Hippie

　　「如果你想要了解自己，必須先探索你週遭的世界。」

　　Hippie 是保羅．科爾賀的半自傳作品，書中帶讀者回到 1969 年，那個胡士托音樂節的年代，當時的人們渴望和平、敢於挑戰既有社會秩序——威權政治、消費主義，以及財富及權力分配不公的狀況。嬉皮文化在全世界蓬勃發展，在阿姆斯特丹的水壩廣場，留著長髮、穿著鮮艷服飾的青年們在此冥想、玩音樂、討論性解放議題、意識的擴張及真理。他們是拒絕父母輩機械式、未經思考的生活的一代。

　　此時的保羅是個纖瘦、留著山羊鬍及長髮並有著作家夢的年輕男子，他踏上旅程以尋找自由及他的人生意義：首先是到玻利維亞、秘魯、智利及阿根廷，接著他來到阿姆斯特丹的水壩廣場，在那裡遇見了卡拉（Karla），而她說服保羅一同前往尼泊爾。他們與一群有趣的旅伴啟程，而每個人都有各自的故事、每個人都將因這趟旅程而轉變，重新排列人生的優先次序及價值觀；保羅和卡拉也將探索彼此的關係，並做出將改變他們人生走向的選擇和決定。（文 / 博客來編譯）

　　If you want to learn about yourself, start by exploring the world around you.
 
　　Drawing on the rich experience of his own life, best-selling author Paulo Coelho takes us back in time to relive the dreams of a generation that longed for peace and dared to challenge the established social order. In Hippie, he tells the story of Paulo, a young, skinny Brazilian man with a goatee and long, flowing hair, who wants to become a writer and sets off on a journey in search of a deeper meaning for his life.

　　Paulo’s travels take him from South America to the famous Dam Square in Amsterdam filled with young people wearing vibrant clothes and burning incense, meditating and playing music, while discussing sexual liberation, the expansion of consciousness, and the search for an inner truth.   

　　There he meets Karla, a Dutch woman in her twenties who has been waiting to find the ideal companion to accompany her on the fabled hippie trail to Nepal. She convinces Paulo to join her on a trip aboard the Magic Bus that travels across Europe and Central Asia to Kathmandu. They embark on the journey in the company of fascinating fellow travelers, each of whom has a story to tell, and each of whom will undergo a personal transformation, changing their priorities and values along the way. As they travel together, Paulo and Karla explore their own relationship: a life-defining love story that awakens them on every level and leads to choices and decisions that will set the course for their lives thereafter.