I read “The Witch of Portobello”, the ‘international best seller’ labeled Paulo’s latest work in a rainy night and anything
in this world couldn’t resist me continuing it until I went through the last lines of the book towards the misty dawn. As on the Author’s own words it is a ‘biography’. The biography an exceptional lady called Athena, depicted through a series of narrations by individuals who directly interact with Athena. And the list includes her divorced husband, foster parents, biological mother, apartment owner, parish priest, friends- especially a newspaper reporter and an actress etc. The biography starts with the words of the reporter who himself consider the lover of Athena. She, the ordinary Sherine, with a gypsy origin, deserted by her biological mother, later fostered by rich Lebanese parents, at 19 starts the quest to fill up the silences in her life and to fill up the spaces within her and the author finds himself this is the apt age for such a quest. With an irresistible passion to give birth to a child she entered into a married life, of course she loved husband to the extreme, but separates with her husband in pursue with very visible reasons as in the case of other ordinary couples – the complications in adjustment between realities and blue moons. Later she, Athena, as she herself calls, wins in her quest and fills the silences in side her through her own difficult and complex ways. She found the possibilities of dance and music. Here the author uses the most common and ancient equipments as measures for this. Later she masters in calligraphy and finds the same possibilities as that of dance and music. She turns to a protagonist revealing the future of people and gains the name
witch of Portobello. More and more mob reaches there to hear from her. She helps the people to unleash the energy within them through her mystic
ideas even though they are not at all mystic to great extend as the author thinks about them. There are a lot to go in par with her ideas, but, as usual, the church; no other establishment since the origin of religion; came into resistance with her ideas saying that it is witchcraft. The destiny of Athena is, as expected, a murder in the night but the mystic nature of the story is more mystified by the author by hiding the murderer of Athena behind the curtain. By not revealing the truth behind the murder, the author keeps the craft and story to the apex literature. The craft of the story is that of the super storyteller, of course, but it is so sorry to say that this story is an extension of his famous Alchemist in certain ideas and ideals. In “Alchemist” he uses the superb symbol ‘desert’ as the key of the novel but here he uses dance and music as the ways to find out the universal mother. The narrating style only makes the story elegant and nothing more than that except some shallow and keen observations about life. This novel should be debated on the raging increase of human gods like Sri Sri Ravisankar, Satya Sai Baba, Matha Amrithanandamai etc. across the world.
A book is great when you reach in another world of experiences while reading it.You will be astonished,wondered,worried,thrown into a deapth of ocean of multiple feelings on completing it.Exactly "Alchemist" works in the same way,but not the "witch".The author is at his best while explaining Athena's confrontation with the priest.The story some what silmilar in nature with that of " Veronica decides to Die" stands aside in narration and artistic talent also.