Eleven Minutes
“One of Coelho’s strongest.”—Kirkus Reviews

“The book casts a curiously sweet spell.”—Entertainment Weekly

From the author of beloved international bestseller The Alchemist, a daring novel that explores the sacred nature of sex and love and invites us to confront our own prejudices and demons.

Eleven Minutes tells the story of Maria, a young girl from a Brazilian village whose first innocent brushes with love leave her heartbroken. At a tender age, she becomes convinced that she will never find true love, instead believing that “love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer.” A chance meeting in Rio takes her to Geneva, where she dreams of finding fame and fortune, yet ends up working as a prostitute.

In Geneva, Maria’s despairing view of love is put to the test when she meets a handsome young painter. In this odyssey of self-discovery, Maria must choose between pursuing a path of darkness—sexual pleasure for its own sake—or risking everything to find her own inner light and the possibility of true love.

“Sensual . . . [An] adults-only fairly tale.”—Washington Post

“[This] Brazilian wizard makes books disappear from stores.”—The New York Times

1100609493
Eleven Minutes
“One of Coelho’s strongest.”—Kirkus Reviews

“The book casts a curiously sweet spell.”—Entertainment Weekly

From the author of beloved international bestseller The Alchemist, a daring novel that explores the sacred nature of sex and love and invites us to confront our own prejudices and demons.

Eleven Minutes tells the story of Maria, a young girl from a Brazilian village whose first innocent brushes with love leave her heartbroken. At a tender age, she becomes convinced that she will never find true love, instead believing that “love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer.” A chance meeting in Rio takes her to Geneva, where she dreams of finding fame and fortune, yet ends up working as a prostitute.

In Geneva, Maria’s despairing view of love is put to the test when she meets a handsome young painter. In this odyssey of self-discovery, Maria must choose between pursuing a path of darkness—sexual pleasure for its own sake—or risking everything to find her own inner light and the possibility of true love.

“Sensual . . . [An] adults-only fairly tale.”—Washington Post

“[This] Brazilian wizard makes books disappear from stores.”—The New York Times

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Eleven Minutes

Eleven Minutes

by Paulo Coelho
Eleven Minutes

Eleven Minutes

by Paulo Coelho

Paperback(Reprint)

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Overview

“One of Coelho’s strongest.”—Kirkus Reviews

“The book casts a curiously sweet spell.”—Entertainment Weekly

From the author of beloved international bestseller The Alchemist, a daring novel that explores the sacred nature of sex and love and invites us to confront our own prejudices and demons.

Eleven Minutes tells the story of Maria, a young girl from a Brazilian village whose first innocent brushes with love leave her heartbroken. At a tender age, she becomes convinced that she will never find true love, instead believing that “love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer.” A chance meeting in Rio takes her to Geneva, where she dreams of finding fame and fortune, yet ends up working as a prostitute.

In Geneva, Maria’s despairing view of love is put to the test when she meets a handsome young painter. In this odyssey of self-discovery, Maria must choose between pursuing a path of darkness—sexual pleasure for its own sake—or risking everything to find her own inner light and the possibility of true love.

“Sensual . . . [An] adults-only fairly tale.”—Washington Post

“[This] Brazilian wizard makes books disappear from stores.”—The New York Times


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780060589288
Publisher: HarperCollins
Publication date: 08/03/2021
Series: P.S. Series
Edition description: Reprint
Pages: 320
Sales rank: 84,773
Product dimensions: 5.31(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.72(d)

About the Author

About The Author
One of the most influential writers of our time, Paulo Coelho is the author of thirty international bestsellers, including The Alchemist, Warrior of the Light, Brida, Veronika Decides to Die, and Eleven Minutes. He is a member of the Brazilian Academy of Letters and a United Nations Messenger of Peace. Paulo is the recipient of 115 international prizes and awards, among them, the Chevalier de l'Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur (Legion of Honor). Born in Rio de Janeiro in 1947, he soon discovered his vocation for writing. He worked as a director, theater actor, songwriter, and journalist. In 1986, a special meeting led him to make the pilgrimage to Saint James Compostela (in Spain). The Road to Santiago was not only a common pilgrimage but a turning point in his existence. A year later, he wrote The Pilgrimage, an autobiographical novel that is considered the beginning of his literary career. He lives in Geneva, Switzerland.

Hometown:

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Date of Birth:

August 24, 1947

Place of Birth:

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Education:

Left law school in second year

Read an Excerpt

Once upon a time, there was a prostitute called Maria. Wait a minute. "Once upon a time" is how all the best children's stories begin and "prostitute" is a word for adults. How can I start a book with this apparent contradiction? But since, at every moment of our lives, we all have one foot in a fairy tale and the other in the abyss, let's keep that beginning.

Once upon a time, there was a prostitute called Maria.

