By The River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept

After reading Alchemist and The Zahir, I didn’t find this story too impressive, it’s simple; a girl gets a call from a childhood friend to attend his lecture. She meets him and the bonding gets strengthened. Then she comes to know that he has the ability to create miracles and cure people and he is now in the seminary. He talks about the feminine side of God and spirituality. Now he is torn between his love for her and his responsibility towards fellow humans. By the time she decides to support him in his responsibility, he gives up his ability to be with her. So she runs away from him and writes the story sitting by the side of the river Piedra.

The story line has nothing new to it. We all have heard such stories before. But Paulo makes it special with his words, the way he puts everything and the way he describes the emotions of the characters.

It is about a guy who is torn between love and responsibility. He had to make a choice. A tough one. It is about a girl who didn’t want to fall in love because she knows the risks involved and thus, doesn’t want to suffer. But yet she falls in love and is ready to take risks and suffer. Have you ever come across someone who says that he/she loves so-and-so person but knows that they can’t be together in future and yet he/she loves that special so-and-so in his/her life? Doesn’t it make you wonder why they want to complicate their life? In my opinion, it sounds logical that if you are so sure you can’t be together, you shouldn’t mess your life with emotions like this. Then why does one fall in love in such a situation knowing all the circumstances? This is what this book talks about. Read it to find out more. 

The description of the “Other” in us which stops us from taking some firm decisions is good. I felt this “Other” represents someone capable of taking those decisions which sometimes we don’t take because of the circumstances around us, I mean, if you forget all the circumstances, you will take decisions like that “Other” and not the way you take now.

I was amazed that Paulo gave it a happy ending. Not that I don’t like happy endings. In fact, I love happy stories. But it would have been good if he had ended it with Pilar sitting by the side of river Piedra. It would have been close to reality of those who go through the emotions that Pilar went through in the middle of the story. Paulo says in this book, all love stories are same. Yes, the emotions maybe are same, but then not all love stories have a happy ending. Maybe he should have given it a thought.

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Write by: RC - Wednesday, April 23, 2008