Author :
Yann Martel
Publisher
: Canongate/Random House
ISBN :
978-1-84195-392-2
There are
some stories, I consider fortunate enough to enjoy the spotlight of the center
stage more than once in their life times. Life of Pi happens to be one of them.
Published in 2001 after being rejected by at least five publishing houses in
London, Life of Pi won Man Booker Prize for Fiction, the following year. Later
it got translated to a couple of other languages too. The story has managed to
create hysteria once again after a decade when it has been adapted into a movie
by an ace director - Ang Lee.
Life of
Pi is a fantasy adventure novel written by Yann Martel. The protagonist of the
story is Piscine Molitor 'Pi' Patel, an Indian boy hailing from Pondicherry,
who happens to get his unusual name courtesy a famous swimming pool in Paris.
His not so regular name makes him subject of a lot of ridicule, teasing and
some funny incidents though it brings a lot of distress for the owner of the
name himself.
Majoring
in religious studies and zoology, Pi's quest to learn more about the divine
power leads him to be a Muslim-Christian-Hindu, a rare combination indeed. The
family (his parents, elder brother Ravi and he)decides to make the alien lands
of Canada their home when his father, a zoo owner decides to call it quits in
India. But that was not destined to be and the cargo ship tragically sinks in
the rough waters of ocean leaving just a few survivors on the solitary lifeboat
- newly orphaned sixteen year old Pi, a hyena, a monkey, a crippled zebra and a
royal Bengal tiger who accidentally got the name Richard Parker. And hence the
stage is set for a perfectly adventurous, nerve wrecking tale of fiction.
Life of
Pi turns out to be a coming of age story of a boy who is caught in a strangely
precarious situation where it is unimaginable to be sharing a lifeboat with a
tiger while it is equally important for him to keep the tiger alive. "A part of me was glad about Richard
Parker. A part of me did not want Richard Parker to die at all, because if he
died I would be left alone with despair, a foe even more formidable than a
tiger. If I still had the will to live, it was thanks to Richard Parker. He
pushed me to go on living. I hated him for it, yet at the same time I was
grateful. "
His
experiences, understanding, grit, patience, suffering and much more equip him
to churn the same into fine pearls of wisdom. Situations which demand all
possible and many times impossible faculties of an individual make the
highlight of the book and it is wonderful to read how the survival instincts
kick in at the right time. 'When your life is threatened, your sense of empathy
is blunted by a terrible, selfish hunger for survival'.
After
struggling with many menacing foes, learning a lot more than regular routine
offers, graduating from being a simple vegetarian to eating anything for
survival, realizing the desperation that threat to survival poses, confronting
the power of fear from close quarters, witnessing the magical presence of God
on many occasions, riding the waves of hope and despair continuously, striking
a symbiotic relationship with a creature with whom it is most unlikely, Pi, in
the company of Richard Parker reaches the shores of Mexico after 227 days.
The
commendable part of Martels's writing is the life like portrayal of Pi, every
mood, every feeling and every scene. Pi's questioning and analyzing mind goads
the readers to introspect on many issues including the one that stays in the
thinking minds always - presence of God. Overall an extremely well written,
engaging account of adventurous life of Pi indeed. The story is power packed
with action, philosophy, spirituality and introspection - all in one.
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