Like all prostitutes, she was born both innocent and a virgin, and, as an adolescent, she dreamed of meeting the man of her life (rich, handsome, intelligent), of getting married (in a wedding dress), having two children (who would grow up to be famous) and living in a lovely house (with a sea view). Her father was a traveling salesman, her mother a seamstress, and her hometown, in the interior of Brazil, had only one cinema, one nightclub and one bank, which was why Maria was always hoping that one day, without warning, her Prince Charming would arrive, sweep her off her feet and take her away with him so that they could conquer the world together.

While she was waiting for her Prince Charming to appear, all she could do was dream. She fell in love for the first time when she was eleven, en route from her house to school. On the first day of term, she discovered that she was not alone on her way to school: making the same journey was a boy who lived in her neighborhood and who shared the same timetable. They never exchanged a single word, but gradually Maria became aware that, for her, the best part of the day were those moments spent going to school: moments of dust, thirst and weariness, with the sun beating down, the boy walking fast, and with her trying her hardest to keep up.

This scene was repeated month after month; Maria, who hated studying and whose only other distraction in life was television, began to wish that the days would pass quickly; she waited eagerly for each journey to school and, unlike other girls her age, she found the weekends deadly dull. Given that the hours pass more slowly for a child than for an adult, she suffered greatly and found the days far too long simply because they allowed her only ten minutes to be with the love of her life and thousands of hours to spend thinking about him, imagining how good it would be if they could talk.

Then it happened.

One morning, on the way to school, the boy came up to her and asked if he could borrow a pencil. Maria didn't reply; in fact, she seemed rather irritated by this unexpected approach and even quickened her step. She had felt petrified when she saw him coming toward her, terrified that he might realize how much she loved him, how eagerly she had waited for him, how she had dreamed of taking his hand, of walking straight past the school gates with him and continuing along the road to the end, where-people said-there was a big city, film stars and television stars, cars, lots of cinemas, and an endless number of fun things to do.

For the rest of the day, she couldn't concentrate on her lessons, tormented by her own absurd behavior, but, at the same time, relieved, because she knew that the boy had noticed her too, and that the pencil had just been an excuse to start a conversation, because when he came over to her, she had noticed that he already had a pen in his pocket. She waited for the next time, and during that night-and the nights that followed-she went over and over what she would say to him, until she found the right way to begin a story that would never end.

But there was no next time, for although they continued to walk to school together, with Maria sometimes a few steps ahead, clutching a pencil in her right hand, and at other times, walking slightly behind him so that she could gaze at him tenderly, he never said another word to her, and she had to content herself with loving and suffering in silence until the end of the school year.

During the interminable school holidays that followed, she woke up one morning to find that she had blood on her legs and was convinced she was going to die. She decided to leave a letter for the boy, telling him that he had been the great love of her life, and then she would go off into the bush and doubtless be killed by one of the two monsters that terrorized the country people round about: the werewolf and the mula-sem-cabeça (said to be a priest's mistress transformed into a mule and doomed to wander the night). That way, her parents wouldn't suffer too much over her death, for, although constantly beset by tragedies, the poor are always hopeful, and her parents would persuade themselves that she had been kidnapped by a wealthy, childless family, but would return one day, rich and famous, while the current (and eternal) love of her life would never forget her, torturing himself each day for not having spoken to her again.

She never did write that letter because her mother came into the room, saw the bloodstained sheets, smiled and said:

"Now you're a young woman."

Maria wondered what the connection was between the blood on her legs and her becoming a young woman, but her mother wasn't able to give her a satisfactory explanation: she just said that it was normal, and that, from now on, for four or five days a month, she would have to wear something like a doll's pillow between her legs. Maria asked if men used some kind of tube to stop the blood going all over their trousers, and was told that this was something that only happened to women.

Reading Group Guide

Introduction

Maria is a young girl from a Brazilian village whose first innocent brushes with love leave her heartbroken. At a tender age, she becomes convinced that she will never find true love, instead believing that "Love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer…." A chance meeting in Rio takes her to Geneva, where she dreams of finding fame and fortune, yet ends up working as a prostitute.

In Geneva, Maria's despairing view of love is put to the test when she meets a handsome young painter. In this odyssey of self-discovery, Maria has to choose between pursuing a path of darkness, sexual pleasure for its own sake, or risking everything to find her own "inner light" and the possibility of sacred sex: sex in the context of love.

Discussion Questions

  1. In what ways is Maria's process of self-discovery similar to the rites of passage all young women experience?

  2. Of all the turning points in Maria's life, which was the most crucial and why?

  3. Why do you think Paulo Coelho chose a prostitute as a protagonist for a parable on the sacred nature of sex? Can you think of other memorable literary figures who resemble Maria?

About the author

Born in Brazil, Paulo Coelho is one of the most beloved storytellers of our time, renowned for his international bestseller The Alchemist. His books have been translated into 56 languages and published in 150 countries. He is also the recipient of numerous prestigious international awards, among them the Crystal Award by the World Economic Forum, Frances's Chevalier de l'Ordre National de la Légion d'Honneur, and Germany's Bambi 2001 Award. He was inducted at the Brazillian Academy of Letters in 2002. Mr. Coelho writes a weekly column syndicated throughout the world.

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