Paulo Coelho

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in two thousand and five, and the presenter was Sue Lawley.

Presenter0:29

My Castaway this week is a novelist. To day he lives here in the countryside on the edge of the Pyrenees in south west France, a sort of resting place, perhaps, after a long journey through his life so far.

Presenter0:41

He was born into a middle class family in Rio de Janeiro. He wasn't an easy child, and as a teenager his parents put him into a psychiatric hospital, where he was given electric shock treatment.

Presenter0:52

In his twenties he became part of Brazil's Alternative Society, a cultural antidote to the military dictatorship of the time. He dabbled in drugs and black magic, and wrote lyrics for pop songs which made him rich.

Presenter1:05

Later, sacked from his job, he travelled around Europe searching for a meaning to his life. Eventually, sixteen years ago now, he wrote a book called The Alchymist, which, together with others he has written since, have made him one of the most popular writers in the world to day.

Presenter1:22

His are stories of spiritual achievement, of human journeys on which his characters pursue their dreams and find success.

Presenter1:31

We must get rid of the idea of fulfilling what people expect us to do, he says, and start doing what we expect from our lives. He is Paolo

Presenter1:42

You write, Paolo, alluringly about the pursuit of dreams, and your message is that we can all pursue them and we can all achieve them.

Presenter1:52

That's why so many many millions of people obviously love your books. But surely we can't all realize them. We must have to have special qualities in order to do so.

Paulo Coelho2:01

I think that the m most important quality is to have dreams. From the moment that you have dreams, of course, you can at least start fighting for your dreams.

Paulo Coelho2:11

And from the moment that you fight for your dream.

Paulo Coelho2:14

Everything is meaningful. My dream was to be a writer.

Paulo Coelho2:18

So, I know my path, I know my road, but I did not fulfill my dream. I know my vision.

Presenter2:23

You didn't take it for a very long time, did you? You didn't start to write

Paulo Coelho2:26

Didn't start to write things.

Presenter2:27

So were you were you lacking the courage or you didn't have the determination? What are you saying to people?

Paulo Coelho2:33

I think that uh at that uh moment of my life I I had uh I had a goal.

Paulo Coelho2:39

But I did not have enthusiasm enough to fulfill it. Because when you're fighting for something that it is meaningful to you,

Paulo Coelho2:48

Every time that you're defeated, it hurts.

Paulo Coelho2:52

We have to have challenges. Life tests us. Sometimes you have to have these challenges, at least to prove to yourself that this thing is important to you. And you only realize that anything is important to you, or anybody is important to you.

Paulo Coelho3:08

When you have to fight for it.

Presenter3:09

But you also suggest that there are signs along the way, and we must understand how to read those signs. And for you I think this is true, isn't it? You can't write another book until you've seen a white feather.

Paulo Coelho3:21

Yeah, most of my life I believed in science.

Paulo Coelho3:24

It means that you have to follow your intuition.

Presenter3:24

Is that

Presenter3:27

But we could see signs anywhere, you know. I could say I've just walked past an oak tree. I mean, how how can we recognize?

Paulo Coelho3:34

Well, w we can go recognize because uh we're not afraid of making mistakes. It's like speaking a foreign language. I cannot say that everything is a sign, but at the same time when you see a sign you realize that it is a sign. It could drive you crazy also if you start seeing signs all over, you know. You need uh to have at the same time discipline and intuition.

Presenter3:57

Okay, I want to learn more, but I also want to hear about the records that you want to take to a desert island. Tell me about the first one.

Paulo Coelho4:03

We start with Bono, with you two. I'd like to stress the fact that they well, the records come from people that I admire. It's very easy to be an artist. It's very easy to be successful. But then to have the responsibility

Paulo Coelho4:20

to use this success in benefit of other human beings that need more than you is very important. And you too and Bono are doing that. So we start by mysterious way that it is somehow the road of the science.

Paulo Coelho4:38

She's still

Speaker 44:38

You're sliding down. She'd be there on the ground.

Speaker 44:47

It's alright, it's alright, it's alright

Speaker 44:51

She moves in my stereotypes.

Speaker 44:56

It's alright, it's alright, alright.

Speaker 45:01

Shiva

Speaker 45:02

For serious wage

Presenter5:06

You too, and Mysterious Ways. You wrote The Alchemist Paolo Cuello when you were about forty. You'd spent your life, as you said, wanting to be a writer and ducking, but finally you put yourself a hundred percent to your dream. And it was this huge it is this huge bestseller.

