Life of Pi

A boy, a tiger, and a lifeboat might seem to be some rather meager materials from which to concoct a novel about life, religion, the very basis of being. This book attempts it, and in many ways succeeds in its aims.Before we get to the lifeboat, Yann carefully develops not only his character of Pi but also shows some excellent slices of life in India, quickly throws both some heavy barbs and some praise for certain aspects of three of the world's major religions, and educates the reader in some basic rules on the care, treatment, and normal behavior of zoo animals. When the ship Pi is travelling on founders, taking down with it his parents and quite a few of the animals from the zoo that Pi's father was director of, Pi suddenly finds himself trapped on a lifeboat with the oddly (but logically) named tiger Richard Parker, and all of this earlier background material comes into play, making the situation not only highly believable but quite fascinating. Pi's resourcefulness in staying alive in this situation for 270 days is exceptional, and Richard Parker becomes a full-bodied character, while remaining very much a real tiger. The interaction between the two and the challenges of the sea is a broad canvas that Yann uses to investigate his larger questions of religion and life, questions which are answered on a very individualistic basis for Pi. But I think most people could recognize some points of contact with Pi's ruminations, and find their own lives richer for vicariously living through Pi's experience.Yann's style is very fluid, occasionally almost poetic, and he gets by with a minimum of description of places and scenes. The style and the carefully placed informational material did much to make me believe in the basic situation of boy and tiger surviving together. The detail work is impressive, from Pi's raft construction to cleaning out the lifeboat of Richard's wastes - details which enforce the feeling that this is a description of reality. However, there were a couple of places where I felt that Yann included some items merely for their shock value, and weren't really necessary to develop his theme or story, and a couple of other happenings did not strike me as at all believable. But neither does he unnecessarily drag out the survival story, and his wrapping of Pi's narrative in a surrounding story of a writer investigating the details of this tale from a much later date adds both cohesiveness and veracity to the story.I was disappointed by the end of the book, as it brings into play the literary artifice of the `unreliable narrator', calling into question the entire earlier portion of the book. While this certainly led me to evaluate all the philosophical points Yann had raised, it left me with a large emotional let-down, an unhappiness with the overall gestalt of the book. I think I would have been happier if this final section had not been included, though many seem to think that it is this section that completes the thematic message of the book.Still, a fascinating read about a truly exceptional situation, with more than enough message to occupy my brain, and enough visceral happenings to keep me emotionally engaged throughout the book.--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)

Beautiful story, but it takes a while to get into. Once it starts moving, it becomes unforgettable.

When I came to the part in the book where Pi is a boat with a tiger and realized that still had many pages ahead, I thought: “well, this is going to be a boring kid in a boring boat with a boring tiger until he is either rescued or death”. I couldn’t have been more wrong. To say that this novel tells the story of a boy in a boat with a tiger reduces into a lame survival plot all the effort the author makes for this book to convey a great deal of wisdom to the reader.Yann Martell manages to tell the same man vs. nature themed story in a completely new fashion, loaded with questions about life and death, beliefs, family and spirituality. Survival stories remind us not only that life is worth living but that we can cling to the desire to live as long as we can find a reason to keep fighting, what if the reason to stay alive is life itself? Pi shows us that sometimes it is when we lose everything that we might find ourselves.I’m hesitant to define this tale as a religious one yet it is deeply spiritual. Pi has a great heart and his soul (his mind, if you rather) craves for knowledge, both physical which is made clear by his interest in zoology and metaphysical which leads him to approach religion. Aristotle said that “All men by nature desire to know” and Pi’s desire to know is nothing else that this natural desire common to all humankind.I believe that what makes Pi different from other boys (and men) is the fact that he is able to realise that both the physical and metaphysical knowledge are rooted in a common true. The spiritual search of Pi is not the search of someone trying to find a messiah, nor of someone looking for a new lifestyle; it is a pursue of a higher truth. That’s the reason why he can be a pious Hindu. And Muslim. And Catholic. Because he understands that both three religions convey a true message. “I told her that in fact she was not so wrong; that Hindus, in their capacity for love, are indeed hairless Christians, just as Muslims, in the way they see God in everything, are bearded Hindus, and Christians, in their devotion to God, are hat-wearing Muslims”.Martell gives you a novel with a powerful insight of a very smart and pious boy who clings to life while coexisting with a tiger in the middle of the sea. The words are overwhelming by the deep meaning they convey and at the same time beautifully used to describe an imposing scenario.This is a book totally worth reading, I totally enjoyed it from beginning to end, loved the characters, yes, it might be a little slow at first and the time spent in the sea to long, but it’s definitely worth it.

