Life Of Pi: Piscine Patel’s Relationship Throughout The Novel
Development describes the growth of humans throughout their lifespan, from conception to death. Relationships are important because, even though we come and go from earth alone, it is impossible to isolate ourselves from others. In life, without knowing ourselves we cannot know each other. In Life Of Pi, Piscine Molitor Patel is a curious boy who is very fond of his different faiths and his zoo animals. As he comes across a storm, he loses his entire family and a couple of zoo animals; Pi learns through the journey of the sea the key to survival is relationships. Yann Martel tries to tell the reader that relationships shape an individual’s life. This is illustrated
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Piscine is born into a Hindu background, however, finds intriguing ways into Christianity and later on, Islam. In all three faiths, he has succeeded to prove his loyalty. When stranded on a lifeboat, his faith is tested through extreme struggles of survival within his environment; such as having a limited amount of food. He decided to start hunting for himself and Richard Parker. Although he is a vegetarian, he becomes a murder to a flying fish. Despite the necessity of the act, Pi can only believe, “[he] was now as guilty as a Cain.” (Martel 203). The author displays the relationship between Pi and his faith in a metaphor where he compares himself to Cain, (a religious figure in Christianity and Islam who committed the first murder in history). He can only choose to believe this sin he has committed is equal to that of Cain’s, who murdered his brother. The extremity of Pi’s circumstances causes him to commit his first real …show more content…
Piscine’s bravery to train one of the most dangerous animals proves the change in Pi’s life. He tackles his enemy, Richard Parker becomes his most awaited companion on his stranded journey. Oncoming death was a game changer for Pi, and he knew, “[he] had to tame him. It was at that moment that [he] realized this necessity. It was not a question of him or me, but him and me. We were literally and figuratively, in the same boat. We would live - or we would die - together” (Martel 181). Martel displays the determination in Pi’s voice by convincing the reader the strength in his words by keeping the phrases concise. This quote also, tells the readers that he was all he had, so “once Pi established territorial limits with Richard Parker, he moved to initiate the semblance of a working relationship with the ferocious beast. In order for their minute society to endure Pi would need to rely on Parker for companionship” (Riley,
Stranded for 227 days at sea in a lifeboat, with no one else except an adult Bengal tiger. This is exactly what the main character Pi, in "The Life of Pi" went through. "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel is a story about a boy named Piscine Molitor Patel, an Indian boy who survives more than seven months floating on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean, with no one else but a 450-pound tiger (Cooper). Yann Martel was born on June 25, 1963, in Salamanca, Spain. His parents, Emile Martel and Nicole Perron, were both born in Canada. He spent his childhood in several different countries, including France, Mexico, the United States, Canada, and Costa Rica. As an adult, he lived in many other places but one of them was India, which may be where he got inspiration for writing “Life of Pi”. Yann Martel uses the literary elements similes and foreshadowing, to express the theme that believing in religion can give you the faith to want to survive.
Piscine Molitor Patel, also known to Pi Patel, was the main character in the story. Pi had lived a life of faith. Nevertheless, the boy had never stopped loving God. Mr. Francis Adirubasamy had once mentioned the toy train in the botanical garden, “A train still runs on Sundays for the amusement of the children. But it used to run twice an hour everyday…The toy train had two stops: Roseville and Zootown. Once upon a time there was a zoo in the Pondicherry Botanical Garden (Martel XI)”. Pi’s faith in God is like the toy train. It is a cycle that must be tested over and over again. No matter how busy Pi’s life was, he never forgets to slip in a prayer during his days. No matter what changes will be made in his life, Pi will always return to God. No matter how many times the train stopped, it will always continue to be on its track. No matter whether the train was broken or stop functioning, it could always be fixed and continue to toot its way around the track.
Both of the main characters in each work created an alter ego for themselves. In Life of Pi, Piscine’s alter ego was a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker, who lived in the Pondicherry Zoo, which Piscine’s father ran until the Patel family decided to move to Canada. This was not evident during the course of the novel, but it became clear to the readers at the very end of the book when Piscine, also known as Pi, conversed with officials from the Maritime Department in the Japanese Ministry of Transport. After Pi told the officials two varying stories of how he survived 227 days at sea, Mr. Tomohiro Okamoto and Mr. Atsuro Chiba exclaimed that “the Taiwanese sailor [was] the zebra, [Pi’s] mother [was] the orang-utan, the cook [was].the hyena—which means [Pi was] the tiger” (Martel 346)....
Piscine Patel was born and raised in an Indian town, this is where he began his own hero’s journey. Pi’s journey started out in his own ordinary world where he studied zoology and religion studies at the University of Toronto. Pi then went on to St. Michael’s College and graduated at the top of his class with awards from the Zoology Department (Martel 6). Pi was also very interested in his father’s zoo animals (Riley). In the ordinary world, Pi came across many circumstances that would later trouble him. While in India he began to practice four different religions. Pi spent a great deal of time in prayer and in the temples. Once all the priests found out about his multiple religious practices he was told not to take part in all religions and that he had to make a choice between them (Martel 85). Pi chose to still take part in all practices, but he tended to stay in the back of the temples. One day Pi’s father announced that they were moving to Canada, this is when Pi heard the call to adventure. He
The protagonist Piscine Patel is able to adapt to situations in his life through a strong sense of motivation.
