Having a balanced lifestyle is crucial to survival. Having too much of something is never good; nevertheless, having too little of something can be harmful as well. For example, when faced with life or death, one needs an animalistic side to survive but also must remember their humanity. This concept is seen in Yann Martel’s Life of Pi where “Richard Parker”, or Pi’s animalistic side, is both a blessing and curse to Pi because it compels Pi to do things that he would not have as the person he is without Richard Parker. Because of this side, Pi is able to survive, but with too much influence from this side, Pi would lose all his morals and become an inhumane monster; he would feel no point in living if he had lost track of his spirituality and …show more content…
In the first version of the story, Richard Parker is a violent creature that helps Pi survive by providing him with company so he does not get lonely or go crazy. Pi says, “If I still had a will to live, it was thanks to Richard Parker… if he died I would be left alone with despair, a foe even more formidable than a tiger” (Martel 164). Pi also makes it clear that Richard Parker “will swim as far as he has to, to catch the drifting raft and the food upon it” (Martel 161). Because of Richard Parker, Pi has a companion, otherwise, he would be left with nothing to do except wallow in sorrow about his pitiful condition. Richard Parker also keeps Pi alert and keeps him engaged throughout the day. In contradiction, Richard Parker also is a burden. He makes Pi exert energy, takes up unneeded space on the boat and is a constant threat to Pi’s life. Pi needs to constantly makes sure that Richard Parker does …show more content…
This side of Pi keeps him alive because it helps him step out of his boundaries that kept him devout and religious. Pi decides to keep his animalistic side alive for his own means of survival because “He pushed me to go on living. I hated him for it, yet at the same time, I was grateful” (Martel 167). The paradoxical qualities of Pi’s animalistic side, from his own perspective are that he hated that part of himself because it constantly left him afraid of what it would make him do; however, this fear was what kept Pi alive and alert on the boat; this is what kept Pi from dying. Pi having a balance between fear and gratefulness leads him to be appreciative yet wary of his animalistic side. Pi’s mixed feelings for his own animalistic side is what forced him to try to understand it. Pi recognizes that “It is the irony of the story that the one who scared me witless to start with was the very same who brought me peace, dare I say even wholeness (Martel 162). The presence of Pi’s animalistic side frightens him because it is a side of himself that he does not know he has. Pi is a stranger to his savage side and it to causes him to do things that the innocent Pi that he knew would not do. At the same time this side gives him reassurance that he can and will stay alive, almost like the side will protect his innocence and fight off the dangers he faces on the lifeboat. When first introduced to this side of
The protagonist, Pi is initially apprehensive to accept Richard Parker on the raft, but later comes to appreciate the tiger once he realizes this animal’s presence is crucial for his survival on the boat. First, Pi is scared and reluctant to accept his shadow self because it conflicts with his character and complicates his beliefs. This is evident when he says, “Together? We’ll be together? Have I gone mad? I woke up to what I was doing […]. Let go […] Richard Parker […] I don’t want you here […]. Get lost. Drown! Drown!!” (Martel 123). Though Pi recognizes his shadow self by encouraging Richard Parker to come on the boat, he soon realizes that he is about to accept his shadow self. He instantly regrets his decision and throws an oar at him in an effort to stop Richard Parker. His action symbolizes his denial and confusion he feels towards the extent of br...
...eating the zebra alive in Chapter 45. Another example of Thanatos is shown when the hyena bites a hole into the zebra and Pi feels a sense of hatred towards the hyena for hurting the zebra and he even considers attacking it. An id and ego split is also shown between Pi and Richard Parker by showing Richard Parker to be an imaginary tiger that is created by Pi in order to keep him alive and focused on staying alive. Pi eventually abandons his superego and partakes in eating meat, even though he was a strict vegetarian prior to being lost at sea. Over the duration of Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, the story relates to Freud’s theories in several ways that are made blatantly obvious; these relations are what makes this story come together to keep the reader involved and interested.
In drastic situations, human psychology uses coping mechanisms to help them through it. In the novel, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Pi’s coping mechanism is his religions and his projection of Richard Parker. Martel’s Life of Pi shows how the projection of Richard Parker played a greater role in keeping Pi alive in comparison to his beliefs in his religions. During the period in which Pi was stranded on the lifeboat, Richard Parker kept Pi aware, helped Pi make the right decisions, and was Pi’s sub-consciousness.
“All living things contain a measure of madness that moves them in strange, sometimes inexplicable ways. This madness can be saving; it is part and parcel of the ability to adapt. Without it, no species would survive” (Martel 44-45). Inside every human being, there is an extremely primal and animalistic trait that can surface when the will to survive becomes greater than the morals of the person. This trait allows humans to overcome their fear to do things which they wouldn’t normally be able to do in order to survive when they’re in extreme peril and in a do or die situation. Throughout the book, Life of Pi, survival is a dominant and central theme. The will to survive changes people and this includes the main character of the story, Piscine Molitor Patel. Survival will even change the most timid, religious, and law-abiding people. Yann Martel, using Pi as an example, tries to explain that all humans must do three things in order to survive a life threatening event: one must give up their morals, one must find a way to keep sane, and one must be ready to compromise and sacrifice.
Pi was afraid and surprised that Richard Parker was in the boat once he had lifted the blanket. Then Richard Parker had roared at him and tried to attack by his claws ,but pi had gotten away as soon as he did. Pi and Richard Parker started to roamed slowly around the boat in the middle of the ocean. Pi didn't trust Richard Parker because he knows that he only wanted to kill and eat pi. Pi tried to get rid of the tiger and then he tried avoiding the tiger, but as time goes on he got tired of trying get rid of Richard Parker. So then he began tame the tiger by using his whistle he had gotten from his locker. As he and Richard Parker started to get along through the past days,they have become really close friends.
