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57th book of 2019.
I read this book in a day and although my original review of this book was 4 stars, and I complained of the ending... I have done some more mulling.
For the Love of Animals
I'd say I'm a pretty serious lover of most animals. Insects don't terrify me. I'm not big on reptiles (snakes being one of the few things that scare me), but animals, on the whole, bring me a lot of joy. I have several favourite animals, admittedly: dogs, whales, sloths, parrots, monkeys, elephants, octopuses, tigers... So you can imagine my delight when I knew this book was about a tiger on a boat, and not only that, but found the first few pages are simply about sloths. And not only interesting facts about sloths, but general musings, in Martel's wonderful, quiet writing:
I am not one given to projecting human traits and emotions onto animals, but many a time during that month in Brazil, looking up at sloths in repose, I felt I was in the presence of upside-down yogis deep in meditation or hermits deep in prayer, wise beings whose intense imaginative lives were beyond the reach of my scientific probing.
I'd say this book is part (metaphorical) ode to the animal kingdom. There is a lot of beauty and appreciation in this book.
Who Is Richard Parker?
I've never seen the film, but I'm quite aware that its now well known that Life of Pi is about a boy trapped on a boat with a tiger. I'll admit, it's quite the image, quite the poster. Even looking at my edition cover fills me with excitement. A tiger on a boat, with a boy! What a great idea. "What a stolen idea," they say to me. Well, yes. Well, no. Well, I don't know. If you're unaware of the "plagiarism" battle that surrounded this novel you can read about it here. There are the same debates about Rowling robbing things for Harry Potter. There seems to be attacks on most writers. So, without opening up a completely separate debate - I move swiftly on.
Richard Parker is the 450-pound Royal Bengal tiger. Pi's boat-friend. However, I will say that, 1. They do not begin as boat-friends, certainly not. And 2. He is not his only boat friend, in the beginning. Before I read this book, having only seen the (and they are beautiful looking) stills from the movie of boy and tiger. But yes, Pi is also graced with having a hyena, a zebra and a female orangutan on his boat, too.
Now this book is classed as a fantasy. The sceptics like to yelp about the unrealistic nature of the plot. "The tiger would just eat the boy." Yes, congratulations, a valid point, if this were a 'realistic' book. Which it is not. That's not to say it isn't believable. The relationship between Pi and Richard Parker is very believable in the scope of the story. In the same way we believe in the Ents in Lord of the Rings, and we believe that men can talk to cats in Murakami. Avoiding the debate aforementioned, then, this book is everything Atwood claimed it to be: A terrific book...Fresh, original, smart, devious, and crammed with absorbing lore. The latter I have mentioned and will mention again, the richness of Martel's writing on animals was stellar, and unlike anything I've read in fiction before. It's partly wrong to compare it to Moby Dick, but in a way, it is comparable to Moby Dick. I'll have to ponder that one some more.
The ending of the book left me cheated. There is a whole part of the book that goes off into the realm of fantasy a little too much, and disbelief does begin to roll in. So ultimately, that means the book is flawed, no? I haven't re-read this, though I would like to one day. But as it stands in my mind (because it does, it often stands in my mind at the front of the crowd, or else it is tall, so can be seen from wherever it stands) the ending has grown on me. Maybe I am now realising it isn't a cheat. It's the classic "leave it up to the reader" ending. My original review of this referred it to as a "I woke up and it was all a dream"-like ending, which I now consider unfair. Open to the reader - does that mean the writer has been lazy? Couldn't pick how to end it so just threw the half-dead body to us so we can decide, is it dead or alive? (A metaphor, no one is left half-dead at the end). Open to the reader is now proving to me that just lets it sit for a little while longer in the mind. This book returns to me, and it returns to me, amazingly as I have not seen the film, but in stills, in images, because of Martel's vivid language.
A Kingdom in a Book
Life of Pi is one of the books that I look at and marvel how so much is held in so little. A 300 page paperback, that's all it is. A single day of my life, is all it took. I'd go as far to say I haven't looked at tigers in the same way since. Maybe that's one of my reasons for ignoring the Internet's sensationalism around Tiger King. You could argue I'm not watching it because it's "popular", well maybe, but I'll stick with saying, no - it's because of Richard Parker.
Richard Parker is my Tiger King, ladies and gentlemen.
