Life of Pi: A Novel Paperback – Black & White, May 1, 2003

[First draft of my review appearing in Jung and India, Spring: a Journal of Archetype and Culture (vol. 90, Fall 2013, guest-edited by Alfred Collins and Elaine Molchanov)]Still attracting full houses to its stunningly beautiful 3D visuals, Ang Lee's Life of Pi (2012) is a largely faithful cinematic rendering of Yann Martel's fantasy adventure novel (2001) of the same name.Born a Tamil Hindu in the former French enclave of Pondicherry, Piscine (Pi) Molitor Patel, named after his Uncle's favorite swimming pool in Paris, becomes obsessed with the meaning of life and seeks his answers by "converting" successively to Christianity and Islam, and attempting to hold on to all three religions simultaneously. Unlike his indulgent mother, the skeptical father, who owns the town zoo with its prize Bengal tiger, sees this as a sure formula for inextricable mental confusion. Repulsed at first by the irrationality of the faith, Pi is irresistibly drawn to the sacrificial figure of the crucified (Son of) God and his Eucharist.Circumstances oblige the family to move with their animals for a better life in Canada, only for their Japanese freighter to capsize in mid-Pacific. When the raging tempest finally clears, Pi finds himself the sole human survivor adrift on a life-boat with a wounded zebra, a female orangutan, and a spotted hyena. After the frenzied hyena has mortally mauled its defenseless fellow creatures, the hidden tiger suddenly springs forth powerfully from beneath the tarpaulin to finish off the small time terrorist.At the far end of his odyssey, the adult Pi describes himself as a Catholic Hindu, who teaches Kabbalah at the university. Instead of attempting to make sense of the unlikely ocean-crossing in terms of the author's spiritual quest, some otherwise educated commentators seem obsessed with figuring out the most favored path, through what may be characterized as `religious' bean-counting. Internet Hindus, for example, are not quite sure whether to feel proud that Patel remains a steadfast practitioner of their ancient all-inclusive dharma ('religion') or to accuse Piscine instead of being a treasonous proxy for a sly U-turn by his Western creator. For, having earlier praised Vishnu for bringing him to Christ, he now thanks the Preserver for coming to the rescue in the avatar of a fish that he kills to nourish the tiger and himself. But why would a story of traversing the ocean for 227 days with a Royal Bengal Tiger make any listener believe in God?Taunted as "Pissing" at school, he shortens his French name "Piscine" to the more respectable "Pi" and strives to prove his intellectual prowess by working out this foundational fraction to its umpteenth decimal on the blackboard. But the Cartesian brain that deliberates upon and resolves the most complex equations is but the cortical appendage to a spinal column that remains rooted in and sustained by the most primordial instincts. When Pi challenges this menace that has leapt out as it were from the cage of his own unconscious, the tiger suddenly turns its back and literally drowns his self-composure in a rain of urine. Or is it the `Hinduized' Martel's zoo-logic pissing on his own "I think, therefore I am" Enlightenment rationality? For "in that elusive irrational number with which scientists try to understand the universe, I found refuge" (p.???).When the Japanese insurers of the freighter refuse to believe such a fantastic itinerary, this sole survivor invents an alternative phantasm of human brutality: he was adrift with his mother, a sailor with a broken leg, and the ship's cook, who killed both sailor and mother to cut them up as bait and food. His Canadian interlocutor deduces from these human-animal correspondences that Pi himself could only be the tiger, appropriately named Richard Parker through a clerical error at the zoo. For the key to this forced cohabitation of socialized man and untamable beast is the ultimate identity of the two.At their first zoo encounter, the still 'innocent' teenager held out some raw flesh through the railings as one might coaxingly to a pet dog. The father disabuses this naive projection of civilized emotions onto the bloodthirsty creature by forcing his child to witness the inevitable fate of a live goat. The 20th century Russian mystic Gurdjieff expressed the inner predicament of the spiritual quest through the riddle of having to transport, one at a time, a wolf, a goat, and a cabbage on a small boat across the river without the goat eating the cabbage or being devoured by the wolf, when left together on the bank by themselves. Here, the mortal challenge for the human steward is to deliver his onerous charge to the other shore without being consumed by his inner beast. Pi is eventually so successful in contriving a modus vivendi--feeding the tiger but not with his own body--that the dangerous pet even sleeps with his head cuddled and scratched on the human lap. Yet, the ungrateful Parker merely pauses, without looking back, before disappearing forever into the thickets, leaving his rescuer somehow disappointed at this lack of acknowledgment. Ancient Chinese manuscripts show enlightened Buddhist monks, though overflowing with universal love, accompanied by a fearsome tiger rationalized to the laity as pacified protector. The happily married Pi, who recounts this 'unbelievable' story from the beginning, has confronted and transcended his own inner demon.The Pondicherry zoo serves to juxtapose the human and animal worlds, preparing us for the confrontation between reason (ego) and instinct (id) within the lone survivor cut