Mapping Emotional Transformation in Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist: A Psychoanalytic Study Based on Silvan Tomkins' Affect Theory

Abstract

This paper proposes a provisional psychoanalytic reading of Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist that employs Silvan Tomkins’ Affect Theory as its primary theoretical framework to trace how innate affects shape Santiago’s emotional development, decisions, and pursuit of his Personal Legend. Using scene-focused close reading, the study maps recurring affective patterns—notably interest–excitement and enjoyment–joy as motivating and integrative forces, and fear–terror, distress–anguish, and shame–humiliation as interruptive or regulatory forces—that appear to orient Santiago’s approach and responses to key narrative turning points (e.g., departure from Andalusia; the Tangier episode; episodes at the oasis; encounters with the alchemist). The analysis treats Tomkins’ taxonomy and the concept of affect scripts as descriptive tools for identifying patterned sequences of affect, cognition, and behaviour, while clearly distinguishing textual evidence, theoretical explication, and interpretive inference. Findings are presented cautiously: the affective vocabulary offers a finer-grained account of motivation and resilience in the novel, and reading Santiago’s arc as a sequence of affect-script formations, ruptures, and consolidations illuminates how emotional experiences contribute to self-realization. By foregrounding Affect Theory within psychoanalytic literary criticism, the paper aims to fill a gap in Coelho scholarship and to model a method for affect-driven readings of contemporary quest narratives.