The Witch of Portobello..

The Witch of Portobello by Paulo Coelho

I am not so into witches.  I haven’t even seen the famous movie “The Blair Witch Project”.  Since childhood, I have this image of witches with crooked nose and creepy finger nails riding their broomsticks wearing their disturbing huge witch hat, which I don’t really like.

And so when Sara lent me this book “The Witch of Portobello”, I agreed on reading it because she recommended it.  It took time for me to start reading the book, It’s ladies stuff and I have the slightest interest on that kind of novel judging by its title.  But Sara kept on asking me if I’ve already read the book, so I read it.

It has an interesting story.  A story about an orphan who was adopted by loving parents and grew into a beautiful, confident and independent woman.  She named herself Athena. She learned and developed special abilities that she used to teach others, to help others.  And in doing so, she had formed some sort of ‘cultish’ group that the religious institutions didn’t approve, which causes her problems and tested her faith.

The idea of  “the Great Mother” is something stimulating but I believe it’s better that she should have no gender.  I prefer to call him/her “the Creator” or “the One Force”.

If a woman read this story, I think it’ll inspire her a lot.  For this book talks a lot about being a mother, a lover, a teacher and being a woman.  There are lots of words of wisdom printed on the book and I too find them inspiring.

I don’t really like the parts of having rituals and having some cultish meetings.  It just seemed too much.  But aside from that, the book is good and worth reading.  In the end, it tells what really Love is, and ‘Love simply is’.

~ by JM on March 21, 2012.