Yann Martel’s Life of Pi raises a question that no other novel has ever done before. In proper paradox, the author catalogs the tale that Pi tells of his voyage and one in which one in which replaces the barbaric animals with human beings, seemingly questioning both the Japanese officials and reader’s faith one token. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his story and press him to tell them "the truth." After hours of coercion, Pi tells a second story, a story much less fantastical, much more conventional—but is it more true?The son of a zookeeper, Piscine “Pi” Molitor Patel has an encyclopedic knowledge of animal behavior and a fervent love of stories. When Pi is sixteen, his family emigrates from India to North America aboard a Japanese cargo ship, along with their zoo animals bound for new homes.The ship sinks. Pi finds himself alone in a lifeboat, his only companions a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra, and Richard Parker, a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with Richard Parker for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. Much in the story is left up to the reader’s imagination as it leaves out key details that prove to be crucial to the story such as the sinking of the Tsimtsum and the disappearance of Richard Parker. In part one of the book, Yann Martel sets up the theme of religion by establishing Pi’s poly-religious worshipping preferences: Christianity, Islam, and Hinduism. More so, Martel’s introduction and analysis of the zoo give the reader thoughtful insight into his purpose for the book. Martel hopes to inspire readers’ thoughts by using animals to symbolize how similar people are in fact to other species.In part two of the book, the reader is unaware of the significance of the novel (which could be perceived as ineffective by some at this point), and what Yann Martel is trying to bring to his or her attention. At this point in the novel, Martel relies on his extremely gifted storytelling abilities, giving the reader the impression that Life of Pi is just another entertaining modern survival novel. However, the author makes sure to give subliminal messages throughout the novel, almost all of which carry a heavier significance by part three of the book.There are times when Martel pushes the didactic agenda of his story too hard. One episode involving a bizarre ''Gandhian'' island of carnivorous seaweed -- populated by an enormous herd of South African meerkats -- struck as a little too baldly allegorical, however magical in its imagery. Despite this Martel is able to keep his feet on the ground by focusing on the physical and logistical details of his hero's predicament.Moreover, in the book's final chapters Martel gives Life of Pi an intriguing twist. After the lifeboat comes safely to shore in Mexico (and Richard Parker disappears without ceremony into the jungle), Pi finds that his wild narrative is not believed by the officials sent to debrief him. And he knows exactly why: ''You want a story that won't surprise you. That will confirm what you already know. That won't make you see higher or further or differently. Urged to provide a more credible explanation for his survival, Pi placates the officials with a story that contains just the kind of ''dry, yeastless factuality'' they're looking for. But is this more straightforward (and tigerless) version of events actually closer to the deeper truth of his adventure? It's a testimony to Martel's achievement that few readers will be tempted to think so. Whether the first or second story is accurate is left up to the reader to decipher.Perhaps the best indication of Life of Pi as a contemporary Postmodern novel is its theological destitution: instead of being interested in the theological basis of Pi’s soul, it is really interested only in the theological basis of storytelling. The former is or could be a day to day, lived reality; the latter is only a piquant but now familiar contemporary abstraction. Yann Martel’s prose leads the reader to believe Pi’s abstract story as told with conviction and establishes a bridge between religion and the moral of the story being hope: without hope the situation seems helpless and barbaric but with hope the situation is romanticized and tells the tale of love and admiration. The novel leaves the reader desiring more of the story and will leave him with a better understanding of animals, the barbarity of the human race and will leave much to ponder about the story of a young man and his journey with a Bengal Tiger.

This is a thrilling adventure story that has made me laugh and weep. In this review I plan to talk about the wonderful, exciting story in its entirety. It's better not to read it if you want to maintain a sense of surprise which Yann Martel, amazingly, continues to do in his story. So please, stop now if you have not read this book.It's that sense of surprise that kept me reading, dragging me through the story as if I were tied to a truck rolling through a busy street. I couldn't put the book down. I was pulled through it by my curiosity. Read it then come back and write about it.A boy and a tiger on a boat. It sounds like it belongs under the magical realism section, with Salman Rushdie. But its not. The story is told by a narrator acquainted with the mathematics of animal-human interaction. But to confine this story to one within the limits of zoology would be ludicrous. Pi is a student of religion and animals. Religion perhaps is something that differentiates humans from animals and that question of what makes us humans unique is a recurring theme in the story. For Pi, the love of God is mankind's unique and greatest joy. It's not a God that belongs to a people or a culture, but a universal God, the Creator of a world that Pi loves. "A God", as Pi says in a memorable line, "whose presence is reward enough".If love of God is unique to human beings, then so is intelligence. And it is intelligence that Pi uses to survive the long journey, on a small boat, with a tiger. With constant awareness of the tiger's state of mind, and the resources available to him, Pi does survive, and this seemingly miraculous survival is what makes up the bulk of this story's 100 chapters.Pi survives to tell the tale. Had the story finished with his final adventure, another battle against the inevitable hunger and danger of his travel companion we would have a story both miraculous and amazingly - acceptable.But the story continues. After his rescue Pi is interviewed and after great stress gives a second description of his survival. This description is gruesome, horrific, and since it differs to the story we have just finished reading, raises very challenging questions.Firstly and most importantly, which version is the true one? Could such a horrific and gruesome story have been made up?But on the other hand, can we really consider dismissing the original story as a mere metaphor for the second "true" story? What of the spectacular details? And what of those parts in the first story which don't seem to map to the second version so easily?Is the first story just a metaphor? If it is, then this is ultimately a book about the human need for myth as a means for living with impossible truths.If it is not, and the first story is the true one, then this second story is just a bone thrown to a dog, a "rational" version of events thrown to a "rational" interviewer, a fool for whom "reason is gold".Which is the true answer? Do we accept the first or the second version?Ultimately, Yann Martel asks us to choose: Is it a believable fantasy, or is it a necessary metaphor?How we choose is maybe related in no small measure by our own relationship with reason and rationality. Do we rely on them entirely for our survival, or might we allow for something else, some unfathomable good "beyond the realm of thought and language"?