Paulo Coelho5:23

But not at the very beginning, I must say, because uh well, my first book is The Pilgrimage. That was my turning point when I wrote The Pilgrimage. I was happy before. I had uh I was thirty nine, I had uh a wife that I still have, I had the money.

Paulo Coelho5:39

I had my house, I had uh everything that a human being needs, except for the fact that I was not very satisfied with myself.

Presenter5:48

Because you hadn't fulfilled your dream. You hadn't

Paulo Coelho5:49

Absolutely, absolutely. Although I knew my dream, so I decided to have a a kind of rite of passage.

Paulo Coelho5:58

And this transition point, it was my pilgrimage from France.

Paulo Coelho6:03

From close to here.

Paulo Coelho6:04

to to San Chiago de Compostela in in Spain.

Presenter6:08

But you were told to do that, weren't you?

Paulo Coelho6:10

I was told to do that by someone that I called my master. Although the m master is not exactly the person who teaches you, but the t the person who shares his experience uh with you.

Presenter6:22

But how did you find him?

Paulo Coelho6:23

I found him in nineteen eighty two.

Paulo Coelho6:26

When I went again I quit everything, trying to well.

Paulo Coelho6:30

to find the meaning of life. At that moment, of course, I had uh seventeen thousand dollars in my pocket, say I had my savings and I thought the meaning of life should be less

Paulo Coelho6:42

Expensive than seventeen thousand dollars. It cannot cost more than seventeen thousand dollars. So

Presenter6:47

But

Paulo Coelho6:48

So I started traveling, then I met this man.

Presenter6:52

But you met him in a very unusual place, or you heard him or saw him in a very unusual place first of all, didn't you?

Paulo Coelho6:56

I saw his reply.

Paulo Coelho6:58

In fact, I saw him in a concentration camp in Deschau, in Germany. I had always this curiosity to know well, like every human being, about the Second World War. So I visited a concentration camp for the first time in my life.

Paulo Coelho7:15

So at that moment in the concentration camp, visiting this.

Paulo Coelho7:20

I lost the dream I hope in humankind.

Paulo Coelho7:23

I thought, well, we don't learn.

Paulo Coelho7:26

We never learn. And then I remembered

Paulo Coelho7:29

A Sermon by John Doan.

Paulo Coelho7:32

when he says no man is an island.

Paulo Coelho7:36

And at that very moment I realized my responsibility towards other people.

Paulo Coelho7:42

I said, Well, I'll be through this.

Paulo Coelho7:45

I had someone knock in my door in the middle of the night. I had been in jail. I had been tortured.

Paulo Coelho7:51

So instead of losing my hope, I should be

Paulo Coelho7:55

Well, at least more responsible for the world as it is today.

Presenter7:59

So these were the signs that you were this was that you were beginning to pick up the message that was meant for you?

Paulo Coelho8:05

The very beginning. The very beginning, yes.

Paulo Coelho8:08

And then I had just a glimpse of someone.

Presenter8:11

But you had a glimpse of him at Dachau.

Paulo Coelho8:13

I know how, I know how. At that very moment that I thought about John Dones' words.

Paulo Coelho8:17

So he

Presenter8:17

So he knew, did he, that you were meant to seek him out? Well.

Paulo Coelho8:24

I think that he knew that I was there for a reason. He's also a man who follows the sign.

Paulo Coelho8:29

It was like this. It is well a miracle in my life.

Paulo Coelho8:34

One of the many miracles in my life, including, of course, the success of my books.

Presenter8:38

But he said you must go on a five hundred mile pilgrimage.

Paulo Coelho8:40

Yeah.

Paulo Coelho8:41

Yeah, so he said, Why don't you do that? Why don't you do that? I said, Because this sounds crazy.

Paulo Coelho8:48

Do a pilgrimage by the end of the 20th century. I can take a car and go there. I said, Yes, you can take a car and go there.

Paulo Coelho8:56

You are not going to enjoy the road.

Paulo Coelho8:58

You're not going to enjoy meeting people, so you're being isolated in your car.

Paulo Coelho9:03

And then when I arrived in Santiago de Compostela,

Paulo Coelho9:08

I did not realize at that moment that it was the beginning of my real pilgrimage.

