Free Will In Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist

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Free will is an abstract concept. Difficult to pick up on and challenging to use correctly. However when it comes to personal legends; free will is nothing more than an absent parent. A false sense of security.In Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist Santiago is reminded again and again that completing your personal legend is a choice, however, this is untrue and the book itself shows evidence of this.

The Alchemist claims that fulfilling your personal legend is a choice. If completing your personal legend is a choice then even the smallest of God’s creations have the option of denying their personal legend. "The sea has lived on in this shell, because that's its Personal Legend. And it will never cease doing so until the desert is once again covered …show more content…
“Well, why don’t you go to Mecca now?” asked the boy. “Because it’s the thought of Mecca that keeps me alive. That’s what helps me face these days that are all the same, these mute crystals on the shelves, and lunch and dinner at that same horrible café..”(Coelho 58). Hope and inspiration can do many things, however, they cannot change the dried ink of destiny. The shopkeeper’s refusal is not a sign of choice, but rather a sign of fate. All in all the shopkeeper refuses the chance to complete his personal legend, as Santiago continues to pursue the pyramids because the shopkeeper is aware that his life is already set in stone.

Whether or not a person completes their personal journey is not up to them.“Lead will play its role until the world has no further need for lead, and then lead will have to turn itself into gold...,"(Coelho 150). Similar to the sea, lead will play its role and turn into gold. Essentially following what fate has already decided. This quote further justifies that completing one’s personal legend and fate is not a choice one gets to make.

All in all, Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist consistently contradicts itself when it comes to whether achieving one’s own personal legend is a choice. Fate plays a large hand in our lives. Not everyone eventually completes their personal
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