Life of Pi, Yann Martel

Life of Pi is a Canadian fantasy adventure novel by Yann Martel published in 2001. The protagonist is Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, an Indian boy from Pondicherry who explores issues of spirituality and practicality from an early age. He survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. Life of Pi, according to Yann Martel, can be summarized in three statements: n  "Life is a story... You can choose your story... A story with God is the better story."n

تاریخ نخستین خوانش: هشتم ماه سپتامبر سال 2005میلادی

عنوان: زندگی پی؛ نویسنده: یان مارتل؛ مترجم: گیتا گرکانی؛ تهران، علم، 1383؛ در 530ص؛ شابک 9643053559؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان کانادا - سده 21م

نقل از آغاز: (پی، پسرکی ست که به دنبال حقیقت میگردد؛ یعنی همان کاری که هزاران هزار انسان در سراسر جهان به آن دلمشغول هستند؛ بعضیها پیروز میشوند و خیلیها شکست میخورند؛ در این میان کسانی نیز گمان میکنند پیروز شده اند؛ در صورتی که هنوز سر سوزنی هم به حق و حقیقت نزدیک هم نشده اند؛ اما یک نکته در همه ی این آدمها مشترک است؛ هر کس راه خودش را میرود؛ هر کس به شیوه ی خود کوشش میکند؛ تا به ذات جهان نزدیک شود؛ به تعداد انسانهای روی کره ی زمین راه وجود دارد؛ هرچند هیچکس نمیتواند به سرانجام رسیدن راهی را تضمین کند)؛ پایان نقل؛

داستان با پاراگراف بالا آغاز میشود، و «پی» برای پاسخ به سرگشتگی انسانی؛ راه تازه ای مییابد؛ و ...؛

زندگی «پی» درباره ی پسر جوانی بنام «پی پاتل»، فرزند یک صاحب باغ وحش در «هندوستان» است؛ «پی پاتل» در شانزده سالگی همراه خانواده‌ اش از «هند» به «کانادا» کوچ می‌کنند؛ خانواده «پی» در قسمت بار یک کشتی «ژاپنی»، در کنار جانوران «باغ‌ وحش»، به سوی خانه ی تازه ی خود سفر می‌کنند؛ در میانه ی راه، کشتی غرق می‌شود، و «پی» خودش را در قایق نجاتی به همراه یک «کفتار»، یک «اورانگوتان»، یک «گورخر» زخمی، و یک «ببر بنگال» دویست کیلوگرمی تنها می‌بیند؛ در هفته ی نخست سفرِ «پی»، با قایق نجات، تنها چیزی که بر همه چیز چیره است؛ کشمکش برای زندگی است؛ ادامه ی کتاب یادمان دویست و بیست و هفت روز گمشدگی «پی»، در دریاست

تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 19/08/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ 23/06/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی

I'd been planning to read Life of Pi for a few years now but never got around to it. I had this impression that it was about someone trapped alone on an island and I found that to be a bit boring. Fortunately I was dead wrong and this has been such a powerfully poignant and meaningful read.

"The world isn't just the way it is. It is how we understand it, no? And in understanding something, we bring something to it, no? Doesn't that make life a story?"

I don't want to talk about the plot because I went in completely blind and it was much better than if I had known what exactly this book was about. I'd believed certain things that were not very clear at first,  like who Richard Parker was,  and it was a shock to realize the truth, so I don't want to spoil anything for anyone.

From the very beginning the writing captured me. I simply loved it, and even had the story been boring -which it wasn't- I would've continued reading for the sake of the writing itself. It was excellent!
Here's an example:
"I enjoyed my meal as I watched the sun's descent in a cloudless sky. It was a relaxing moment. The vault of the world was magnificently tinted. The stars were eager to participate; hardly had the blanket of colour been pulled a little than they started to shine through the deep blue. The wind blew with a faint, warm breeze and the sea moved about kindly, the water peaking and troughing like people dancing in a circle who come together and raise their hands and move apart and come together again, over and over."

