Paulo Coelho Quotes

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Paulo Coelho

Profession : Novelist

Birth : August 24, 1947

About the idea of a clash between cultures, between civilisations, I don't believe in it. It's something some political leaders tried to use, and that the media tried and are still trying to sell us, in order to simplify the world and their work.

Paulo Coelho

I hate to be smart.

Paulo Coelho

When I write a book, I write a book for myself; the reaction is up to the reader. It's not my business whether people like or dislike it.

Paulo Coelho

I have been practicing archery for a long time; a bow and arrow helps me to unwind.

Paulo Coelho

I am not a self-help writer. I am a self-problem writer. When people read my books, I provoke some things. I cannot justify my work. I do my work; it is up to them to classify it, to judge.

Paulo Coelho

My literature is much more the result of a paradox than that of an implacable logic, typical of police novels. The paradox is the tension that exists in my soul.

Paulo Coelho

Publishers see free downloads as threatening the sales of the book.

Paulo Coelho

I'm first and foremost a writer. I followed my personal legend, my childhood dream of becoming a writer, but I can't say why I'm one.

Paulo Coelho

I was arrested three times and tortured once.

Paulo Coelho

I don't set out to write about spirituality; I am free to do something different every time.

Paulo Coelho

My connection with Brazil is so abstract. My blood and my way of thinking is Brazilian, but that's it. I don't tend to go back to the past, and although I have an apartment there, I rarely visit. When I move, I really move.

Paulo Coelho

I never say I am a guru.

Paulo Coelho

In writing, I apply my feminine side and respect the mystery involved in creation.

Paulo Coelho

Everything for me is sacred, beginning with earth, but also going to things made by man.

Paulo Coelho

This may sound a little bit idealistic, but when I go to my blog, my Facebook page, my Twitter account, I talk to different people from all over the world, and you see how it's easy to establish a dialogue.

Paulo Coelho

I can't consciously explain how people feel after reading my books. All is too personal.

Paulo Coelho

However happy people say they are, nobody is satisfied: we always have to be with the prettiest woman, buy a bigger house, change cars, desire what we do not have.

Paulo Coelho

I write from my soul. This is the reason that critics don't hurt me, because it is me. If it was not me, if I was pretending to be someone else, then this could unbalance my world, but I know who I am.

Paulo Coelho

I was not encouraged to follow the career of a writer because my parents thought that I was going to starve to death. They thought nobody can make a living from being a writer in Brazil. They were not wrong.

Paulo Coelho

I love almost everything about my work except conferences. I am too shy in front of an audience. But I love signings and having eye contact with a reader who already knows my soul.

Paulo Coelho