. In the years that followed, the mysterious Master had, in agreement with Coelho, regularly ordered further trials. At least one of these the author has confessed to having fulfilled purely out of respect for the duty to find disciples to whom he should transmit the knowledge he had received from Jean and show them the route to spiritual enlightenment. 'I have disciples because I am obliged to, but I don't enjoy it,' he told journalists. 'I'm very lazy and have little patience.' In spite of this resistance, he has acted as guide to four new initiates as demanded by RAM.

Besides following the Routes, the name given by members of the order to the different pilgrimages, he was ordered by Jean to submit to various tests. Some of these did not require much willpower or physical strength, such as praying at least once a day with his hands held beneath a jet of flowing water, which could be from a tap or a stream. Coelho does, however, admit to having been given tasks that were not at all easy to perform, such as submitting to a vow of chast.i.ty for six months, during which time even masturbation was forbidden. In spite of this deprivation, he speaks with good humour about the experience, which happened in the late 1980s. 'I discovered that s.e.xual abstinence is accompanied by a great deal of temptation,' he recalls. 'The penitent has the impression that every woman desires him, or, rather, that only the really pretty ones do.' Some of these tests were akin to rituals of self-flagellation. For three months, for example, he was obliged to walk for an hour a day, barefoot and without a shirt, through brushwood in thick scrubland until his chest and arms were scratched by thorns and the soles of his feet lacerated by stones. Compared with that, tasks such as fasting for three days or having to look at a tree for five minutes every day for months on end were as nothing.

The task Jean set his disciple in April 2006 may seem to a layman totally nonsensical. The time had come for him to take the External Road to Jerusalem, which meant spending four months (or, as the initiates prefer to say, 'three months plus one') wandering about the world, wherever he chose, without setting foot in either of his two homesthe house in France and his apartment in Rio de Janeiro. For him this meant spending all that time in hotels. Did this mean that only those with enough money to pay for such an extravagance could join the order? Coelho had been troubled by this very question twenty years earlier, just before setting off along the Road to Santiago, and he recalls Jean's encouraging reply: 'Travelling isn't always a question of money, but of courage. You spent a large part of your life travelling the world as a hippie. What money did you have then? None. Hardly enough to pay for your fare, and yet those were, I believe, some of the best years of your lifeeating badly, sleeping in railway stations, unable to communicate because of the language, being forced to depend on others even for finding somewhere to spend the night.'

If the new Road to Jerusalem was unavoidable, the solution was to relax and put the time to good use. He devoted the first few weeks to carrying out a small number of the engagements that had acc.u.mulated in Sant Jordi's diary, among which was the London Book Fair. While there, he chanced to meet Yuri Smirnoff, the owner of Sophia, his publisher in Russia. Coelho told him that he was in the middle of a strange pilgrimage and that this might be the perfect opportunity to realize an old dream: to take the legendary Trans-Siberian Railway which crosses 9,289 kilometres and traverses 75 per cent of Russia, from Moscow to Vladivostok. Some weeks later, he received a phone call while he was touring in Catalonia, in northern Spain. It was Smirnoff calling to say that he had decided to make Coelho's dream come true and was offering him a fortnight on one of the longest railway journeys in the world.

Coelho a.s.sumed that the gift would be a compartment on the train. Much to his surprise, when he arrived in Moscow on 15 May, the agreed date for his departure, he discovered that Smirnoff had decided to turn the trip into a luxurious 'happening'. He had hired two entire coaches. Paulo would travel in a suite in the first, and the other two compartments would be occupied by Smirnoff, his wife and Eva, an admirer of Coelho's work, who would act as his interpreter during the two-week journey. He was also provided with a chef, two cooks and a waiter, as well as two bodyguards from the Russian government to ensure their guest's safety. The second coach was to be given over to thirty journalists from Russia and other European countries, who had been invited to accompany the author. Altogether, this kind gesture cost Smirnoff about US$200,000, and it proved to be a very poor investment indeed: some months later Coelho left Sophia for another publisher, Astrel.

It turned out to be an exhausting fortnight, not just because of the distance covered, but because he was constantly besieged by his readers. At every stop, the platforms were filled by hundreds and hundreds of readers wanting an autograph, a handshake, or even just a word. After crossing the provinces in the far east of Russia and skirting the frontiers of Mongolia and China, on a journey that crossed eight time zones, the group finally arrived in Vladivostok on the edge of the Sea of j.a.pan on 30 May.

During the interviews he gave while on his Trans-Siberian journey Coelho made it clear that, in spite of the comfort in which he was travelling, it was not a tourist trip. 'This is not just a train journey,' he insisted several times, 'but a spiritual journey through s.p.a.ce and time in order to complete a pilgrimage ordered by my Master.' Despite all these years of being a constant presence in newspapers and magazines across the world, no journalist has ever been able to discover the true ident.i.ty of the mysterious character to whom Paulo owes so much. Some months after the end of the World Cup in 2006, someone calling himself simply a 'reader of Paulo Coelho' sent a photo to the website set up for collecting information for this book. It showed Coelho wearing a Brazilian flag draped over his shoulders, Christina and a third person walking down a street. The third person was a thin man, with grey hair, wearing faded jeans, a Brazilian football shirt and a mobile phone hanging around his neck. It was hard to identify him because he was wearing a cap and sungla.s.ses and his right hand was partly covering his face. The photograph bore a short caption written by the anonymous contributor: 'This photo was taken by me in Berlin during the 2006 World Cup. The man in the cap is Jean, Paulo Coelho's Master in RAM.' When he saw the photo, the author was deliberately vague: 'What can I say?' he said. 'If it isn't him, it's very like him.'