off from the rest of society. Beneath this appearance, however, zoology has become the handmaiden of theology. [to be completed]Thrown into the swimming pool at an early age, Piscine owes his survival to the mentorship of his 'Uncle', who was so attached to breathing water that he had to be swung in circles by his feet at the moment of birth to expel the amniotic waters from his lungs. For Freud, the "oceanic feeling" at the heart of all mystical experience is induced by a regression to the maternal womb, and some subsequent psychoanalysts have emphasized the importance of reliving the trauma of birth and even of 'killing the mother', a motif that has abundant resonances in the symbolic life of Hinduism. Not only does the orphaned boy have visions of his beloved mother sleeping within the wreck at the bottom of the ocean, her orangutan counterpart on the lifeboat is soon mauled to death. For the Life of Pi is an initiatic voyage of shedding one's humanity to confront, embrace, and transcend the beast within. What opposes the silent, sinewy, and beautiful tiger to the garrulous hyena, whose rabid bark is even worse than its repetitive bite, is what distinguishes raw power reduced to its pure, pristine, dangerous, and sacred essence from the petty mutual violence of men. In the 'humanized' retelling, it is Pi himself who finally kills the hyena-cook.Violence here is not so much a question of ethics, much less of cinematic aesthetics, but foundational like 'original sin' (ontological). Hailing from the ancient land that produced the Mahatma and the extremes of Jain self-denial, Pi's vegetarian family has hardly anything to eat in the galley, where they are aggressively taunted by the racist French cook (the visceral Gérard Depardieu) for their almost natural aversion to meat. But adrift with dwindling rations, Pi is before long obliged to sink his own teeth into the raw fish he feeds his ravenous ward. Vegetarianism is deliberately deconstructed on the idyllic island where the bioluminescent algae turn out to be carnivorous to the point of digesting shipwrecked humans, so much so that even the fearful tiger flees back to the lifeboat.A highpoint in the 3D effects is the primordial tiger unexpectedly leaping out from the screen at us, titillated viewers, as though we were the one cast adrift on that endless ocean. On Dec. 16 after having followed Pi's otherworldly itinerary at a Delhi cinema, a young woman tried to take a passing bus back home only to be gang-raped to the point of being disemboweled. Richard Parker, who had seemed so human but refused to become so to Pi's ultimate despair, had pursued her on his senseless rampage...Sunthar Visuvalingam

Warning: This review may contain some spoilersWhy do we choose to tell the stories that we tell in the way that we tell them? Is it to portray unembellished reality or do we chose our narrative in service to a deeper purpose? In the novel Life of Pi, Yann Martel suggests that stories are how we find meaning in the universe; they are a path to God. Martel's characters tell stories that provide comfort, explain hardship, and provide inspiration without being literally factual. The author takes pains to remind the reader that the book itself is a work of fiction and that the literal representation of the truth is not his priority. In fact, Martel seems to say that sometimes we must abandon literal truth if we want to find meaning in the universe. If we fail to look beyond the literal truth in search of something deeper, we will "lack imagination and miss the better story"--we may fail to find God (Martel, 2007, p. 64).Piscine Molitor Patel, known as Pi, is the titular character of the novel. The book's central conflict is Pi's struggle to survive while adrift at sea in a lifeboat after his ship sinks. He must endure against elemental forces, lack of food and fresh water, and stave off despair. However, on top of these very serious challenges, he must also deal with the fact that he is not alone in the life boat. For most of his ordeal, his only companion is a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker: a wild and untamed creature that could easily kill him at any time. However, this is not a simple survival story where the tension comes from wondering if the main character will manage to triumph over adversity. Even before we know a single detail of his ordeal, Martel assures us that Pi is alive and well, living an almost ordinary life. At the same time, he assures us that this is "a story to make you believe in God" (Martel, 2007, Author's Note). Much of the tension of the book comes in discovering what the author means by this.On the surface, this is a survival story. However, this is not really a book about Pi's ordeal at sea; it is about the telling of the story of Pi's ordeal at sea. In the course of the narrative, there are at least five different times that one character tells the story to another. We are only privy to the details of two of these exchanges; the others occur "off stage." However, after each one, Martel shows us the impact hearing the tale has on the listeners. We get the sense that nobody is truly the same after hearing it. This is true even though the two versions of the story we see are mutually contradictory. By this, Martel demonstrates that it is not necessarily the literal truth of a tale that makes it meaningful. There is some other aspect of the story that makes it meaningful.In the Author's Note, Martel calls fiction "the selective transforming of reality" and says that writers create it "for the sake of greater truth" (Martel, 2007, Author's Note). This note is where the narrative