Presenter9:12

And indeed you said it was the most important thing to happen in your life, and we'll come back and learn why, but let's pause for record number two. What is it?

Paulo Coelho9:13

There we go.

Paulo Coelho9:20

Well, record number two, I think that is very symbolic, that it is uh the long and riding road by the Beatles. And uh when people think about this, they think about uh woman waiting for someone uh

Presenter9:22

What

Paulo Coelho9:32

The door, but I think that it was my dream that was waiting for me.

Speaker 49:37

The long and winding road

Speaker 49:42

That means

Speaker 49:45

To your door

Speaker 49:52

Will never disappear.

Speaker 49:59

Let's see

Presenter9:59

The Beatles and the Long and Winding Road. Let's go back to your beginnings, Paolo, because your life up to the point of taking that pilgrimage had been quite extraordinary in itself.

Presenter10:15

Um Brazil, nineteen forty seven, you were born the son of an engineer, middle class family, middle class ambitions. Parents wanted you to become a lawyer, but

Presenter10:26

You were an odd child. You didn't conform. They weren't very pleased with you.

Paulo Coelho10:30

Yes, and they took some radical decisions like put me in a psychiatric hospital when I was a teenager.

Speaker 110:37

Why would they have done that?

Paulo Coelho10:40

They done that too out of love, I think. I never blamed them for this. I think that they were desperate.

Paulo Coelho10:48

So they said,

Presenter10:48

There's this large leap from that to putting you in a psychiatric hospital. I mean, if their friends had said what's happened to Paolo, how would they have explained why they'd put you in this institution?

Paulo Coelho10:57

Well, first they tried to hide, of course, uh uh for years. This was a taboo in my family. I was the typical bad boy who goes to the street gangs and and and fights and and is always in danger.

Paulo Coelho11:11

You know, so they thought, My God, my son is going to die.

Paulo Coelho11:15

You know, racing cars in the middle of the night and things like this.

Paulo Coelho11:20

So they said, well, he needs treatment.

Presenter11:23

Shut you up.

Paulo Coelho11:24

And you but you were given electric shock treatment when you were talking about the term.

Paulo Coelho11:29

I'm not that bad, if I may say. But yeah.

Paulo Coelho11:33

You don't feel any pain. It's horrible to see, but when you are

Presenter11:38

So you don't remember pain? You don't remember?

Paulo Coelho11:40

No, you don't have pain. You don't have pain.

Presenter11:42

Nicely.

Paulo Coelho11:43

And then

Presenter11:43

But you got the medical records out, your own, didn't you, when you were researching for Veronica disease?

Paulo Coelho11:46

Danger.

Paulo Coelho11:49

I got my medical records not because I needed that for the research, but to prove to the press that I was in this hospital because my publisher was a little bit concerned. He said.

Paulo Coelho12:00

Who is going to believe in that? I never heard about that.

Presenter12:02

Apparently

Presenter12:03

Because people expect that everything you write about you have experience. That's really the the the thesis behind all of your books, is that they're all born of your experience.

Paulo Coelho12:09

I just want to make sure that.

Paulo Coelho12:11

Absolutely, absolutely. Even if they are metaphors like the alchemists never being a shepherd boy, but uh

Presenter12:15

I'll never be

Paulo Coelho12:17

Of course, this is the metaphor of me searching for my own path. Yeah.

Presenter12:22

But how did you escape? How did you get out of there in the end? Because they put you back three times, didn't they?

Paulo Coelho12:26

Yeah, I skipped the two times.

Paulo Coelho12:29

And then what is dangerous in that situation is that you get used to be crazy. It's so comfortable to be crazy because you don't have any responsibility in life. And then it was thanks to God that another psychiatric said, don't play this game.

Paulo Coelho12:46

Uh this is a very dangerous game, you're not crazy so.

Paulo Coelho12:51

Take the responsibility of your life into your hands and and move forward. And this person, without knowing, he was saving my life. Was he an omen?

Presenter13:00

Yeah.

Speaker 413:01

Yeah.

Paulo Coelho13:01

Well he wants to explain.

Presenter13:04

But looking back, I mean, you know, if that hadn't happened to me, I wouldn't be here today. It was a sign along the way.

Paulo Coelho13:05

That's it.

Paulo Coelho13:09

It was a sign along the way. He was the right person at the right moment, and we find this every single day in our lives.

