Life Of Pi Questions

Throughout the entire novel the author gives us characteristics about Pi, he is the protagonist and, for most of the novel the narrator. In the chapters that frame the story and tell us everything that has happened they portray Pi as a shy, graying, middle-aged boy, whom tells the author about his early childhood and the shipwreck that changed his life, and gave him a new friendship with someone whom you would never believe a human could become friends with. This novel makes everyone question the truth which makes us wonder if Pi’s story is accurate and makes us wonder what pieces we should believe. Pi emphasizes the importance of choosing the better story which makes

In the book, The Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Pi becomes a different person after he kills the flying fish. In the beginning of the passage Pi shares that he is a vegetarian, and could never hurt anything living. After Pi kills the flying fish to use for bait, he says, “I wept heartily over this poor little deceased soul” (Martel 88). This portrays the morals of Pi before he kills the flying fish. He gives life a great value and is reluctant to interfere with the wellbeing of anything living. Later in the story, Pi kills another fish, this time a dorado. After catching the dorado, Pi says, “killing it was no problem” (Martel 89). The attitude Pi has towards killing a fish changes drastically the second time compared to

Life of Pi begins with an unique hook in its author’s note. In the author’s note, the fictional author is struggling to come up with a new book concept. He travels to India for inspiration and this is where he meets Francis Adirubasamy, or better known as Mamaji in the book. Adirubasamy claims that he has “a story that will make you believe in God”. After he recounts on the story, the author is determined to meet up with the main character, and he was reeled into the amazing world known as the Life of Pi. As the author listens into Mr. Patel’s adventure, his main objective was to believe in God and this was obviously completed from a quote in the author’s note. “...I agreed with Mr. Adirubasamy that this was, indeed, a story to make you believe in God.”

It is interesting to view religion as the most visible consistency in the novel when the main character, Grant Wiggins, is himself an atheist. Although he himself does not believe in things such as heaven or hell he is still impacted upon by the community around him. Grant, an educated man,

What happens when an Individual seeks union with divinity Where the protagonist Piscine Molitor Patel “Pi” is visited by the most extraordinary dreams, trances, visions, thoughts, sensations, and remembrances. In this 2012 American survival drama film Life Of Pi written by David Magee and directed by Ang Lee, Pi is

Pi Patel’s full name is Piscine Molitor Patel, we are told that Piscine’s name is derived from the French word for “swimming pool” the inspiration for the name in the form of a family friend who had fallen in love with a pool in France and told his friend–Pi’s father–it should be the name of his newborn son. This family friend, Mr. Adirubasamy, is the one who teaches Pi to swim which ties in with the theme of survival as Pi is the only one in his family who survives thanks to his swimming abilities which Mr. Adirubasamy bestowed to him. There is also some irony in the name Piscine, in that as a child he is tauntingly called Pissing and when is stranded it occurs to him he may need to drink his own urine or ‘piss’.

Commentary: The author’s note is the story of how Pi’s story came to life. The author meets a friend of a guy who recalls and elaborates on his journey to Canada. The description is helpful in the understanding of how and why the book was made and it’s beneficial to know where the plot line came from.

Once rescued, Pi’s credibility is questioned as he embellishes the accounts of his journey to the Japanese inspectors who find his story unlikely. Pi’s reasoning and rationale are based on illusions and mirages he envisioned while stranded on the lifeboat. His story demonstrates his desire to create a different story in order to avoid the harsh facts of life. Delving into deep and often complex truths, as Gladwell did in Outliers, enforces the reader to face the realities of life as they are and not live under any false illusions. Pi Patel, in Martel’s Life of Pi, differs from Gladwell in that he desires to live in a world of comforting lies. As he narrates his journey to others, Pi fabricates many aspects of the story in order to deceive himself and others surrounding

faith, which changes his and the reader’s perception of religion for the remainder of the book.

The will to live is a strong urge of survival that occurs when one’s life is threatened. The novel and film Life of Pi is about a boy named Piscine Molitor Patel who is lost in the middle of the Pacific Ocean due to a shipwreck with a 450 pound Bengal Tiger. The theme that fits the novel and film the best is the will to live. The novel and film effectively prove the theme by using symbols to portray how badly Pi wants to live. Characterization also plays an important role in proving the theme as the novel and book show how Pi and his tiger have to change themselves to live. Cinematic techniques such as different types of camera angles are used as well to prove that the will to live is the essential theme in the film. In the novel, Yann Martel shows how the camera angles prove what they prove. The film and novel Life of Pi effectively capture the theme of the will to live by the effective use of symbolism, characterization, and cinematic techniques.

Readers are introduced to Pi’s appreciation of both religion and science in the first paragraph of the novel when he speaks of his majors in both religious studies and zoology at the University of Toronto. His choices of majors are ironic given the long-standing friction between religious and scientific thought, and the two opposing viewpoints coming together seems impossible.

Whereas the plot of The life of Pi, takes place in 1977 India, and the pacific ocean. It is a story of a young religiously diverse indian boy, Piscine Molitor Patel (aka Pi) whose father owns the Pondicherry Zoo in South India. While moving to Canada, the ship they are on sinks, leaving Pi the sole survivor with only a bengal tiger to accompany him on his stretch of 227 days on the Pacific Ocean. Pi struggles with reality, hunger, thirst and despair. But begins to gain strength, confidence and a desire to survive as he feels obligated to watch over a bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

On its surface, Martel’s Life of Pi proceeds as a far-fetched yet not completely unbelievable tale about a young Indian boy named Pi who survives after two hundred twenty-seven days on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. It is an uplifting and entertaining story, with a few themes about companionship and survival sprinkled throughout. The ending, however, reveals a second story – a more realistic and dark account replacing the animals from the beginning with crude human counterparts. Suddenly, Life of Pi becomes more than an inspiring tale and transforms into a point to be made about rationality, faith, and how storytelling correlates the two. The point of the book is not for the reader to decide which

general theory and also that he speaks of religion as an illusion; a fantasy structure from

The story is actually about a man’s experience to believe in god. The story started off the conversation with Pi and the author. Pi told about his flashback how he was born and his family members. His