Coelho's Maria: A Playlist

Posted Sun, 04/12/2009 - 20:29 by Shannon Church

Eleven Minutes’ Maria

I chose to do my playlist on Maria, the main character from Paulo Coelho’s novel “Eleven Minutes”. Coelho is one of my favorite modern authors because he creates extremely strong characters that his readers can not only identify with but invest in as well. This novel is no exception.


Maria is a young woman from the interior of Brazil whose first encounters with love leave her heartbroken. At a young age, she becomes convinced that she will never find true love, instead believing that “love is a terrible thing that will make you suffer…”(13) Maria’s simultaneous aversion to and infatuation with love are what shapes her as she begins her journey to leave home and pursue fame and fortune in Geneva, Switzerland. Instead of breaking Maria into distinctive traits, I chose to do my playlist in the form of narrative based on the different women that Maria becomes. Her character is mutable throughout the novel and she transforms herself into distinctly different women based on her circumstances and what she hopes to gain from the situation.

Maria as a Child

The novel begins with Maria experiencing love for the first time. She falls for a boy who is in her class but with whom she has never spoken. The boy and his family move away to Salvador and she is devastated that they never exchanged words. The first 50 pages of the novel emphasize Maria's innocence - which is highly ironic because Maria goes on to become a prostitute. Coelho lays the foundation for this irony with Maria's excessive romanticism early on saying "They never exchanged a single word, but gradually Maria became aware that he was the love of her life. The best moments of her day were walking to school, with him in the distance, and her trying her hardest to keep up" (3).

To represent the innocence of Maria's childhood, I chose Fleetwood Mac's song Sweet Girl .

Sweet girl....
Where would you go,
If you had the time?
Crossing some crazy state-line somewhere?
To whom do you cry?
People are unkind,
Sweet girl...

The lyrics of this song obviously fit with Coelho's characterization of Maria in the beginning. Beyond that, it seems that the tone of the song is melancholy - the singer is lamenting the fact that sweet girls have to grow up and realize that "people are unkind". The quality of the clip above isn't the greatest (it's the only version I could find on youtube) but when polished, the instrumentation compliments the song's regretful lyrics about the loss of innocence. The beat created by the mix of bass and drums is really steady and rhythmic which produces a somber tone as the backdrop. The song starts off fast-paced and energetic, reminiscent of a child's energy, but then drops off towards the end- alluding to the child's initiation into experience. In the second half of the song, the lead guitarist sticks mainly with lower notes and major chords which contribute to the melancholy atmosphere of the song. Layered on top of the instrumentation is Stevie Nicks' voice which is very soothing and steady. Her voice is similar to the instrumentation - she starts off hitting higher notes and sings the words with more energy but her enthusiasm declines as the song continues. She hits a beautiful low note at the end of the last "sweet girl" in the chorus which enforces the idea of this song as a simultaneous lamentation of our childhoods gone by and a warning for children who have yet to realize that the world can be unkind.

Maria as a Traveler

After experiencing her first regrets about love and men, Maria meets a stranger in Rio de Janeiro who promises her fame and fortune. At this stage in her life, Maria is still painfully naieve and without a second thought, she follows the stranger to Switzerland to pursue her dreams of becoming a model and actress. The sinister stranger seduces her with empty promises of love from exotic men, a hefty paycheck and certain fame. Wanderlust overpowers her and she abandons all that she has ever known to simultaneously escape the tedium of her life and seek adventure in a world unknown.

I think Crosby, Stills and Nash's track "Just a Song Before I Go" encapsulates this portion of the novel.

Just a song before I go
To whom it may concern
Traveling twice the speed of sound
It's easy to get burned

Just a song before I go
A lesson to be learned

Again, it's not hard to see that the lyrics in this song align with the events taking place in Maria's life at this point in the narrative. I particularly like the line "Traveling twice the speed of sound, It's easy to get burned". Maria was so enticed by the idea of the "unknown" and making decisions so quickly that she failed to see that the stranger was burning her, setting her up for failure. Additionally, the line "A lesson to be learned" implies growth which Maria undergoes consistently throughout her plight.