Presenter13:16

Except that you got out of there and got into Black Magic, which we'll hear about in a minute. But let's pause for record number three.

Paulo Coelho13:22

So record number three, it was uh right after the internation, when you start to see the world as a mess, but at the same time you're glad that the world is a mess, because your head is a mess also. And then Pinky Floyd arrived with Atom Hard Model.

Presenter14:08

Pink Floyd and Father Shout the beginning of Atom Hart Murray.

Presenter14:12

The next dramatic event in the life of Paolo Coelho was that um practically overnight he became a rich man. How did you do that?

Paulo Coelho14:22

Well, after my parents thought, oh, his my son is lost forever.

Paulo Coelho14:30

Well, it was the moment that the heat movement began.

Paulo Coelho14:34

And let's start travelling the world.

Paulo Coelho14:36

So on my way back I said, I have to write, start writing, because uh my dream was already to be a writer.

Paulo Coelho14:43

But well writing books, there are so many books in the world.

Paulo Coelho14:48

So I went back to Brazil. I created my underground newspaper.

Paulo Coelho14:53

And then I met a singer.

Paulo Coelho14:56

And we made some lyrics together and then all of a sudden

Paulo Coelho15:00

Well, the lyrics made the number one in the pipes parade. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Presenter15:03

Yeah, yeah.

Paulo Coelho15:06

Well, I start earning money, something that

Paulo Coelho15:09

My parents could never

Paulo Coelho15:11

Talk about

Presenter15:12

Suddenly they had a success on their hands.

Paulo Coelho15:14

Suddenly they had at least a person who could buy an apartment. If and if you can buy an apartment, you'll you'll not be homeless. And if you're not homeless, then you're safe.

Presenter15:18

Yeah.

Presenter15:23

And in the end you wrote, I think, some sixty odd top lyrics and

Speaker 415:28

Yeah.

Paulo Coelho15:28

Probably, yes, probably.

Presenter15:30

But at the same time you were dabbling in black magic. I mean give me an idea of what we're talking here. What kind are we talking about?

Speaker 415:30

Uh

Paulo Coelho15:37

We're gonna talk about hammer production, huh? That I can assure you. When you talk about black magic, people always see the satanic rituals.

Presenter15:46

But you did frighten yourself to death.

Paulo Coelho15:48

Of course, of course. I was doing that to be left wing of the left wing of left wing of the hippie movement. And then one day, of course, as there is no free lunch, I went, if you want to know, it's quite complicated to explain that and I don't want to be superficial, but I I saw myself in a black hole.

Presenter16:11

but a black hole of evil.

Paulo Coelho16:13

I would say if you yes, yes, yes, yes. I have my my feet on, touching it.

Presenter16:19

So you learned about the black hole of evil in in that sense, in that mystical sense. You also learned about it in a very real and physical sense, because at a certain point you were taken in by the police, weren't you, in Rio, and you were subjected to some pretty evil torture, frankly.

Paulo Coelho16:37

Absolutely.

Presenter16:37

Why did they take you in?

Paulo Coelho16:39

I was arrested under the pretext that my lyrics were subversive.

Presenter16:45

Two lyrics.

Paulo Coelho16:45

Yeah, yes. So I saw the dangions of the Brazilian dictatorship. They took me to to torture. And then this this I cannot uh

Paulo Coelho16:55

Forget. This is evil. This is really evil in its pure manifestation.

Presenter17:01

And this was a kind of electric shock treatment that was painful.

Paulo Coelho17:05

Absolutely. Not only that, but when you see how evil can be a normal person, you'll see that people who are normal good sons or good daughters, when they have the power in their hands.

Paulo Coelho17:19

something is triggered within themselves that well, evil manifests itself. They have this devilish attitude towards you.

Presenter17:29

Tell me about record number four.

Paulo Coelho17:31

We are going to Roberto Carlos, a wonderful Brazilian singer. Says, I want to send everything to hell.

Presenter17:39

Perfect.

Speaker 417:40

Is that what he's singing about? Yeah.

Speaker 417:43

Dickivanus was empriabrila.

Speaker 417:49

Sivo sena veto ali esperá.

Speaker 417:56

Something you will say

Speaker 417:59

Run el pensan entru.

Presenter18:09

It was uh Roberto Carlos and you're gonna have to help me here, Paolo. Quero que fa tuldo pro inferno.