And others:
"So while I, who wouldn't think of pinching a tiger's paw, let alone of trying to swallow one, received a volcanic roar full in the face and quaked and trembled and turned liquid with fear and collapsed, the shark perceived only a dull vibration."

"Faith in God is an opening up, a letting go, a deep trust, a free act of love—but sometimes it was so hard to love. Sometimes my heart was sinking so fast with anger, desolation and weariness, I was afraid it would sink to the very bottom of the Pacific and I would not be able to lift it back up."

"...Oh, look. Speak of the devil. There he is. He's yawning. My, my, what an enormous pink cave. Look at those long yellow stalactites and stalagmites. Maybe today you'll get a chance to visit."   

The story is brutal. The author has weaved fantasy into its fabric very subtly that I had to pause a bit to understand whether I'd read something wrong or whether this or that had actually happened.  What part was hallucination and delirium and what part was real *I'm talking about you, fellow blind Frenchman* . I loved that.

Another point relating to the brutality of this novel was the realization that we can talk about morals all we like but when push comes to shove, we'd do anything to save our lives in the face of impending doom. Necessity is the mother of all.

" But in point of fact the explanation lies elsewhere. It is simple and brutal: a person can get used to anything, even to killing."

I felt so deeply grateful for sitting comfortably at home, with plenty of water and food. We are so accustomed to having the basics of life always at hand that we forget how everything we are would crumble without one of them.
As someone who doesn't eat animals or their products, I was in deep anguish over what Pi had to do to survive. But I hold no illusions as to what I would've done were I in his shoes. It was just so heartbreaking to read about it in such detail. I'm grateful though. It has reminded me that when it's a battle for survival, you do what you have to do. Simple as that.
"I broke its neck by leveraging its head backwards, one hand pushing up the beak, the other holding the neck. The feathers were so well attached that when I started pulling them out, skin came off—I was not plucking the bird; I was tearing it apart. It was light enough as it was, a volume with no weight. I took the knife and skinned it instead. For its size there was a disappointing amount of flesh, only a little on its chest. It had a more chewy texture than dorado flesh, but I didn't find there was much of a difference in taste. In its stomach, besides the morsel of dorado I had just given it, I found three small fish. After rinsing them of digestive juices, I ate them. I ate the bird's heart, liver and lungs. I swallowed its eyes and tongue with a gulp of water. I crashed its head and picked out its small brain. I ate the webbings of its feet. The rest of the bird was skin, bone and feathers.   

The ending was brilliant in its idea. I had my jaw hanging open through the last 30 pages or so.  I loved that the author left the choice of which story to believe up to the reader. And while the 2nd story is most likely the real one because it's more realistic, I personally can't bring myself to accept it. It doesn't explain everything Pi has experienced, and I've grown fond of Richard Parker. I was SO GLAD when he made it in the end, as it's been a constant worry of mine that he'd have to die at some point.

I had to look up the ending on the internet to know for sure, but I came up empty-handed. It seems that, as this is a story that would make you believe in God, the message is that whether you'd choose to believe in Pi and the story he'd been telling all along, like people choose to believe in the existence of a supreme being; or whether you'd be a realist and accept the 2nd story, with all its horror, and consider Pi's story some sort of coping mechanism with what he went through.

Pi's hardships could also be a symbol for the pain and heartbreak and suffering we go through in life, and here the message is clear: no matter how hard it is, there is always hope.
And this, above anything else, is what I'll take away from this book.
Hope is what keeps us alive.

A man very much aware of the literary elements (obviously an avid reader and serious lit student), Yann Martel proves that a classic can certainly be construed. First off, start with a ridiculous scenario &, doing the reverse of what the Bengal tiger does in the lifeboat, fill it up with meat. He layers the inspirational tale beautifully, & it really helps that the writer's note at the beginning takes you straight to the main source. He knows tons about storytelling. This could have been a 60 page novella, but that would be lesser than the main intention: to construct a sure-fire (pre-"classic") hit.

