Analysis of Paulo Coehlo's “the Alchemist” and Ernest Hemmingway's “the Old Man and the Sea” Based on Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall's “Spiritual Capital: Wealth We Can Live by”
This assignment analyses the novels “The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho and “The Old Man and The Sea” by Ernest Hemmingway on the aspects defined in the book “Spiritual Capital: Wealth We Can Live By” by Danah Zohar and Ian Marshall.
First we analyze “The Alchemist”. A major feature of the book by Zohar is the analysis if the motivations which stimulate a man’s actions and reactions. In the book Zohar advocates that there are majorly 16 types of motivations, eight negative and eight positive, each with a numeric value. She says in the novel that when the summation of the motivations of a job is positive only then can the job lead to a sustainable development of spiritual capital. In “The Alchemist” we find a number of characters who have chosen their lives based on positive motivations and many who have journeyed on their paths motivated by the negative aspects. Here I’m going to analyze the different characters and their motivations.
Starting with the protagonist of the novel, Santiago, he started out his journey as a shepherd. At that point in life his decision was driven by the motivation “exploration”, which according to Zohar has a +1 value. So his decision led to a happy and satisfied life for himself and others dependent on him or related to him, for example, his sheep. Later on he decides to go on and search for his treasure. People may argue that he was driven by a negative motivation, greed, which has a -1 value, so his actions were wrong. But in reality he was driven by “power within”, a +3 level motivation. He had the power to motivate himself to sell his sheep and go out exploring for treasure in an unknown land. He had the strength to give up his sheep and to sail forward to realize his dreams. His association with the crystal merchant and the camel driver may be advocated to have been motivated by “gregariousness and cooperation”. Later on in his travels he reaches higher levels of motivations. For example, in the oasis when he informed the chief of the
First we analyze “The Alchemist”. A major feature of the book by Zohar is the analysis if the motivations which stimulate a man’s actions and reactions. In the book Zohar advocates that there are majorly 16 types of motivations, eight negative and eight positive, each with a numeric value. She says in the novel that when the summation of the motivations of a job is positive only then can the job lead to a sustainable development of spiritual capital. In “The Alchemist” we find a number of characters who have chosen their lives based on positive motivations and many who have journeyed on their paths motivated by the negative aspects. Here I’m going to analyze the different characters and their motivations.
Starting with the protagonist of the novel, Santiago, he started out his journey as a shepherd. At that point in life his decision was driven by the motivation “exploration”, which according to Zohar has a +1 value. So his decision led to a happy and satisfied life for himself and others dependent on him or related to him, for example, his sheep. Later on he decides to go on and search for his treasure. People may argue that he was driven by a negative motivation, greed, which has a -1 value, so his actions were wrong. But in reality he was driven by “power within”, a +3 level motivation. He had the power to motivate himself to sell his sheep and go out exploring for treasure in an unknown land. He had the strength to give up his sheep and to sail forward to realize his dreams. His association with the crystal merchant and the camel driver may be advocated to have been motivated by “gregariousness and cooperation”. Later on in his travels he reaches higher levels of motivations. For example, in the oasis when he informed the chief of the