Paulo Coelho18:18

Perfect.

Presenter18:18

Well, to hell with everything, basically.

Paulo Coelho18:20

Yeah.

Presenter18:22

So you decided to put an end to all this chaos in your life.

Paulo Coelho18:25

I did not decide. They decided for me. I mean, I was they is is the the establishment. I was scared to death when I left the the prison.

Presenter18:28

Who's they?

Presenter18:35

Of the authorities, maybe.

Paulo Coelho18:36

Oh yes, oh yes.

Presenter18:38

Or of the Black Hole.

Paulo Coelho18:39

No, no, most. Most.

Paulo Coelho18:42

So I said, okay, I want to be old and happy and I'm going to marry, I'm going to find a job.

Paulo Coelho18:50

Uh enough is enough.

Presenter18:51

So you did and it lasted for what about five years?

Paulo Coelho18:54

Seven years. Seven, seven long years.

Presenter18:55

Seven.

Paulo Coelho18:59

Was it that?

Presenter18:59

Was it that boring?

Paulo Coelho19:00

Yeah, it was no, it was more than boring. It was something very distressful, I think.

Paulo Coelho19:06

I I thought, my God, I lost hope in life.

Presenter19:10

And fate stepped in and you got the sack.

Presenter19:13

One day in your early thirties. Yes, hopefully. Now was this an omen?

Paulo Coelho19:15

Yes, hopefully.

Paulo Coelho19:17

When we look back, yes, Jesus, I think that God is there to help you. any time you need help. But it's not always in a with a very soft hand. Sometimes he had to kick you out. And I said uh to my wife, Well, let's stop everything. Let's let me do again the same uh

Paulo Coelho19:38

journey that I did in the seventies. What are you doing?

Presenter19:41

So so you set out all over again but as now as a more mature man in his early third

Paulo Coelho19:46

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Presenter19:48

The car

Paulo Coelho19:49

Uh

Presenter19:49

And some money in his pocket.

Paulo Coelho19:50

And the money, yeah.

Presenter19:51

As we've heard, it's looking for l literally for the meaning of life.

Paulo Coelho19:57

Which now I realize that it is a stupid question because

Paulo Coelho20:01

The meaning of life is the meaning that you give to your life. But I thought there was a standard meaning of life. No, you could uh well get to the ultimate answer.

Paulo Coelho20:12

M

Presenter20:12

But aren't you saying, aren't you?

Presenter20:15

Isn't your book, in particular, The Alchemist, saying that you did get to the ultimate answer? Because as we've heard, you went across Europe, you met this man, he sent you on the pilgrimage and it your life was changed and as a result you became a writer.

Paulo Coelho20:24

It's too late.

Paulo Coelho20:27

The fact that my life was changing because I have only one quality, I'm not a coward person.

Paulo Coelho20:35

does not mean that I had answered this question. What's the meaning of life? But the most interesting thing about this question is that you should learn how to live with

Paulo Coelho20:46

This question without getting some answer. Because from the moment that you get an answer, you know the meaning of life, period, now you can die.

Presenter20:56

Record number five.

Paulo Coelho20:57

Talking about the meaning of life and uh questions without answers, no I choose well the the ninth symphony by by Beethoven. He was uh deaf. He could not hear himself, but he still composed the most beautiful piece of of classic music ever.

Presenter22:14

Part of the Ode to Joy from the final movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony with the Concertgebar Chorus and Orchestra of Amsterdam conducted by Bernard Heitink. Um you've written Paolo Coelho the best part of a a dozen books. You don't know how many'cause it's superstitious to count. Uh

Presenter22:31

How long does it take you to write one?

Paulo Coelho22:33

I I write uh I write very quickly uh in the sense that uh to write it down uh is it does not take long.

Paulo Coelho22:41

The Alchemist Twix again.

Presenter22:43

So you just sit down and it just flows out of you, does it?

Paulo Coelho22:45

Yes, but first you have to live your life. First you have to be in contact with nature and with

Paulo Coelho22:52

Human beings.

Presenter22:53

They're very simple, slender tales, very stripped down, very minimalist i in style. That's deliberate, isn't it? I mean, you you sub it down hard after you've put it down on the page.

Paulo Coelho23:04

I could write a very complicated book every week.

