Eleven Minutes
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Eleven Minutes (Onze Minutos) is a 2003 novel by Paulo Coelho based around a young prostitute named Maria.
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[edit] Plot introduction
Maria, from the interior of Brazil, goes to seek her fortune in Switzerland, only to find that reality is harder than she expected and she ends up working in a brothel on Rue de Berne, the heart of Geneva's red-light district. The book deals with issues surrounding sex and sexuality, such as prostitution, and sacred sex in the context of love. Because of its graphic descriptions, the novel has been described as "erotic".
Maria is on journey to find what true love is but ends up letting her own life guide her. She enters a life that leads her down the path of sexual awakenings and almost leads to her self-destruction when she is introduced to all sides of sexual experience. When she has given up hope to find true love she meets a painter with whom she falls in love. And she must now choose where she is to take her life. Either to let it lead her or finally take control of her life and end this subtle self-destructive life she is leading. Just like many of Coelho's books, this book is also about a journey of self-discovery that leads the reader into understanding the issues of sex (in prostitution), sacred sex, and sex in the context of love.
[edit] Characters
Maria – the main character
Maria's father – a salesman
Maria's mother - a seamstress
Boy from Maria's childhood - this was Maria's monkey love (she was 11 year). Experience with this boy became Maria's motivation to be bolder with boys/ men.
Maria's boyfriend who gave her the first kiss – later this boy flirted with Maria's girlfriend. It motivated Maria to earn a lot of money so one day she could humiliate him (beside buying a farm for her parents)
Maria's boyfriend to whom she lost her virginity – Maria used him to learn about sex.
Store owner – Maria’s boss. He fell in love with Maria and provided the money for her trip to Rio de Janeiro. He became Maria’s safety net in her future plan
Maílson – translator / security / agent in Rio de Janeiro, he provided translation service when Maria met Roger Roger – his main interest was to employ beautiful young girls to dance at his club.
Vivian – a cold woman who knew better that the young girls would not get their dream (i.e. adventure, money, finding husband) while worked for Roger. She introduced the name “Rue de Berne” to Maria, which was a red district in Genève
Arabic boyfriend – Maria’s acquaintance with this man cost her her job at Roger’s club
Heidi – the woman at the library from whom Maria borrowed books
Maria’s first customer – an Arabic man, he paid one thousand Swiss franc to sleep with her
The invisible woman – only Maria could see her. She took the appearance of Virgin Mary, Jesus’ mother
Milan – the owner of “Copacobana” where Maria worked as a prostitute
Nyah – Filipino prostitute and Maria’s only girlfriend at Copacobana
Ralf Hart – a 29 year old successful painter to whom Maria secretly fell in love. Ralf married twice but got divorced because he lost interest in the sexual part of a relationship. He saw Maria as his opportunity to learn about sex once again
Terence – a wealthy English man who introduced Maria to the pleasure of sadism and masochism
[edit] Translations
Although the novel was originally written in Portuguese and published as Onze Minutos, it has been translated to numerous foreign languages.
- ഇലവന് മിനിറ്റ്സ് (Malayalam)
- Njëmbëdhjetë minuta (Albanian)
- أحدى عشر دقيقة (Arabic)
- বাংলা (Bangla)
- Единайсет минути (Bulgarian)
- Onze minuts (Catalan)
- 愛的十一分鐘 (Traditional Chinese)
- Jedanaest Minuta (Croatian)
- Jedenáct minut (Czech)
- Elf Minuten (German)
- Üksteist Minutit (Estonian)
- Yksitoista minuuttia (Finnish)
- Onze Minutes (French)
- Tizenegy perc (Hungarian)
- Eleven Minutes (English)
- Vienpadsmit minūtes (Latvian)
- Vienuolika minučių (Lithuanian)
- Единaeсет минути (Macedonian)
- Elf Minuten (Nederlands)
- Elleve Minutter (Norwegian)
- Ellefu Mínútur (Icelandic)
- Одинадцять хвилин (Ukrainian)
- Jedenaście minut (Polish)
- Одиннадцать минут (Russian)
- Once minutos (Spanish)
- Έντεκα λεπτά (Greek)
- Undici Minuti (Italian)
- یازده دقیقه (Persian)
- 11分間 (Japanese)
- 십일 분 (Korean)
- 11 นาที (Thai)
- On Bir Dakika (Turkish)
- Једанаест минута (Serbian)
- Elva minuter (Swedish)
- Unsprezece minute (Romanian)
- Labing-isang Minuto (Filipino)
- Sebelas Menit (Indonesian)
- თერთმეტი წუთი (Georgian)
- אחת עשרה דקות (Hebrew)
- Mười một phút (Vietnamese)
[edit] See also
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