Religion is always known as a source of hope, but in the novel, Pi must choose between keeping true to his religious faith or survival. During Pi’s drift in the Pacific Ocean, he faced the situation where he had to kill a life to feed Richard Parker: “I wept heartily over
Religion is and always has been a sensitive topic. Some choose to acknowledge that there is a God and some choose to deny this fact to the death. For those who deny the presence of a higher being, “Life of Pi” will most likely change your thought process concerning this issue. Yann Martel’s, “Life of Pi”, is a compelling story that shows the importance of obtaining religion and faith. Piscine (Pi) Patel is both the protagonist and the narrator of Martell’s religious eye-opener who undergoes a chain effect of unbelievable catastrophes. Each of these catastrophic events leaving him religiously stronger because he knows that in order to endure what he has endured, there has got to be a God somewhere.
Having just experienced the sinking of his family’s ship, and being put onto a life boat with only a hyena, Pi felt completely lost and alone. When he sees Richard Parker, the Bengal tiger from his family’s zoo, it is a familiar face to him. His initial reaction is to save the life of his familiar friend so that he may have a companion, and a protector aboard the lifeboat. Suddenly Pi realizes just what he is doing. He is saving the life of Richard Parker, by welcoming him, a 450 pound Bengal tiger, onto the small lifeboat. He experiences a change of heart when helping the tiger onto the boat. Pi realizes that he is now posing a threat on his own life. With Richard Parker on the boat, Pi is faced with not only the fight to survive stranded in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, but the fight to survive living with a meat eating tiger. The change of heart that Pi experiences might possibly mean that he is an impulsive thinker. It may mean that he often does something on impulse without thinking it through, and then later regrets his actions.
The son of a zookeeper, Pi 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. The Japanese authorities that 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?
An id and ego split is also shown between Pi and Richard Parker. Richard Parker is an imaginary tiger that is created by Pi in order to keep him alive and focused on staying alive. Pi eventually abandons his superego and partakes in eating meat, even though he was a strict vegetarian prior to being lost at sea. Over the duration of Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, the story relates to Freud’s theories in several ways that are made blatantly obvious; these relations are what makes this story come together to keep the reader involved and interested. Works Cited Martel, Yann.
He lives in a zoo, and is surrounded and influenced by animals daily. His knowledge of animals grows as he does, and he learns and sees new things year after year at the zoo. One peculiar, yet crucial thing that Pi learns while living in the zoo, is the concept of zoomorphism. Zoomorphism, “is where an animal takes a human being or another animal, to be one of its kind”(84). He explains that within the zoo that he spent his childhood, there were many cases of zoomorphism, from the strange friendly relationship between the goats and the rhinoceroses, to the even stranger friendly predator-prey relationship between a viper and a mouse. Pi then says that the only explanation for zoomorphism is that the “measure of madness moves life in strange but saving ways”(85). The rhinoceros and goats get along because the rhinoceros, “[is] in need of companionship”(85), and without the goats, the rhinoceros would become depressed and die. This explanation of zoomorphism is major foreshadowing and background on why Richard Parker and Pi can live together on the lifeboat. Like the rhinoceros, both Pi and Richard Parker would have died without the company of another being. The “madness” that is the relationship between Richard Parker and Pi, scares Pi and causes him stress. However, this stress and fear keeps Pi alive, and ultimately saves his life. Therefore, the story with the animals is true, because
The Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, is the story of a young man, Piscine, or Pi for short, who experiences unbelievable and unrealistic events, which are so unrealistic ambiguity is aroused amongst the reader. Duality reoccurs over the course of the novel through every aspect of Pi’s world view and is particularly seen in the two contradictory stories, which displays the brutal nature of the world. Martel wonderfully crafts and image of duality and skepticism though each story incorporated in this novel.
The author left the reader thinking about how religion and faith can have an impact in our lives positively. Religion can affect our choices in life, and faith In the novel, Pi grows up to be a religious man, growing up in a place with diverse culture. He believes that “religion is about choosing the better story”. Therefore, he learns to worship three religion - Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam.
As the reader examines the novel Life of Pi by Yann Martel, the reader recognizes the similarities between the story of the animals and the factual story. The main character Piscine Molitor Patel, known as Pi, goes through many struggles once he is stuck on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean which are shown between both of his stories. Throughout the novel, Martel describes to the readers the relationships the Pi has between the animals in the story of animals and the real people in the factual story. In Life of Pi, Pi meets many different animals on his journey on the lifeboat that influence him in many ways, including the zebra, which represents the Taiwanese sailor; the hyena, which represents the chef; Orange Juice, the orangutan, which represents Pi’s mother; and the Royal Bengal tiger, Richard Parker, which represents Pi himself.
The projection of Richard Parker helps Pi to be aware of this current situation, which was him being stranded in the ocean on a lifeboat in comparison to his beliefs in his religions. His fear towards Richard Parker was one of the reasons of his survival. Pi says, “Fear and reason fought over answer. Fear said yes. He was a fierce, 450-pound carnivore. Each of his claws was sharp as a knife” (Martel 108). Pi describes Richard Parker as an extremely dangerous, fearful, and vicious predator. This causes Pi keep aware because he is on a boat with a deadly carnivore. He tries to keep awake at night while being on the lifeboat with Richard Parker from the fear of being attacked and eaten by the Bengal tiger. However, since Richard Parker is Pi’s id, it was actually him keeping himself aware and alive. Pi states, “If I still had the will to live, it was thanks to Richard Parker. He kept me from thinking too much about my family and my tragic circumstances” (Martel 164). This shows how Richard Parker occupies Pi’s mind and influences his thoughts about the tragic incident that has happened. The will to live for Pi is no longer his family, but Richard Parker, his id. Richard Parker taught Pi how to survive based on his instincts an...