Paulo Coelho23:08

Because it's very easy to be complicated, but it's quite difficult to be simple. I mean, you have to purify yourselves, not in the sense uh in the religious sense, but you have to to go to the core of it.

Paulo Coelho23:20

No, you see the snow here in the mountains. They are beautiful because they are white. I cannot see a technical or snow in the top of the mountains.

Presenter23:30

But as you know, the result of The Alchemist, which was the most popular of all, was that people felt you were some kind of guru and they wanted to ask you, you know, for your advice, wanted you to tell them how to lead their lives. That's a dangerous zone to get into.

Paulo Coelho23:43

I think that my reader is much more intelligent than that. He never he never asked me this. I think that when they read The Orchemist, they thought, Oh, I could have written this book.

Paulo Coelho23:55

Because this person, this Brazilian, he understands my soul, uh so I could have easily written this book.

Paulo Coelho24:02

I think that uh no, no, no, I'm not a guru.

Presenter24:05

You also, as you're well aware, have your critics and and in the main they can be summed up as believing that what you write is not literature but is are self-help books, really. Lightweight mysticism is what they say. Do you get very wounded by that?

Paulo Coelho24:21

Never, never. I think that, well, when you do something that you you did because you want to do, you should be happy with the results. And also you should be prepared that it's not everybody who is going to like what you do. So I think that, okay, if you write, don't try to please everybody because this is impossible. Don't try to justify your work because you don't need to. Just try to do what you feel like doing. And this is what I do. Critics criticize, writers write, readers read, and we're happy with this. We cannot, you know, trying to exchange rules in this process.

Paulo Coelho24:59

And then we go to to trying to explain the universe, but in a very different way, like the Beatles in in because.

Speaker 425:14

Cast the world is round.

Speaker 425:19

Turns me on.

Speaker 425:26

Because the world.

Speaker 425:32

He is right.

Presenter25:37

The Beatles and Because.

Presenter25:40

The real question, Paolo, when attempting to analyse your success

Presenter25:44

You surely, you know, you've got millions of readers entranced by the beauty of your prose and the message in it and so on, but aren't you simply playing to their prejudices? Aren't you saying to them they can have exactly what they want, all they've got to do is just go out there and get it?

Paulo Coelho26:01

Which is true.

Paulo Coelho26:03

Which is absolutely true.

Presenter26:06

Isn't that easy?

Paulo Coelho26:08

Nothing is easy to begin with. If you live your li a life that is not yours is not easy either. So go and get it. Don't expect

Paulo Coelho26:19

That you are not going, don't expect only happiness and joy. You're going to have your scars. You're going to have your moments that you're dumb. And now it's like.

Presenter26:26

Sure, but you're still telling people they can have what they want. And you know, the argument is that you you've been very lucky that you gave them this message at the right moment in time, you know, the end of the twentieth century.

Paulo Coelho26:38

You say that I'm I'm I I'm being very lucky. Well, I had my share of suffering. Sure. We are discussing this program about that. We are discussing about the psychiatric international moments that I was betraying my dreams about the jail, about everything.

Presenter26:54

Sure, but I'm talking about your luck at your timing of when you wrote this book, telling people they could have what they want. You put it out into a kind of consumer society. At the end, as I say, the end of the twentieth century, communism is overthrown.

Presenter27:09

People are empowered. You gave them that personal power.

Paulo Coelho27:11

So now

Paulo Coelho27:12

I will

Presenter27:13

But is it the right thing to give to people?

Paulo Coelho27:15

First I think it is. Second I'm not sa I'm not giving that, unfortunately, because a book cannot change uh uh the life of a reader.

Presenter27:24

But that's what they say.

Paulo Coelho27:25

Well, no, no, no. Uh, w when I read uh Henry Miller or Borges or William Blake.

Paulo Coelho27:32

Uh the only thing that changed in me, it was I don't feel alone.

Paulo Coelho27:37

We are alive in a world full of crises. We have a lot of opportunities out there. So let's go and get it. Let's go and get it.

Presenter27:46

So it's in praise of of

Presenter27:48

everything that is positive, everything that is happy, everything that is good. But what I'm asking you is whether you aren't guilty, if guilt is the right word, of encouraging people, your readers, and there are many millions of them as we've heard

Presenter28:03

To be self-indulgent, to be utterly selfish.