Let me say, though, that I WAS TURNED OFF by the constant-casual dollops of religion, perhaps what the novel's true main point is. But sometimes petitions are drags. I enjoyed the moments that transported me back to my favorite book in middle school "The Cay" and survival lit always does it's trick: makes you appreciate that you are where you are, and not in the middle of nowhere. Pi the boy is smart & verry patient, a detail that is perhaps even more fantastic than the premise itself. It seems cartoony at times, sure, but when the violence & gore get brutal... well, the combination is simply fantastic. Well done.

UPDATE: Some will see this as good news...there is a movie based on this piffling 21st-century Kahlil Gibran ripoff, directed by Ang Lee, coming out...trailer here. As one can readily see, no smarm or treacle has been spared.


The whole world has a copy of this book, including me...but not for long. Over 100,000 copies of this on GR, so how many trees died just for our copies alone? Don't go into the forest, ladies and gents, the trees will be lookin' for revenge after they read this book.

There is no question that Martel can write lovely sentences: "Those first hours were associated in my memory with one sound, not one you'd guess, not the yipping of the hyena or the hissing of the sea: it was the buzzing of flies. There were flies aboard the lifeboat. They emerged and flew about in the way of flies, in great, lazy orbits except when they came close to each other, when they spiralled together with dizzying speed and a burst of buzzing." (p118, paper ed.) Good, good stuff, nicely observed and handsomely rendered, and not enough to lift this dreary pseudo-philosophical rehash of Jonathan Livingston Seagull into greatness.

Piscine Molitor (Pi) Patel does not wring my heartstrings on his spiritual quest across the vasty deep, accompanied by a tiger named Richard Parker, to a carnivorous island, thence to Mexico to answer to a pair of noxious Japanese stereotypes and, ultimately, to Canada...sort of an anodyne for all the adventure he's been through, the way the author presents it. If I were Canadian or Torontoid (or whatever they call themselves), I'd be livid with fury over this crapulous insult to my homeland.

But hey, I'm Texan and Murrikin, if they don't care enough to run this yahoo outta town, why should I? The yodeling of joyous awakening that fogged this book on its debut..."a story to make you believe in the soul-sustaining power of fiction" ugh!; "could renew your faith in the ability of novelists to invest even the most outrageous scenario with plausible life" oh really?; "a fabulous romp through an imagination by turns ecstatic, cunning, despairing and resilient" *retch*...made my "oh yeah?" follicle erect its sturdy little hair, so I avoided it. But, in all fairness, people I love and respect lived it, so it's a mitzvah to read it, right?

Public notice: My spiritual debt to the opinions of others is, with the reading of this ghastly book, herewith Paid In Full For Good. Most strongly and heartily NOT RECOMMENDED.

n  n
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

I hated this book so much that I can't even talk about why.

Probably one of the most notable novels of our generation. In fact, there are three books in one: the first about religion and faith, the second about wild animals and their behaviour (the best part, if you ask me) and the third adventurous part about the journey itself.

"Life of Pi" is a classic text that yielded even richer rewards for me on my second reading of it. It is easily in my top five favorite books of all time. The reason is very simple. Yann Martel has written a work that is quite engrossing and interesting on two levels: the literal, and the much more satisfying metaphorical.
I first read "Life of Pi" three years ago. I reread it recently because it was a book club choice. Although this novel carved out a niche in my brain on that first reading, I found even more to appreciate and digest during my second.
This allegorical novel explores many themes so fundamental to human existence. Faith, religion, storytelling, survival, love, companionship, etc. Not only does "Life of Pi" explore these themes, it sheds new light on these very overdone topics. That is not easily done. For Mr. Martel to take such universal themes that have been written and discussed a million times over, and make them fresh and new is a testament to his own prowess as a thinker and a writer.
Mr. Martel's writing is also rarely didactic, and his use of figurative language is at times breathtakingly beautiful. As one who enjoys good writing, and am impressed by those who have such tight control of style and language I was not disappointed in that aspect of this text. Too many good storytellers are not good writers. Mr. Martel thankfully does not fall into that category
To not read this book with an open and inquiring mind is to miss "the better story", regardless of what you make that out to be. As I read the text I found and saw a very heavily Christian influence in the book's events and themes. It is just as conceivable that someone else could read it, and see none of those things. What is so wonderful is that both points of view can be defended from the text.
One critic talked about how this novel makes one believe in the "soul sustaining power of fiction." "Life of Pi" lives up to that praise.
Read this text and enjoy one of the few modern novels that gives the reader a real chance to "explore".