I read this book in a day and although my original review of this book was 4 stars, and I complained of the ending... I have done some more mulling.
For the Love of Animals
I'd say I'm a pretty serious lover of most animals. Insects don't terrify me. I'm not big on reptiles (snakes being one of the few things that scare me), but animals, on the whole, bring me a lot of joy. I have several favourite animals, admittedly: dogs, whales, sloths, parrots, monkeys, elephants, octopuses, tigers... So you can imagine my delight when I knew this book was about a tiger on a boat, and not only that, but found the first few pages are simply about sloths. And not only interesting facts about sloths, but general musings, in Martel's wonderful, quiet writing:
I am not one given to projecting human traits and emotions onto animals, but many a time during that month in Brazil, looking up at sloths in repose, I felt I was in the presence of upside-down yogis deep in meditation or hermits deep in prayer, wise beings whose intense imaginative lives were beyond the reach of my scientific probing.
I'd say this book is part (metaphorical) ode to the animal kingdom. There is a lot of beauty and appreciation in this book.
Who Is Richard Parker?
I've never seen the film, but I'm quite aware that its now well known that Life of Pi is about a boy trapped on a boat with a tiger. I'll admit, it's quite the image, quite the poster. Even looking at my edition cover fills me with excitement. A tiger on a boat, with a boy! What a great idea. "What a stolen idea," they say to me. Well, yes. Well, no. Well, I don't know. If you're unaware of the "plagiarism" battle that surrounded this novel you can read about it here. There are the same debates about Rowling robbing things for Harry Potter. There seems to be attacks on most writers. So, without opening up a completely separate debate - I move swiftly on.
Richard Parker is the 450-pound Royal Bengal tiger. Pi's boat-friend. However, I will say that, 1. They do not begin as boat-friends, certainly not. And 2. He is not his only boat friend, in the beginning. Before I read this book, having only seen the (and they are beautiful looking) stills from the movie of boy and tiger. But yes, Pi is also graced with having a hyena, a zebra and a female orangutan on his boat, too.
Now this book is classed as a fantasy. The sceptics like to yelp about the unrealistic nature of the plot. "The tiger would just eat the boy." Yes, congratulations, a valid point, if this were a 'realistic' book. Which it is not. That's not to say it isn't believable. The relationship between Pi and Richard Parker is very believable in the scope of the story. In the same way we believe in the Ents in Lord of the Rings, and we believe that men can talk to cats in Murakami. Avoiding the debate aforementioned, then, this book is everything Atwood claimed it to be: A terrific book...Fresh, original, smart, devious, and crammed with absorbing lore. The latter I have mentioned and will mention again, the richness of Martel's writing on animals was stellar, and unlike anything I've read in fiction before. It's partly wrong to compare it to Moby Dick, but in a way, it is comparable to Moby Dick. I'll have to ponder that one some more.
The ending of the book left me cheated. There is a whole part of the book that goes off into the realm of fantasy a little too much, and disbelief does begin to roll in. So ultimately, that means the book is flawed, no? I haven't re-read this, though I would like to one day. But as it stands in my mind (because it does, it often stands in my mind at the front of the crowd, or else it is tall, so can be seen from wherever it stands) the ending has grown on me. Maybe I am now realising it isn't a cheat. It's the classic "leave it up to the reader" ending. My original review of this referred it to as a "I woke up and it was all a dream"-like ending, which I now consider unfair. Open to the reader - does that mean the writer has been lazy? Couldn't pick how to end it so just threw the half-dead body to us so we can decide, is it dead or alive? (A metaphor, no one is left half-dead at the end). Open to the reader is now proving to me that just lets it sit for a little while longer in the mind. This book returns to me, and it returns to me, amazingly as I have not seen the film, but in stills, in images, because of Martel's vivid language.
A Kingdom in a Book
Life of Pi is one of the books that I look at and marvel how so much is held in so little. A 300 page paperback, that's all it is. A single day of my life, is all it took. I'd go as far to say I haven't looked at tigers in the same way since. Maybe that's one of my reasons for ignoring the Internet's sensationalism around Tiger King. You could argue I'm not watching it because it's "popular", well maybe, but I'll stick with saying, no - it's because of Richard Parker.
Richard Parker is my Tiger King, ladies and gentlemen.