Two months after the end of the World Cup, Brazilian bookshops were receiving the first 100,000 copies of The Witch of Portobello The Witch of Portobello. It was a book full of new ideas. The first of these, to be found right at the beginning, is the method used by the author to relate the travails of Athena, the book's protagonist. The story of the young Gypsy girl born in Transylvania, in Romania, and abandoned by her biological mother is narrated by fifteen different characters. This device brought eloquent praise for his work in the Folha de So Paulo Folha de So Paulo. 'One cannot deny that, in literary terms, this is one of Paulo Coelho's most ambitious novels,' wrote Marcelo Pen. The book is the story of Athena's life. Adopted by a Lebanese couple and taken to Beirut, from where the family is driven out by the civil war that raged in Lebanon from 1975 until 1990, she then settles in London. She grows up in Britain, where she is educated, marries and has a son. She works for a bank before leaving her husband and going to Romania in order to find her biological mother. She then moves to the Persian Gulf, where she becomes a successful estate agent in Dubai. On her return to London, she develops and seeks to deepen her spirituality, becoming, in the end, a priestess, who attracts hundreds of followers. As a result of this, however, she becomes a victim of religious intolerance.

The second innovation was technological. The book appeared on the author's website before the printed version reached the Brazilian and Portuguese bookshops, and in just two days his web page received 29,000 hits, which took everyone, including the author, by surprise. 'It was just amazing, but it proved that the Internet has become an obligatory s.p.a.ce for a writer to share his work with the readers,' he told newspapers. To those who feared that the initiative might rob bookshops of readers, he replied: 'In 1999, I discovered that the edition of The Alchemist The Alchemist published in Russia was available on the Internet. Then I decided to confront piracy on its own ground and I started putting my books on the web first. Instead of falling, sales in bookshops increased.' published in Russia was available on the Internet. Then I decided to confront piracy on its own ground and I started putting my books on the web first. Instead of falling, sales in bookshops increased.'

As though wanting to reaffirm that these were not empty words, the site where he began to make his books available (www.piratecoelho.wordpress.com) has a photo of the author with a bandana on his head and a black eye patch, as though he were a real pirate. Convinced that someone only reads books on-screen if he has no other option, and that printing them out at home would cost more than buying them in the bookshops, Coelho began to make all his books available online. 'It has been proved that if people read the first chapters on the Internet and like it,' he states, 'they will go out and buy the book.'

Since the middle of 2006, he and Monica and Chris, as well as some of his publishers, had been hoping that the number of books sold would pa.s.s the 100-million mark around the feast day of St Joseph, 19 March, the following year, when he had decided he would celebrate his sixtieth birthday. As it turned out, the 100-millionth book was not sold until five months later, in August, which was his real birthday. Although he had told the newspapers that being sixty was no more important than being thirty-five or forty-seven, in February, he decided that he would celebrate St Joseph's day in the Hotel El Peregrino, in Puente la Reina, a small Spanish town 20 kilometres from Pamplona, halfway along the Road to Santiago. That day he announced on his blog that he would be glad to welcome the first ten readers to reply in Puente la Reina. When the messages began to arrivecoming from places as far away as Brazil, j.a.pan, England, Venezuela and QatarPaulo feared that those who replied might think that the invitation included air trips and accommodation, and hastened to clarify the situation. To his surprise, they had all understood what he meant and were prepared to bear the cost. On the actual day, there were five Spaniards (Luis Miguel, Clara, Rosa, Loli and Ramon), a Greek (Chrissa), an Englishman (Alex), a Venezuelan (Marian), a j.a.panese (Heiko) and an American who lived in northern Iraq (Nika), as well as the ex-football star Rai and Paulo's old friends, among them Nelson Liano, Jr, his partner on the Manual do Vampirismo Manual do Vampirismo, and Dana Goodyear, the American journalist. In his blog, Liano summed up the atmosphere at El Peregrino: It was a celebration in honour of St Joseph in four languages. Paulo adopted the feast day of the patron saint of workers to celebrate his birthday, following an old Spanish Christian tradition. While the party was going on, a snowfall left the Road to Santiago completely white. Salsa, French regional music, the bolero, tango, samba and the unforgettable hits that Paulo had written with Raul Seixas gave a pan-musical note to the party, accompanied by the very best Rioja wine.

Five months later, as his real birthday was approaching, the team led by Monica at Sant Jordi was working flat out on the preparation of a smart forty-page folder in English, the cover of which bore a photo of a beaming Paulo Coelho and the words 'PAULO COELHO100,000,000 COPIES'. The urgency was due to the fact that the folder had to be ready by the first week of October, for the Frankfurt Book Fair.

While the people at Sant Jordi were engaged on this, on 24 August, the man