The ending of this book put me into a bit of a mental crisis.

The first 2/3 of the book are beautiful, sad, brutal-ish, and oddly filled with hope? While that ending does a full 180 and makes it more tragic, more real, and forces your head to be filled with too many thoughts to comprehend. I'm obviously not an expert on Classics but I believe this is exactly what a classic is supposed to make you feel.

“Life is so beautiful that death has fallen in love with it, a jealous possessive love that grabs at what it can.”

I definitely do not recommend watching the movie before reading this. The movie is okay but this book brings so much more to the table. Plus the movie removed one of my favorite scenes soo...

“You might think I lost all hope at that point. I did. And as a result I perked up and felt much better.”

I will say, at first there were some points where I thought about dropping the book but (thankfully) I couldn't because at the time this was a mandatory read for one of my classes. It's hard to enjoy a book you're forced to read in school but I ended up liking this one quite a bit, even if I did struggle through the beginning. I was literally yelling "Come on!!! Just get stranded already!!!". Seriously though, don't let that lengthy start discourage you from continuing the book.

I'm not a religious person but at times even I was touched by his faith, since it was the only thing he really had out in the sea. Also, this is kind of irrelevant, but the tiger was cute... Dangerous, yes, but cute. I might have gotten a little attached to him.

زندگی پی جدالی ایست بین حقیقت تلخ و دروغ زیبا، واقعیت و توهم ، امید و ناامیدی ، طوفان و آرامش ، ایمان و ناباوری ، بین رد کردن و پذیرفتن ، ذات انسانی و گرگ درون و بالاخره بین پای و ریچارد پارکر.
آقای پای قبل از این که عازم سفر شود ، خود ذات و باطن خدا جویی داشته ، خدای مسلمانان را می شناسد ، با مسیح و کلیسا آشنا است ، داستان خدایان هندو را می داند ، آقای پای با همه فرق دارد ، جدا از آن اسم عجیبش و این که ارقام عدد پی را می داند ، پای داستان یک استثنا است ، او خدا جو اوست ، خدا را در دل طبیعت می یابد و به این ترتیب و با این مقدمات رهسپار سفر می گردد ، بدون آنکه بداند در این سفر باز هم خدا را خواهد یافت ، در دریا ، در طوفان ، در قایقی تنها در دل دریا و در دل خود که از هر اقیانوسی بزرگتر است .
پای ، پسر 16 ساله داستان در طی این سفر دریایی ، با خود آشنا می شود ، او که کشتی ایش غرق شده ، خانواده اش را از دست داده ، با ریچارد پارکر تنها توی یک قایق اسقاطی ایست ، او غیر از خدا و یاد او چه دارد ؟

اما پای ، کوچک مرد دوست داشتنی ما دل به دریا زده نه این که از هندوستان به کانادا رود ، او عازم سفر دیگری ایست ، اوطریق خود شناسی و خدا شناسی را با هم طی می کند ، در خود خدا را می یابد و در خدا خود را

