I finished Life of Pi yesterday after a trip to the Lincoln Park Zoo with my husband. We didn’t run across Richard Parker but we did see a very active Siberian Tiger pacing its grounds, putting home the fear Pi must have had while living on a raft with a Tiger. In the end, I loved this book. It wasn’t a love I felt immediately but upon thinking about it more, and thinking about it still, I am a bit awe struck over the story and Martel’s writing. Though it began slowly the novel grew to proportions I hadn’t expected. I was amazed at Martel’s ability to make a novel with so little dialogue so gripping, to be able to go beyond describing emotions but to describe events so well I couldn’t help but question, “Is this real?”. Martel made you want what he was about to give you before you even knew it was coming. In that sense, I think he was a bit of a miracle worker with his writing. Then we have the religious and philosophical aspect both so subtle and obvious my head was spinning. It leaves you thinking, thinking, thinking...what more can a reader ask for?
For those of you who have already read it, I am especially eager to talk about the role of meta-fiction in the novel. And also that idea that it is a story, “that will make you believe in God.” What does that mean? Do you think it’s true?
Also, here is a short interview with Martel about writing the book, if you are interested.
25 comments:
stories are how we understand God, right? thats what i think. its through stories that meaning can be communicated, like the story of jonah, or job, or king lear, or moby dick.
martel says that pi's story on the raft with richard parker is the story that God prefers. we prefer it, too. at least i do. even if it isn't factual. its true. thats what martel's saying, according to my reading
there is no secular or sacred literature, there is only good and bad writing...to borrow from bloom. you might enjoy john updike's short story "the christian roommates."
Bryant, could you expound on what you said about secular and sacred lit? I ask because I’m pretty sure I disagree with you, or maybe not you but Bloom. There is of course good writing and bad. But what of The Bible, The Koran or any number of other religious works. Do they not supersede what Bloom said?
says bloom: "The distinction between sacred and secular texts results from social and political decisions, and thus is not a literary distinction at all..."
i think bloom, the jewish-agnostic-aesthete, probably acknowledges a text's sacredness to its appropriate group of worshippers; however, he probably also abhors the idea that texts would be classified by anything other than their sole, intrinsic literary worth. i tend to agree with him.
responding to czfinke,
i don't understand you. while God may prefer the one story, it doesn't change the fact that it did not heppen, and that Pi witnessed the brutal murder of his mother.
so the biggest question i had after finishing this book was, is belief in God a choice made simply to alleviate the horrors of this world? That's pretty depressing.
I don't think that's what martel meant by saying that the book will cause you to believe in God, but that's how i ran with it.
i wouldn't say the horror of one should be replaced by the horror of another ( i know the fictional tale doesn't have pi viewing his mother's death, but i think it has plenty of horror of its own). i just think that we see the world in stories, and we tell stories in order to understand what happens, and what meaning is. at least i do.
i'm kind of chucking and jiving here, but it makes sense. we don't ignore the terrors of the world, but we can understand them better through stories, right? isn't that why we go to hamlet?
I’ve been thinking about all the times when reading the book I couldn’t help but turn to CLFZ and ask, “Wait, what about the author’s note? Is the story real? Maybe it had to be fiction because so much was changed?” In that sense Martel made me want to believe in something that when thought about logically I would never ever even consider believing in. Maybe that’s it. It makes no sense to believe in God, we never see God. God never talks to us. All we have is this really old fantastical book. But then there is still this persistent belief. And it’s not about the story so much, but about the hunger for the story. Or the hunger for God.
well said you two.
I’ve also been thinking a lot about the set up of the book. First we have the author, talking directly to us. Then we have Pi’s story. Followed by the story of Pi being interviewed by the two Asian men. Last, chapter 100, we have the author coming back to us. While reading Pi’s story I was so concerned about the author’s note. Then when I got to the interview and heard the second version I was both stunned and saddened. But this is what made me realize, that I didn’t need to worry about the author’s note anymore, it didn’t matter if it was true or not, I was already attached. What mattered was that I was so engrossed with Pi’s story of survival. Which in turn made me realize that it doesn’t matter that Richard Parker was never on the raft. But that Pi was alive to tell the story. And in a way, that he could turn it into this amazing magical trip, still with the heartbreak, but not having his soul broken. It’s incredible. Although, I am perturbed by the fact that I may be coming across as if it doesn’t matter what the Truth is or if there even is Truth. I believe God is a Truth. But, in the same sense I can’t describe God, or give a definition to Truth. Make sense? Can someone help me with that last part?