Not only did he have to learn how to survive in one of the most impossible landscapes, he also had to train and avoid one of nature’s most ferocious predators in a confined space. As their food and water supply began to deplete, he had to learn how to catch fish and collect rainwater to satiate both his and his beast’s hunger and thirst. Pi experienced a spiritual dilemma because as a Hindu, Christian, and Muslim he abstains from eating meat but while out upon that aquatic battlefield he had to decide between his religious morals and his earthly survival. He eventually succumbed to eating strips of dried fish and drinking the nutritious blood of sea turtles, but in return for this gift of sustenance, he traded part of who he had been. Pi faced many dangerous obstacles as he struggled to convince himself that to continue living was still a fight worth
To begin with, Pi’s success could not happen without believing in animals. Since he was grew up in a zoo, animals were a significant part in his childhood. He believed that all animals are spiritual in the beginning. However, one event changed Pi’s opinion a little bit. When Pi was only a child, his father stopped him from trying to feed Richard Parker and showed Pi tiger’s inhuman natural instinct by letting him see the entire process about the tiger killing a goat. At that moment, Pi said,“ I heard two things at that moment: Father saying “Never forget this lesson” as he looked on grimly; and the bleating of the goat.” (Matel 44). This experience certainly made Pi feel shocked and afraid. He started to question himself whether the animals were as pure as he thought. This change of attitude towards animals strongly affects the later
At the start of novel, and when Pi is a child, he is extremely religious. He devotes his life to loving God, and even practices three religions to do so. He practices Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity. His explanation for practicing all three is that according to Bapu Gandhi, “‘All religions are true’”(69). Pi explains that he practices all three religions because, “[he] just wants to love God”(69). Pi’s major religious values and faith in God continue to shape his life daily, until the shipwreck leaves him stranded on the Pacific, with a tiger for 227 days. Although Pi still remains religious and continues to praise God most days, the shipwreck does change Pi’s religious morals. Richard Parker is the factor that begins this change in Pi, because Pi knows that in order to survive he will have to fish to provide for Richard Parker if he wants to avoid being eaten himself. Fishing, however goes against the religious practice of Hinduism, which requires vegetarianism. Also, killing animals goes against Pi’s whole religious morals to not hurt another living being. Pi says the idea of killing a fish, and of “beating a soft living head with a hammer [is] simply too much”(183). It goes against everything he believes in. So, he decides to instead cover to fish’s head and break its neck (183). He explains that, “he [gives] up a number of times.
“The presence of God is the finest of rewards.” (Yann Martel, Life of Pi 63) In Yann Martel’s riveting novel “Life of Pi” The basic plot of survival unfolds, however, this essay will show how the hidden yet the dominant theme of religion throughout the story is what helped the main character Piscine Molitor Patel (Pi) survive.
In the book Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, the idea of the boundaries between savagery and humanity are tossed around quite a bit. In Pi’s life or death situation, the idea of savagery becomes a little obscured by the desperation to survive. There are several acts within the story that people who are not in Pi’s situation would possibly see as being savage. As I read the text, I see most of Pi’s actions as a need to survive. Pi creates the character of Richard Parker, who is portrayed as a Bengal tiger, to justify his incidents of savagery. It is through the different events in Life of Pi that the idea of savagery can be misconstrued and confused with the necessity to live.
... Richard Parker wants to take the zebra out of its misery.Richard Parker, along with the other animals on the lifeboat, are what truly keeps Pi alive throughout the 227 day trip out at sea.
“You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.” Adapting to a new situation or experience like violent crashing waves can be difficult. Nevertheless, a person needs to learn how to surf in order to outlast the pounding waves. In a similar fashion, individuals need to learn how to adapt to a challenging situation in order to survive. This idea of the significance of adapting to new situations is often explored in literature. In the novel, Life of Pi, Yann Martel makes powerful use of character development to suggest that individuals may be able to adapt to situations in life through a sense of determination, or through denying reality and using their imagination instead.
The Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, is the story of a young man, Piscine, or Pi for short, who experiences unbelievable and unrealistic events, which are so unrealistic ambiguity is aroused amongst the reader. Duality reoccurs over the course of the novel through every aspect of Pi’s world view and is particularly seen in the two contradictory stories, which displays the brutal nature of the world. Martel wonderfully crafts and image of duality and skepticism though each story incorporated in this novel.
The novel, Life of Pi by Yann Martel, talks about a sixteen-year old man named Pi Patel, who unbelievably survives a dreadful shipwreck after 227 days with the animals in a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean. Different ideas and themes in the book can be found in which the readers can gain an understanding about. The author communicated to the reader by using an ample amount of symbolisms to talk about the themes. The main themes of this novel are religion and faith. His religion and him being faithful have helped him throughout the journey, and this eventually led to an incredible precedent. The author left the reader thinking about how religion and faith can have an impact in our lives positively. Religion can affect our choices in life, and faith
Having just experienced the sinking of his family’s ship, and being put onto a life boat with only a hyena, Pi felt completely lost and alone. When he sees Richard Parker, the Bengal tiger from his family’s zoo, it is a familiar face to him. His initial reaction is to save the life of his familiar friend so that he may have a companion, and a protector aboard the lifeboat. Suddenly Pi realizes just what he is doing. He is saving the life of Richard Parker, by welcoming him, a 450 pound Bengal tiger, onto the small lifeboat. He experiences a change of heart when helping the tiger onto the boat. Pi realizes that he is now posing a threat on his own life. With Richard Parker on the boat, Pi is faced with not only the fight to survive stranded in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, but the fight to survive living with a meat eating tiger. The change of heart that Pi experiences might possibly mean that he is an impulsive thinker. It may mean that he often does something on impulse without thinking it through, and then later regrets his actions.