پای آمده تا حقیقت را پیدا کند ، پس اگر با یک گورخر با پای شکسته ، یک اورانگوتان ، یک کفتار و ریچارد پارکر تنها در اقیانوس باشد او را چه باک ؟ که اگر شک مختصری هم داشت با این تجربه به یقین تبدیل شده ، پای 227 روز خود را در پناه او رها کرده ، سکان دست اوست ، اوست که تصمیم می گیرد کِی با ماهی های پرنده ، پای و ریچارد پارکر را سیر کند و کِی با آن وال بزرگ ، آذوقه آن ها بگیرد ، اوست که سیراب می کند . اوست که خشکی را می رساند و همان اوست که آن ها را از خشکی جدا می کند .
اما پای هم یک بیکاره نیست ، او باید تکلیف خود را با ریچارد پارکر مشخص کند ، باید مرزهایش را با او جدا کند ، باید خوی تند ریچارد پارکر را مهار کند ، افسارش را در دست بگیرد که سرنوشت پای و ریچارد پارکر با هم گره خورده است ، انگار که هر دویکی هستند ، با هم گرسنه می شوند ، آفتاب هر دوی آنها را با هم می سوزاند و با هم افسرده و با هم ناامید می شوند .
و بالاخره زمانی که به خشکی می رسند ، ریچارد پارکر از پای جدا می شود ، بدون هیچ احساسی ، پای را رها میکند و به جنگل می رود ، شاید هم به جنگل درون پای می رود که در زمان دیگری دوباره سر بر آورد گویی ریچارد پارکر و پای هر دو یکی هستند .
پای می ماند و داستان او ، داستانی که ذهن بیدار پای ساخته برای ماموران دقیق بیمه کشتی باورکردنی نیست ، اما پای است دیگر ، فقط او می تواند تلخی داستان را این گونه کم کند ، فقط ذهن اوست که ملوان کشتی را به گورخر ، مادر مهربانش را به اورانگوتان وآشپز فرصت طلب فرانسوی را به کفتار تشبیه می کند .
به گمان نویسنده ، فقط پای و ریچارد پارکر هستند که با هم می توانند بر این مشکلات و اقیانوس پیروز شده و داستان باورنکردنی خود را برای خواننده بگویند که دلیلی باشد بر وجود او و عظمت ذات او .

First, the good news!!!
Beware of reading it....danger of addiction....
Symptoms:
unputdownable!!!!!
entrancing!!!
hold a great fascination over the reader!!!!
gripping and enthralling to the uttermost!!!!

Warning:
If you haven't enough time, or an important appointment, don't beginn to read it........
You will much likely be prone to forget the time and your surroundings at all!!!!

The not so good news:
If you love animals, then you have a genuine treat before you.....
Intense and vivid depictions of animal sufferings!!!!

"Life Of Pi" by Yann Martel is about heroism and courage in spite of a desperate situations and having poor resources to lay hands on!!!!
It's about to never give up no matter what!!!!
And it's about suffering and endurance....about faith in God, and what that really means......

"Pi" is a young Indian boy, and finds himself after a devastating shipwreck exhausted and alone in a lifeboat with several wild animals including a full-grown Bengal tiger.... in the middle of the ocean!!!!
And so the story gets off to a dramatic start....

I have enjoy it totally, and although I had some considerations in giving it 5 stars because of the gruesome pictures of animal suffering, I've made my mind towards it!!!!

A great reading experience awaits you, and I'll recommend it wholeheartedly....

Dean;)

No need to reinvent the wheel. Here's my Amazon.com review:

It doesn't matter whether what you tell people is truth or fiction, because there's no such thing as truth, no real difference between fantasy and reality, so you might as well go with the more interesting story. That's "Life of Pi" in a nutshell. Sorry to spoil it for anyone who hasn't read it yet.

Remember that season of the TV series "Dallas" that turned out to be just a dream? That's kind of how you feel after you've invested hours of your time reading page after page of a quite engrossing survival narrative, only to find out that it was all something the survivor made up.

Or was it? Ah, there's the twist that we're supposed to find so clever. But the officials from the ship company who tell Pi they don't believe his story are such hopelessly weak strawmen that the author pretty much forces you to accept the "better story." Pi, and, by extension, Martel, have no patience for the "dry, yeastless factuality" that the ship officials want, you see. Never mind whether it's closer to the truth -- it's just too boring, and we need colorful stories to make our lives richer. Besides, Pi and Martel say, as soon as something leaves your mouth, it's no longer reality -- it's only your interpretation of reality. So why bother grasping for the truth? You prefer the Creation story to the Big Bang? Then go with the Creation story, even if it defies logic and scientific discovery.

