The Fifth Mountain

Title: The Fifth Mountain

Author: Paulo Coelho

Publisher:  HarperCollins, 2012 (First published 1998)

ISBN: 978-81-7223-514-7

Pages: 244

This is the fourth review of Coelho’s works here, including The Alchemist, By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept, and Like the Flowing River. I sincerely wish this is not the last, but the recurring theme in all of Coelho’s collection seems to be the same that reading another book of his doesn’t warrant the loyal attention. In plain language, it gets boring after a certain point. I struggled with Aleph, another of the author’s adventures, but dropped it halfway. Possibly intoxicated with The Alchemist’s phenomenal success, the author appears to have fallen in a groove, which churns out morally uplifting stories and articles for the depressed. The works are carefully designed to accommodate the worries and tribulations of people who’ve erred in the past, and are in search of a paradigm to move forward in life. They find their own anxieties expressed by Coelho’s characters in the book who get them quenched in the ebullient flow of wisdom preached by another set of characters. I have lost track of counting the number of times the phrase ‘Warriors of Light’ appear in his books. It seems to fill his literary yield. The huge number of readers vying to get hold of his works should not deter us from taking a close scrutiny of his writing under the cold light of reason. We would be struck aghast at the pointlessness of some of his creations – some parts of them, at least. The driving theme of his masterpiece, The Alchemist, which runs “When you strongly desire for something, the whole universe conspires to get it to you” is one such idea. It is beautiful and so consoling to the ailing heart, but, what does it mean practically? Absolutely nothing, to say the least. So, the idea revered by many people falls to the level of a candy, which is sweet to taste – for a short time, after which the harsh and bitter reality comes biting back.

The Fifth Mountain is also written and produced in the same mould. It concerns about the flight of Israelite prophet Elijah from his homeland where the foreign-born queen Jezebel has tempted King Ahab to adopt Phoenician gods and kill all Israeli prophets. Elijah flies to Lebanon and reaches the town of Zarephath, which its inhabitants call Akbar. He finds accommodation with a young widow having a boy. The child dies, and Elijah returns him to life, by performing a miracle his god kindly grants him. Though he rises in stature among the society, he falls foul of the machinations of the High Priest who is disgusted with the spread of writing and alphabet. The priest worries that when writing becomes universal, the priests have nothing to memorize about and the knowledge will be shared by all. In his wicked desire to destroy the city, he persuades the governor to intensify provocations against the Assyrian army which was camped outside the city walls. Ignoring the invading Army’s appeal for peace, the Governor kills an envoy and invites the wrath of a numerically superior armed force. They attacked one night, decimated the city’s warriors and torched the houses. All young men fled for their lives, leaving the women, children and invalid to fend for themselves. As the governor also fled, Elijah assumed leadership of the town to rebuilt it in memory of the young widow whom he loved and who was killed in the Assyrian attack. The town prospered beyond recognition under Elijah’s guidance, which he left to go back to Israel according to his god’s command.

Coelho turns the trials of Elijah into an inspiring story of how faith and love can ultimately triumph over suffering and that those two feelings are not mutually exclusive. Elijah’s inner struggle when he realizes that the widow’s love was bothering him in following the path which god had set before him is notable for the reconciliation he achieved in the end. The book is easy to read, though not definitely a page-turner. Being a translation, or in spite of, the text is smooth flowing and appealing to all classes of readers. Definitely, you can have a try of this book, if this is one of your first Coelhos. Otherwise, for those who know his style and work from his earlier volumes, there is nothing much new to discern from this one. Whatever we may highlight against the work, there is no denying that Coelho is an enchanting storyteller, and inspires people all over the world to see beyond the ordinary and into the remarkable.

The book is recommended.

Rating: 2 Star