Beyond the lyrics, the instrumentation of the song is amazing and it fits well with the text. Crosby, Stills, & Nash only use two guitars and a piano in this song. Paired with the stripped down lyrics, the song initially seems overly-simplistic and a little hollow. But given a second listen, the sound of the guitars mixed with the piano create a nice layering and an effective harmony. This parallels Maria's character in Eleven Minutes. At first, she appears deceptively simplistic yet as the narrative progresses, the reader sees she has many layers that weren't obvious before.

The guitar players jointly play consistent chords that are matched by the repetition of notes on the piano. Because of this, the musical composition reminds me of someone walking steadily yet at a quick pace. Additionally, the piece builds a bit of tension with an accelerated pace and a variation in the notes right before the line "She had to go". This hints at a sense of urgency which is perfect for Maria who felt like she was being driven to pursue life abroad and felt compelled to make her choice in a hurry at the risk of her alternative life and opportunities for love passing her by.

Maria as a Prostitute

After Maria arrives in Europe, her dreams of becoming a famous actress and model are quickly replaced with the reality of her situation. She sees that the stranger's promises had all been lies and his intentions for her had always been to trick her into prostitution. Initially, Maria resists but the stranger shows her the contract she so hastily signed and ultimately she is forced to sell herself for money. She beings to work in a club on Rue de Berne, a street notorious for its prostitution and crimes. Maria forces herself to forget the person she had been before and vows to embrace the woman she must become saying in her diary, "I want to be happy. Everyone does. But no one is. What have I got to lose if, for a while, I decide to become a...it's a difficult word to even write...to become a prostitute? I've never found anyone to love me- now I'm letting life decide for me" (62). To ease some of her guilt, Maria adopts a new deterministic philosophy that fate led her to her current circumstance and that she couldn't have changed it if she tried.

Although Maria manages to abandon almost everything about the woman she was in Brazil, her romantic ideals of love are the only pieces of her former self that endure. After spending months as a prostitute, one would think she would become jaded about men and romance. Instead, Maria's notions of perfect love are what keep her going. She writes: "Its been such a long time since I thought about love or anything called love...but if I don't think about it I will be nothing. We all dream of someone who will come along and see us as a real woman- a companion, a lover, a friend. But with each encounter comes dissapointment. I must think about love...love." (74).

I wanted to split this section of the playlist into two separate parts because it represents a very complex portion of the novel and of Maria's life. Initially, Maria is humiliated and terrified of becoming a prostitute. However, as time elapses, she her new profession becomes a source of empowerment -she learns a great deal about love, sex, and the human condition which gives renews her strength.

For the first portion of Maria's experience as a prostitute I chose the instrumental song "The Heart Asks Pleasure First" by English composer Michael Nyman. Although this song doesn't have words, I think it is an incredibly haunting and beautiful song. I thought it was an appropriate choice because the instrumentation in the song matches Maria's horror and anxiety in realizing her fate is to become a prostitute. The piano is played rapidly throughout the song which creates a sort of anxiousness and a building of suspense. Also, the song sounds completely tragic, although I can't pinpoint why exactly - which adds to the beauty of it. The title of the song is very revealing when considered in the context of its melancholy tone - the fact that the heart asks for pleasure before asking for love is tragic in itself- and it is a fact that Maria must reckon with throughout her time as a prostitute.