Paulo Coelho28:06

On the opposite. I don't think that we should be self-indulgent, but I think that we should be fully conscious of our uh individuality. I had uh many scars, as I said to you, because I always fought for the right to be different. So I think that I'm responsible for every single word that I put in my in my books. That said, from the moment that I put the final dot

Paulo Coelho28:34

Then it is up to the reader to understand.

Presenter28:36

You're not responsible for anything they do after that as well.

Paulo Coelho28:38

No, no, no. And I and I don't and I don't think that Harry Miller is responsible for me uh quitting everything and start traveling.

Paulo Coelho28:48

Yeah.

Paulo Coelho28:49

Then we have to come down a little bit with with this beautiful piece by Chopin that was always underrated also by the critics.

Presenter28:51

Uh Come on, dude.

Speaker 128:51

Yeah.

Presenter29:51

part of the second movement, the Largetto of Chopin's Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, number one in E minor, played by Marta Agarich with the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Claudio Abardo. We've talked, Paolo, about the power of the imagination. Let me tap into yours to end with and ask you what you think your

Presenter30:11

desert island might be like, where we are casting you away, you know, everyone's is different. What do you think your desert island is like?

Paulo Coelho30:18

Well, my desert island would have a manual on how to build a boat, because I was not born to live in desert islands.

Presenter30:29

Why wouldn't you love it? Wouldn't you like to just sit there and

Paulo Coelho30:29

Maybe

Paulo Coelho30:32

Uh

Presenter30:32

Think about the extraordinary, as we've said, life you've led. Just reflect on it, think what it might mean.

Paulo Coelho30:39

Well, I can do that after I die. But while I'm still alive, I think that the the thing that I treasure the most is human contact.

Paulo Coelho30:48

So the only thing that I need in my desert island is a book called Manual of How to Build a Boat.

Presenter30:55

Yeah, but if I tell you under our rules you can't have that.

Paulo Coelho30:57

I cannot have that.

Presenter30:58

You are alone. You have no help. There is nothing

Paulo Coelho31:02

Then I only need a tree, a row.

Paulo Coelho31:05

Then I will hang myself.

Paulo Coelho31:07

Because I really did not took all this difficult step in my life.

Paulo Coelho31:15

to be in a desert island.

Paulo Coelho31:17

I would be devastated, I would be mad, and then my parents would have reason to put me back to an asylum.

Paulo Coelho31:25

Because to be in a desert island, I think uh even if it is in the middle of the most beautiful place in the world, it is for me, I think, the the worst of torments that hell can give you.

Speaker 131:38

Last record.

Paulo Coelho31:39

And then, as I'm not in the desert island, I would like to hear Shine the Corner of this wonderful person.

Speaker 431:47

I can eat my dinner in a fancy restaurant

Speaker 431:54

But nothing, I said nothing can take away those loose Cause nothing compares

Speaker 432:07

Nothing compares to you

Presenter32:15

Jinead O'Connor, and nothing compares to you. Now, Paolo, if you could only take one of those eight records, which one would you take?

Paulo Coelho32:23

I'll take a bit of that.

Presenter32:25

O do O to joy.

Paulo Coelho32:26

Yeah.

Presenter32:27

Before you hang yourself.

Paulo Coelho32:28

Oh no, we have no the whole the whole symphony. The whole symphony.

Presenter32:32

Now we do let you take a book, but not a practical book. We give you the Bible and we give you the complete works of Shakespeare if you'd like them.

Presenter32:41

But we allow you one book of your own choice. What would yours be?

Paulo Coelho32:44

Well, I think uh besides the manual how to build bolts, uh

Presenter32:49

No no, no no, he can't have it.

Presenter32:52

Yes, but then you can have one book of your own.

Paulo Coelho32:54

Complete works of Oscar Lyons.

Presenter32:57

Complete works of Oscar Wilde.

Paulo Coelho32:58

Yeah.

Presenter32:58

And we allow you one luxury.

Presenter33:02

No practical value.

Paulo Coelho33:03

One one luxury.

Paulo Coelho33:07

Oh my god. Now I'd like to fly Concorde. I never did that in my life and now they don't fly Concorde anymore.

Presenter33:15

A quick trip round your island or over your island in Congo.

Paulo Coelho33:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Presenter33:21

Paolo Coelho, thank you very much indeed for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Paulo Coelho33:25

Thank you very much for inviting me to your desert island.

Speaker 133:36

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists Archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio forward.