Quarter #4- Life of Pi
Synopsis"He tries to make a connection with the tiger, provides him with the fish he catches and with his water supply and Pi even starts to communicate with the tiger but making sure that Pi is the "top tiger" and Richard Parker has to follow him and has his own territory on the lifeboat which he is not allowed to cross and enter Pi's territory." (End of my last synopsis: Quarter #3-Life of Pi)
Referring to the end of the last synopsis, Pi now starts to train Richard Parker, showing him who the boss is. After all, Pi is not a good zookeeper, unlike his father because Pi accomplishes psychological bullying, that's what Pi realises.
Throughout the last section of this book, Pi's eating habits changed. Starting with Pi not being a vegetarian anymore. He now eats turtles and fish to survive so he does not starve to death. Continuing, Pi realises that he eats like an animal, specifically like Richard Parker and that he has become a very cruel and brutal killer. Afterall, he now is able to eat birds' liver and brains and other organs. The top of all is that he has reached the point where he just eats anything in order to survive and so he eats the flesh of the dead Frenchman. Pi meets the Frenchman in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and they have a very bizarre conversation until the castaway tries to eat Pi because he is very hungry too. Since the blind man stepped into Richard Parker's territory in order to get near Pi, the man gets killed by the tiger because he entered the tiger's zone.
Pi discovers a low-lying island of pure vegetation. It has algae, trees and freshwater ponds, all Pi needs- food and water. Therefore he decides to stay and day after day Pi gets stronger and stronger, the tiger too gets stronger. As soon as Pi finds out that the island is carnivorous which means that the algae turns highly acidic during night and eats the fish in the ponds, Pi and Richard Parker leave the island feeling strong and healthy.
"Life on a lifeboat isn't much fun. It is like an end game in chess, a game with few pieces. The elements couldn't be more simple, nor the stakes higher. Physically it is extraordinary arduous and morally it is killing. You must make adjustments if you want to survive. Much becomes expendable. You get your happiness where you can. You reach a point where you're at the bottom of hell, yet you have your arms crossed and a smile on your face, and you feel you're the luckiest person on earth. Why? Because at your feet you have a tiny dead fish." (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 78, page 241)
Finally the lifeboat reaches land after 227 day on sea in Mexico where Richard Parker leaves Pi without a proper farewell while Pi gets rescued by women in a nearby village. Soon after his arrival he gets interviewed by two investigators of the Maritime Department in the Japanese Ministry of Transport, where Pi tells his story. Well, he tells both his stories. Pi tells the same story of the survival at sea with animals and without animals, substituting humans who had survived the shipwreck. The Japanese men don't believe the story with the animals, it just doesn't sound believable. The story where humans are introduced, that's the one they believe in because it sounds more realistic.
Characters introduced
The blind castaway- During the time while Pi is blind, he meets a blind Frenchman at sea and they have a very bizarre conversation. Since the blind castaway is very hungry too, he tries to eat Pi but has no success because Richard Parker kills him first. -flat character/static character
Tomohiro Okamoto- Mr. Okamoto is an investigator of the Maritime Department in the Japanese Ministry of Transport and he is supposed to investigate the sinking of the Tsimtsum and therefore interviews Pi. -flat character/static character
Asuro Chiba- Mr. Chiba too is an investigator of the Maritime Department in the Japanese Ministry of Transport and he is Mr. Okamoto's junior college. They both interview Pi. -flat character/static character
Pi's story told without animals
Gita Patel- Pi's mother substitutes Orange Juice. -round character
The cook- The cook, who has been the cook on the sinking boat, substitutes the hyena. -flat character
Taiwanese sailor- The sailor substitutes the zebra. -flat character/static character
Piscine Molitor Patel- Pi substitutes Richard Parker.-round character/dynamic character
Point of view
At first there is a fictional author's note, explaining the origins of the book but later on the protagonist becomes the narrator at first person's view. This point of view only reveals the thoughts of the protagonist which is most important in the story. The reader is not interested on the personal feelings of the other flat characters so it is good that Yann Martel chose the protagonist to become the narrator.