That's all well and good. Everyone likes a good story. But there's a time and a place for them, and the ship officials didn't need a story -- they needed to know what happened to their ship. To that end, Pi's entire tale is irrelevant anyway. And that, in turn, makes you wonder what the whole point of the book was. Other than, maybe, to laud the power of storytelling in a really hamfisted manner. Or to advocate for taking refuge in fantastical fiction when reality is too harsh. Or to champion shallow religious beliefs ("Why, Islam is nothing but an easy sort of exercise, I thought. Hot-weather yoga for the Bedouins. Asanas without sweat, heaven without strain."). Or to bash agnostics. Or something.

Be advised that this is not a book for children or the squeamish. Pi's transformation from vegetarian to unflinching killer, and Richard Parker's dietary habits, are rife with gratuituously gory details about the manner in which animals suffer and are killed and eaten.

The story promises to make you believe in God. Yet with Martel's insistence that a well-crafted story is just as good as or even preferable to reality, he leaves us not believing in a god of any kind, but rather suggesting that we embrace the stories that religions have made up about their gods, regardless of those stories' relation to scientific knowledge, since the stories are so darn nice, comfy, warm, and fuzzy in comparison with real life. Whether the God in the stories actually exists, meanwhile, becomes totally irrelevant. So ultimately, Martel makes a case for why he thinks people SHOULD believe in God -- it's a respite from harsh reality, we're told, a way to hide from life rather than meet it head-on with all of its pains and struggles -- and that's quite different from what he ostensibly set out to do. He trivializes God into a "nice story," a trite characterization sure to offend many readers.

Pi sums up this postmodern worldview by telling the ship investigators, "The world isn't just the way it is. It is how we understand it, no?" Well, no, the world IS just the way it is, in all of its highs and lows, triumphs and tragedies, happiness and sadness. But Pi and Martel's solution is to avoid the whole messy thing altogether, pretend that the way things are don't really exist, and pull a security blanket of fiction over your head. Create your own reality as you see fit. That's called escapism. It's fine when you want to curl up with a good book on a rainy day and get lost in the story for a few hours, but it's a lousy way to try to deal with real life.

Pi would tell me that I lack imagination, just as he told the investigators they lacked imagination when Pi claimed he couldn't "imagine" a bonsai tree since he's never seen one, as a way of mocking the investigators' reluctance to believe in Pi's carnivorous island. (Nice cultural stereotyping with the bonsai, by the way -- the investigators are Japanese.) But you see the problem, right? It's not a matter of lacking imagination. It's a matter of conflating things that are obviously imaginary with things that are obviously real. They're not one and the same. It's ludicrous to suggest otherwise. You might as well say that the story of Frodo and the Ring is every bit as real as the American Revolution.

Pi also tells us, quite pointedly, that choosing agnosticism is immobilizing, while atheists and religious folks make a courageous leap of faith. Yet immobility is precisely where Pi places us, so that by the time the book ends, you're stuck not knowing what to think about what you've just read. Do you accept the original shipwreck story just because it's more engrossing, even if it's less believable? Or do you accept the plausible but boring story Pi gives to the officials after he's rescued? Fanciful religious allegories or cold, scientific recitation of facts that might come from the mouth of an atheist -- we're expected to pick one or the other.

But it's a false dichotomy. We needn't make a choice between embracing religious tales merely because they're more interesting or settling for the sobering realities of science and reason. We can go as far as our reason will take us and then leave ourselves open to further possibilities -- just as Pi himself suggests. That's not immobility. That's intellectual honesty -- an admission that I don't know all the answers but am willing to keep an open mind about whatever else is presented to me.

Seems better than saying you might as well just accept the better story since it really makes no difference. That's laziness. And it doesn't make for a very good story.

A cleverly disguised criticism of religion and the magical thinking associated with religious belief systems, Yann Martel's "Life of Pi" was an engaging fantasy-adventure novel about a young boy shipwrecked on the high seas on a life-raft with a Bengal tiger.

This is one of those books that requires careful reading, as the narrator is, as one discovers over the course of the novel, extremely unreliable. But is his unreliability purposeful or is it a necessary and involuntary self-defense mechanism to a traumatic event that he is unable to deal with? It's up to the reader to decide.

Beautifully written and thought-provoking, "Life of Pi" was made into a decent film. The book was better.