Moist1, have your feelings changed at all? Do you still think it’s a despairing story in the end?
Moist1 is now...branch!
There are many ways to truth (God). Is this what Life of Pi is really getting at? It seems to be the crux, with the dual stories and and multiple faith conversions and all that.
I guess I still find the end very very disturbing. Doesn't he get his mom's head tossed on him or something? I mean, that's some bad, BAD truth. But I understand and agree with what you're saying, as i'm sure you also agree with me that severed mom heads are bad news. Really bad.
does anyone make anything else of the first 100 or so pages? anything other than "there are many ways to God"?
I think thats a great question. I have no idea what to make about the first 100 pages, and really haven't thought about them much as a result. But I'm sure Martel would want us to get more out of that part.
I know I'm out of my element here, and it's been over a year since I last read Life of Pi, but the discussion here brought to mind a quote from the end of the book. Pi is responding to his Japanese interrogators:
"Isn't telling about something--using words, English or Japanese--already something of an invention? Isn't just looking upon this world already something of an invention? The world isn't just the way it is. It is how we understand it, no? And in understanding something, we bring something to it, no? Doesn't that make life a story?"
And in my head I am associating this with Tim O'Brien and the Things They Carried. Sometimes fiction/lies are more "true" than what really happened. No?
What if fiction/lies about God reveal more truth than reality can?
jcawes!
You are brilliant! I never thought about O'Brien, but I think you are spot on with that analogy.
Do you think we can apply that idea to the first hundred pages of the book? We adopt one faith normally, but in this case we have three faiths in one person. But the point isn’t what religion you practice; it’s that you love God. And Pi really sends that home to us when he runs into all of the men on the beach and says “but I just want to love God.”
Although, I still feel like I’m missing something. I don’t know.
Is this like saying all truth is God's truth? All roads lead to God?
Martin Buber says,
"Everything is commandment."
So, whatever it takes for Pi to love God is somehow necessary--however many (diverse) religious practices/beliefs. The book is about perspective (I'm making this up) -- it's like that analogy of the blind men observing an elephant by touch. They each think the elephant is something else (a rope, tree, etc) based on where they touch it.
Okay, so this is Pi, except for that he's the only blind man. Through his experience of several different religions he is able to come to a purer understanding of God. (?) Wouldn't we do better to somehow adopt other religions, see what truth they have to offer and what faults are in our own belief systems. A little thesis, antithesis, synthesis action? no?
Anyway, the blind man analogy applies to Pi's telling of what happened on the boat. The different versions, though conflicting, when considered together make the truth.
I don't know, I should probably finish my morning coffee before I attempt this malarkey. Sorry if it's incoherent.
had a short argument once about the subjective, and mister babtist/marine, said that if there is a red car outside and everyone believes it is green, then obviously subjective truth is wrong, and my answer to him, was yes that we would be believing a lie if we believed the car was green, however-and this sounds trite, but i think one is forced to make the concession-i said it's more complicated than that.
in terms of the great abstractions of the great religions, we can, we are forced, to arrive at them subjectively. becuase they are projections, conceptions, abstractions of what we believe, of faith. in which case three faiths at once do not really contradict.
However, the ease of these religions contradicting, or not, is not analogous to pi's time in the boat, imaginitive and real. pi experienced, the horrific real then made up a story. and now believes a lie and exorts us to believe a lie, becausae the lie is more enjoyable. this seems to me like an argument against god, or religion. God cannot replace the practical.
Pi invents richard parker for pragmatic reasons, to cope, to deal with the horror of the real story. Pi is in denial.
the practical cannot replace god
but if its an argument against god, then why does Pi still believe at the end?
i have borrowed my book to someone and cannot reference it. i have no answers.
after everything you just spouted out, it seems you would hardly need your book to answer that question.
we read fiction becuase it is like life, becuase life itself is interesting. becuase good fiction reveals our own lives.
we read not to escape--although that is a common enough reason-- but to arrive.
A question you might post on the front page is why we read fiction at all. this is the question of kavelier and clay, and also at base the question of pi.
i think pi's answer is a reduction. at the end he says richard parker is more interesting than 'the real story'. which is not true. it is more pleasent. easier perhaps, but not more ineresting. We do not read books out of denial. unless its fantasy literature. which it seems to me is what pi is arguing for.
the story of a boy on a raft with a bengal tiger is easier than a boy drifting alone in a raft?
that doesn't seem much easier, or in fact much preferable.
the violence, the cannabalism, his mother's head. or is that made up to? now i am confused and need my book.
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