Setting
At the very beginning the story takes place in Pondicherry, a former French territory of India in the 1990's but then Canada is the next setting in this novel. Well, Canada doesn't really become the setting because Pi and his family does not make it to Canada. Since their ship sank in the Pacific Ocean, the main story takes place there. It is the time at sea, the survival at sea.
At the fair end of the story, before Pi and Richard Parker are save on land, their lifeboat comes across
a low-lying island. This place is also added to the setting list because Pi and the Bengal tiger stay there for a few days until Pi realises that this island is carnivorous and so he decides to better leave this mysterious place.
After Pi and Richard Parker have finally reached land in Mexico, Mexico is the final setting where the story takes place and where Pi gets interviewed by the Japanese investigators.
Writer's Style
Yann Martel uses a diary-like writing style which is easy to understand and we can also find dialogues in his story. In this section the reader gets confronted with the interjections of the author and now we, as the reader, can really understand and follow the story because we got used to the interjections and know that there isn't only one story.
I started to recognise the different writing styles like the usage of comparison, personification, metaphors and similes. Examples: comparison- "The fish was as strong as an ox." (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 61, page 204) personification- "The sea moved in a lethargic way, as it already exhausted by the oncoming heat." (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 62, page 207) metaphor- "Time is an illusion that only makes us pant." (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 59, page 192) simile- "His paws were like volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica." (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 45, page 132)
By the usage of these terms, Yann Martel creates a very visual scene and for the reader it has a huge effect because you, as a reader, can just imagine everything so much better and you are really into the story and feel like you are part of it.
Allegory- Yann Martel writes his whole novel in an allegory- It is everything or nothing. The author matches up each animal with a human survivor which gets clear at the end. Pi tells his story twice: with and without animals.
Martel writes with a whimsical, tolerant tone consistent with Pi's outlook on life.
The book is also gory and gross at times. Martel doesn't pull back. He describes some pretty brutal and nasty stuff with no fuss. During Pi's time at sea, he kills tons of animals, eats Richard Parker's feces and even goes blind from malnutrition. All of this is told without the slightest fancy-pants nonsense.
In general, Yann Martel uses very little dialogue. There are two parts in the story where this usage can be clearly identified by the reader because these are two long dialogues. The first one is the bizarre conversation between Pi and the French blind castaway and the second extremely long dialogue is the one that goes throughout the second last chapter of this novel, the interview. I suppose these two parts are the only ones because while Pi is at sea he has no one to talk to, although he even tries to communicate with Richard Parker. "We've made it! We're saved! Do you understand, Richard Parker? WE'RE SAVED!!" (Yann Martel, Life of Pi, Chapter 86, page 259)
Statement of Themes
I think that there for sure is a minor theme representing Science and Religion or rather the connection between those two categories. Since Pi has a really strong focus on religion throughout this novel which gets clear in this second quarter, another theme would be the belief in God, accepting and sharing different religions.
The act of storytelling and narration is a significant theme throughout this novel. The author keeps interjecting and informs the reader about Pi's family in Canada, so there is more than one story in this novel that the author wants us to know.
Adding to the theme of storytelling, at the end of the novel it becomes obvious that Pi tells two stories with the same content but one is told with the usage of animals and the other one is told without the animals, substituting real humans.
The second part of the novel is all about the survival at sea. Therefore a major theme is the survival. I would day the primacy for survival. This theme is clear throughout his ordeal—he must eat meat, he must take life, two things which had always been anathema to him before his survival was at stake. The reader finds out that Pi is a vegetarian and that the first sentient being he had ever killed was a fish and this action took place while he was fighting for is survival. It is his survival thinking, acting and instinct that makes him able to do things he never thought he would do, concerning his brutality of killing.
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