actually starts; it is part of the fiction Martel has created, not something that lives apart from the rest of the book. The character of the author appears throughout the book in a series of interludes within Pi's narrative. Martel uses these recollections to describe the man Pi has become and how the events of the story have changed him. The author also uses them to heighten the mystery about what exactly transpired in the lifeboat. He makes numerous references to events that have not yet been shared with the reader, foreshadowing the action to come.Martel devotes most of the book to telling Pi's preferred account of his ordeal. This is a story that focuses on both the practical day-to-day details of his survival and his internal struggle to retain his faith in a higher power. The account is striking in both its realism and its utter implausibility. Even if we ignore the improbability of being able to survive on a lifeboat with an untamed Bengal tiger for 277 days, there are many other aspects of Pi's story that are hard to believe. We know this because Martel takes pains to have other characters, such as the shipping agents who hear the tale, point out the implausibility of these aspects. Details such as encountering another lifeboat at random in the Pacific midway through the journey, finding an almost magical floating island, and just the act of being able to survive in a lifeboat for 277 days are all highlighted as being hard to believe. However, this is not the only account of the events that Pi offers. He tells an alternative version of the events that is just as brutal and unforgiving as the other, but far more plausible. In this story, many more things make sense. Pi's actions are selfish, even if excusable. His thoughts are about survival, revenge, and satisfying his hunger, not his relationship with God. This version has only ugliness; it offers no meaning. Pi tells the shipping agents both of these stories and offers them a choice; the author does the same for the reader.Pi seems to prefer the version of the story where he finds meaning because that is something he craves. Earlier in his narrative, he describes how his search for meaning caused him to become a Christian, a Muslim, and a Hindu, all at the same time. Each of these religions tells stories that explain the universe; they provide meaning and comfort. Pi embraces all of them. He feels no need or obligation to choose between these mutually exclusive stories. Why should he choose? The author told us in the Author's Note that stories are selective transformations of reality for the sake of greater truth. Pi craves this truth; he wants to know God and not restrict himself to "dry, yeastless factuality" (Martel, 2007, p. 64).For the most part, both versions of Pi's narrative have the same elements; each of the fanciful aspects of the first narrative has a corresponding aspect in the second narrative that is tragically believable. However, there is a key part of the first narrative that does not appear in the second one: the floating island. This is the least plausible portion of Pi's first narrative. The island is an idyllic place (at least at first) with almost magical properties. It is wholly absent from the second narrative. This is a mystery within a mystery; the shipping company representatives he tells the story to give up trying to understand it. We are left to wonder if it points to a gap in Pi's second story, a piece that explains how a man could survive that long at sea. On the other hand, maybe it does not appear in the second story because it was literally true and needed no amendment. We are left to wonder.Martel is careful to leave the door open for both interpretations of the story. For instance, one of the shipping representatives calls the island a botanical impossibility (Martel, 2007, p. 294). However, the representatives had also just assured Pi that the floating island of bananas that appeared earlier in the story was similarly impossible, an assertion that Martel shows proven wrong (Martel, 2007, p. 293). In this way, Martel hints that if the representatives were mistaken about one floating island, they might be mistaken about another. If one thing that is hard to believe is possible, perhaps another incredible thing also can be so. Even when we are convinced we know what happened, Martel reminds us that we should have doubt. The author tells us how he has read the diary that Pi kept during his ordeal. In it, we are shown Pi questioning his relationship with God. This is the Pi of the first story, not the survival obsessed pragmatist of the second one. There is always reason to doubt.Why does Martel tell this story in the way that he does? Why is this not a simple linear narrative of a boy trapped on a lifeboat with a tiger? Martel tells the tale this way because he wants the reader to face the same choices that his characters face. He uses a complex structure of narratives within narratives in order to create ambiguity. The reader is left to decide what really happened. Do we choose the version of events with meaning, or the one with plausibility? Which one do we prefer? Is the "more plausible story" truly plausible? Martel refuses to give us definitive answers to these questions. Martel uses the plot and structure of the book to show that it does not matter if either is true. It does not matter if the author invented this story or if, as he says, it was told to him. What matters is the meaning we choose to give the story as readers.Work CitedMartel, Yann (2007). Life of Pi (Kindle Edition). New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. (Original work published 2001)