After Maria has worked for two years in Switzerland, her perspectives about herself and her line of work have changed dramatically. Maria no longer sees herself as a victim; instead, she celebrates herself as an acute observer of the human condition and as a woman who has made a substantial living from being beautiful and capitalizing on her sexual power. She becomes baffled that so much in life revolves around the average "eleven minutes" it takes for her to have sex with a client, from which the book draws its title. She feels like she has conquered the act of sex by allowing herself to remain emotionally un-invested in it; meaning, she has conquered something that dominates many aspects of the world and the people that live in it. To represent this section of Maria's life, I chose the song "Venus in Furs" by the Velvet Underground:

Shiny, shiny, shiny boots of leather
Whiplash girlchild in the dark
Your servant, dont forsake him
Strike, dear mistress, and cure his heart
Downy sins of streetlight fancies
Chase the costumes she shall wear
Ermine furs adorn the imperious
Severin, severin awaits you there

This is an intense song that depicts a strong woman, possibly a dominatrix, who is highly aware of her sexual power. This parallels Maria's character at this phase in the novel because she has come to terms with her line of work and in embracing it, she has made herself a stronger woman who has control over her life. Maria also realizes she has control over the men she sleeps with noting in her diary: "Men are strange. All men. They can beat you up, shout at you, threaten you, and yet they're scared to death of women really" (83). Her new-found confidence seems to evoke the needs of her clients and Maria begins not only sleep with the men, but she counsels them on their personal problems as well. She becomes a lover and a healer which is another reason I chose the song "Venus in Furs" since Venus was both the goddess or love and healing. I thought the line "Chase the costumes she shall wear... Severin, severin awaits you there" was a really powerful line. The costumes point to an ever-changing woman (reminiscent of Maria) and the name 'Severin' is a generic moniker for a man the woman in the song is looking for. I like the ambiguity of this part of the song and I also like how it parallels the narrative of Eleven Minutes considering Maria soon finds the man she has been looking for.

The instrumentation of this song is very strange (and the music video is even stranger). The mix of extremely different instruments (viola, fiddle, sound distortion loop pedal, among others) produces an almost grotesque effect and Lou Reed's voice is foreboding and dark. I chose this song not only for its relevant lyrics, but because it does sound so unnatural. I think Paulo Coelho wanted to send the message to his audience that the industry of prostitution is itself grotesque and its ability to make a woman like Maria view sex as something separate from emotion is unnatural.

Maria in Love

After the dark period of Maria's life in which she is both empowered and content with herself as a prostitute, she meets a painter named Ralf Hart who pulls her out of this phase and helps her become a new and better woman. She writes in her diary of Ralf: "It's enough just to love him, to be with him in my thoughts and to color this lovely city with his steps, his words, his love... Some people have a natural talent for love, others of us have to re-learn, and everyone, without exception, needs to burn on the bonfire of past emotions, to relive certain joys and griefs, until they can see the connecting thread that exists; because there is a connecting thread that allows us to begin anew" (138-9).

For the portion of Maria's life in which she experiences the transformative qualities of love for the first time I chose Death Cab for Cutie's song "I Will Follow you Into the Dark":

The instrumentation in the original version of this song (not exactly the same as the one heard in the youtube clip) is simple and beautiful. It's a mix of guitar and piano that creates an airy and lighthearted sound which is reminiscent of the emotions of someone who has fallen in love. There is also a pretty long pause in the beginning where it's just the singer strumming his guitar and he doesn't begin singing until about 35 seconds into the song. This creates anticipation which speaks to the larger theme of the song about waiting for a once-in-a-lifetime kind of love.

No blinding light, or tunnels to gates of white, Just our hands clasped so tight, Waiting for the hint of a spark

I think this song obviously represents death but I don't take it to be in the literal sense. It's about how love can change a person into someone better, meaning the person they used to be dies in order for them to be transformed through love. I think the "hands clasped so tight" line represents the union of people and the "waiting for the hint of a spark" signifies the beginning of love between those people. The song continues on:
You and me have seen everything to see, From Bangkok to Calgary- And the soles of your shoes are all worn down, The time for sleep is now... It's nothing to cry about, 'cause we'll hold each other soon"
I think this is such a pretty line that deals with experience. It goes back to the death of one's former self before they fell in love and how far they've walked and how much they've experienced before that point. This is reminiscent of Maria who went through so much only to wind up a different person because someone saw past all the women she had been in the past and loved her for who she had the capacity to become.