The Alchemist: Epilogue Summary & Analysis

Santiago now returns to Spain and to the place where his story began. This physical return brings everything full circle, and the abandoned church acts as a bookend for the novel. The church is a holy place, but also a natural place (because of the tree growing through it). The holy and the natural have always been connected in Santiago’s story, and have suggested a more universal nature of spirituality that is meant to transcend individual religious dogma. Santiago now sees that his quest was valuable in itself, despite the fact that it ends where it began. On one level, the book has basically been a longer, more detailed version of the Ralph Waldo Emerson quote, “Life is a journey, not a destination.”

Santiago now speaks directly to God, realizing the irony of his own inability to see the big picture, while God always could. After all that Santiago has experienced and the true love that he seems to have found along the way, a treasure that is only gold and jewels almost seems like a letdown—something entirely worldly as a reward for a journey that was almost entirely spiritual.

Santiago sees that he has received such great generosity and blessings from God because he has purely pursued the path to his Personal Legend, and has not let himself hesitate or fall into a trap of fear. He does the right thing by fulfilling his promise, and he has learned the value of commitment. This is a well-ordered, satisfying, and “happy” ending, but as Coelho clearly intends the book as a kind of parable or moral lesson, it is also somewhat problematic, as some critics have noted. Taken to its logical conclusion, the lesson of the book seems to imply that if someone is unhappy, unfulfilled, or even poor, there is nothing to be done about it—it is either their own fault for not properly pursuing their “Personal Legend,” or it has just been “written” that way.

The book ends with the suggestion that Santiago will return to Fatima and prove that their love is indeed pure and true, and is therefore incorruptible (like the metals the alchemist compared it to). It’s also assumed, of course, that Fatima has been faithfully waiting for Santiago all this time. The two lovers are connected through the Soul of the World, even when they are hundreds of miles apart. Santiago has learned all his lessons and achieved his treasure, and now he can return to the oasis—that place of peace and life in the middle of a war-torn desert—and live happily ever after.