Book Review- Paulo Coelho's Eleven Minutes
This's a book review I wrote for a competition a few months back. Paulo Coelho's books are always a gem. Enjoy! or criticise! >< XO
First read Eleven Minutes around age 19 and remember it vividly enough to reread it for the book review and yes, it is a romance novel based on a prostitute named Maria.
Irregardless of one’s belief on sex, can a book that centers on a prostitute’s experiences be described as romantic? But, perhaps love is not an exclusive experience only for the selected who walk the conventional path to relationships and marriage. In Eleven Minutes, Coelho not only makes the novel romantic but makes it read almost like a religious and philosophical discovery, with mentions of Mother Mary, the meaning of sex and love and the history of sacred prostitution. It is sweet and unlike the usual romance books, provokes deep thought, pushing the reader to have an expanded view of sex and morality; at least while immersed in reading the novel.
A short summary would be something along the line of Maria, our protagonist noticing a figure who looks like Virgin Mary advising her not to go on the sexual prostitution path, yet she embarks on it and luckily has a happy ending at the end, instead of being killed or exploited. Maria is depicted as a rather intellectual character, despite being in the sex trade who has rather intelligent thoughts on life and sex. She writes a diary, studies and even falls in love!
However, do not be deceived. This is not an erotic novel nor solely a novel about the sex trade. It is a novel that can be shared by mothers with their young female adult daughters, for it ponders the meaning of sex and body and what it can and cannot be used for without losing oneself. Paulo also gives the reader a sobering view of the prostitution industry by talking candidly about how Maria garnered the courage and clarity to craft a different path for herself eventually, while contrasting it with the circumstances of her other colleagues who remain in the sex trade.
Despite never having been in the sex industry thus perhaps not an accurate judge of it; nevertheless, I feel that Coelho gives a seemingly realistic depiction of the life of a prostitute in Switzerland. He revealed that he had consulted his Swiss agent on the prostitution laws in Switzerland and that Eleven Minutes is based very much on the stories of different prostitutes he had met with, who passed him their manuscripts and shared their stories with him; and that real-life Maria is married with two children since.
As a woman who lives in a more traditional society where women, as compared to men are talked of more disparagingly with regards to sexual mores and a more severe form of misogyny with regards to sex than western societies still exists, I am endlessly fascinated by authors who write in a non-judgmental style on sexuality which is Coelho’s signature style, not just in Eleven Minutes.
To say that this is simply a romance novel with an unusual character as a protagonist would not do the book justice. This novel is essentially a story about grace and redemption. Coelho prefaces the novel with an epigraph that include the story in Luke 7 about the “sinful woman” who is forgiven, and a poem from around 4th Century B.C. with the lines- “I am the prostitute and the saint. I am the wife and the virgin. ” Coelho’s description of Maria’s journey is a reflective one in we can all see fragments of ourselves in her through her thoughts even though we have never stepped into the sex trade.
One of the more outstanding parts of Coelho’s novel is how he portrays Maria’s struggle to choose between the two forms of sex offered to her from two different clients.
One a more loving form of sex and the other a more damaging one disguised as pleasure that is destructive for Maria’s mental health and soul. This brings to mind Bondage Discipline Sadism Masochism or BDSM (a form of sex that involves physical bondage and the giving or receiving of pain) that was depicted in wildly popular blockbuster movies but the dangers of the abuse of such forms of sex are perhaps poorly understood in modern dating culture; as non-fatal strangulation was reported as an earlier occurrence prior to death in 43% of homicides in The Journal of Emergency Medicine in 2007. Non-fatal Strangulation is an Important Risk Factor for Homicide of Women
Coelho describes Maria’s exposure to BDSM in great detail, but does not overwhelm the novel with it, even though it is one of the important centerpieces; rather focusing on Maria’s resultant emotional journey and growth; as she faces her struggles in her profession of sexual work and ponders whether to continue with the “special requests of BDSM”.
It is quite remarkable how Maria’s first exposure to the questionable form of sex she was invited to take part in was described. Paulo shows his depth of skill and research by writing despite nothing happening the first time Maria and the client met, the client told Maria simply by exposing her to the idea of the form of damaging sex he had in mind, Maria would be ready the next time as the changes would have started to happen in her soul.