Back to writing

Review: Hippie by Paulo Coelho

December 25, 2019

I originally purchased Hippie for quick airplane reading, and quick it was. I finished the book before my flight landed and with time to spare, not because I enjoyed it but because I was desperate to finish.

Hippie, describes the time period in author Paulo Coelho's life when he was (as the title suggests) a Hippie. The story primarily follows his adventures with a woman named Karla as they embark on the "Hippie Trail" to Nepal.

I personally picked up this book because I have always had a sense of wonder and awe surrounding the late 60s and early 70s. In high school, I wrote my National History Day paper on the "Students for a Democratic Society" (SDS) and whether the organization was the cause or result of the ideological shifts of young people at the time. In general, hippies and their culture of peace and progressive ideas fascinate me. This book managed to make me question that interest. While it is full of interesting tidbits that provided color and depth to the era for me, like the descriptions of the Invisible Post and the books important at the time such as "Europe on a Dollar a Day," the pretentious language and narrating style fell flat for me. I found myself constantly asking "How does he know that?" For example, while the book is autobiographical (thus characters are based on real people) the author chose to use a semi third-person perspective. For me, it felt like the author was putting words/ thoughts into his characters' mouths/ minds. I found this especially unsettling with Karla, something about the thought of her potentially reading this book and having a man who she hasn't spoken to in eons guesstimate her mental state at the time made me deeply uncomfortable. I would have preferred if he had chosen to simply narrate from his own perspective. In addition, the lack of growth depicted in this autobiography was really disappointing. I expected the author to have an "a-ha moment" where he rejected his past elitist viewpoints but it never came. It's a minor quip, and I know that for most it probably was not irritating, but his constant criticisms of people who were not hippies at the time or don't follow his specific viewpoints were really annoying. Especially because I don't think the author realizes how ironic it is that he is levying these critiques on society. The fact of the matter is that he has strayed from hippie ideals, he is a rich man that occupies the upper echelons of society. So his constant bemoaning of people who did not undertake his same lifestyle made my eyes roll so hard.

As a whole, this book felt very pretentious and surprisingly mundane. I personally would be more excited to see a response to the novel by the characters who he felt entitled to speak for. @Karla make a response! I'd read it in a heartbeat.

Book details