Life of Pi

“Absurd, macabre, unreliable and sad, deeply sensual in its evoking of smells and sights, the whole trip and the narrator’s insanely curious voice suggests Joseph Conrad and Salman Rushdie hallucinating together over the meaning
of The Old Man and the Sea
and
Gulliver’s
Travels.” Financial Times

“
Life of Pi
is a great adventure story, the sort that comes along rarely and enters a select canon at once. This would be enough to justify its existence, but it is also rich in metaphysics, beautifully written, moving and funny.”
Scotland on Sunday

“This is compelling storytelling, and Martel is always ready to reel in the reader with a well-turned phrase or tasty aside.”
Independent

“Here is a writer with a talent as fabulous as the tale that he – and his Pi – have to tell.”
Spectator

“An engrossing and beautifully written meditation on God, man and beast. This is a rare gem: a book that you want to immediately re-read.”
The List

“Martel has large amounts of intellectual fun with this outrageous fable … It dramatises and articulates the possibilities of storytelling, which for this writer is a kind of extremist high-wire act.”
Observer

“One encounters page after page of images and observations riveting in their precision and insight … A story to make you believe in the soul-sustaining power of fiction and its human creators, and in the original power of storytellers like Martel.”
Los Angeles Times Book
Review

“[This] enormously loveable novel is suffused with wonder.”
Guardian

“Yann Martel is a vivid and entrancing storyteller.”
Sunday Telegraph

“Martel is dazzling.”
Independent on Sunday

“A fabulous romp through an imagination by turns ecstatic, cunning, despairing and resilient, this novel is an impressive achievement … Martel displays the clever voice and tremendous storytelling skills of an emerging master.”
Publishers Weekly

“Impressive enough to make you, as the old man said, believe in God … Martel has hit on a marvellous notion and revels in elaborating it.”
Scotsman

“
Life of Pi
is a real adventure: brutal, tender, expressive, dramatic and disarmingly funny … It’s difficult to stop reading when the pages run out.”
San Francisco Chronicle

“Martel’s witty and wise novel, with its echo of William Golding’s
Pincher Martin
, has a teasing plausibility about it that taps into our desire for extraordinary stories that just might be true.”
Metro

“
Life of Pi
could well be the book of the year.”
What’s On In London

“An impassioned defence of zoos, a death-defying trans-Pacific sea adventure à la
Kon-Tiki
, and a hilarious shaggy-dog story … This audacious novel manages to be all of these.”
New Yorker

“Readers familiar with Margaret Atwood, Mavis Gallant, Alice Munro, Michael Ondaatje and Carol Shields should learn to make room on the map of contemporary Canadian fiction for the formidable Yann Martel.”
Chicago Tribune

“[Martel] demonstrates the immense power of the imagination to transform our view with the light twitch of a tiger’s tail.”
India
Today

Excerpt
Title Page
Dedication
Author’s Note
Part One: Toronto And Pondicherry
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Part Two: The Pacific Ocean
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty-Four
Chapter Fifty-Five
Chapter Fifty-Six
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Chapter Sixty
Chapter Sixty-One
Chapter Sixty-Two
Chapter Sixty-Three
Chapter Sixty-Four
Chapter Sixty-Five
Chapter Sixty-Six
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Chapter Sixty-Eight
Chapter Sixty-Nine
Chapter Seventy
Chapter Seventy-One
Chapter Seventy-Two
Chapter Seventy-Three
Chapter Seventy-Four
Chapter Seventy-Five
Chapter Seventy-Six
Chapter Seventy-Seven
Chapter Seventy-Eight
Chapter Seventy-Nine
Chapter Eighty
Chapter Eighty-One
Chapter Eighty-Two
Chapter Eighty-Three
Chapter Eighty-Four
Chapter Eighty-Five
Chapter Eighty-Six
Chapter Eighty-Seven
Chapter Eighty-Eight
Chapter Eighty-Nine
Chapter Ninety
Chapter Ninety-One
Chapter Ninety-Two
Chapter Ninety-Three
Chapter Ninety-Four
Part Three: Benito Juárez Infirmary, Tomatlán, Mexico
Chapter Ninety-Five
Chapter Ninety-Six
Chapter Ninety-Seven
Chapter Ninety-Eight
Chapter Ninety-Nine
Chapter Hundred
Reading Group Guide
About the Author
Copyright

This book was born as I was hungry. Let me explain. In the spring of
1996, my second book, a novel, came out in Canada. It didn’t fare well. Reviewers
were puzzled, or damned it with faint praise. Then readers ignored
it. Despite my best efforts at playing the clown or the trapeze artist, the
media circus made no difference. The book did not move. Books lined the
shelves of bookstores like kids standing in a row to play baseball or soccer, and
mine was the gangly, unathletic kid that no one wanted on their team. It
vanished quickly and quietly
.

The fiasco did not affect me too much. I had already moved on to another
story, a novel set in Portugal in 1939. Only I was feeling restless.
And I had a little money
.

So I flew to Bombay. This is not so illogical if you realize three things:
that a stint in India will beat the restlessness out of any living creature;
that a little money can go a long way there; and that a novel set in Portugal
in 1939 may have very little to do with Portugal in 1939
.

I had been to India before, in the north, for five months. On that first
trip I had come to the subcontinent completely unprepared. Actually, I had
a preparation of one word. When I told a friend who knew the country well
of my travel plans, he said casually
,
“
They speak a funny English in India.
They like words like
bamboozle.”
I remembered his words as my plane
started its descent towards Delhi, so the word
bamboozle
was my one
preparation for the rich, noisy, functioning madness of India. I used the
word on occasion, and truth be told, it served me well. To a clerk at a train
station I said, “I didn’t think the fare would be so expensive. You’re not trying
to bamboozle me, are you?” He smiled and chanted, “No sir! There is no
bamboozlement here. I have quoted you the correct fare
.”

This second time to India I knew better what to expect and I knew
what I wanted: I would settle in a hill station and write my novel. I
had visions of myself sitting at a table on a large veranda, my notes spread
out in front of me next to a steaming cup of tea. Green hills heavy with
mists would lie at my feet and the shrill cries of monkeys would fill my ears.
The weather would be just right, requiring a light sweater mornings and
evenings, and something short-sleeved midday. Thus set up, pen in hand,
for the sake of greater truth, I would turn Portugal into a fiction. That’s
what fiction is about, isn’t it, the selective transforming of reality? The
twisting of it to bring out its essence? What need did I have to go to Portugal?

The lady who ran the place would tell me stories about the struggle to
boot the British out. We would agree on what I was to have for lunch and
supper the next day. After my writing day was over, I would go for walks
in the rolling hills of the tea estates
.

Unfortunately, the novel sputtered, coughed and died. It happened in
Matheran, not far from Bombay, a small hill station with some monkeys
but no tea estates. It’s a misery peculiar to would-be writers. Your theme is
good, as are your sentences. Your characters are so ruddy with life they practically need birth certificates. The plot you’ve mapped out for them is grand,
simple and gripping. You’ve done your research, gathering the facts—
historical, social, climatic, culinary—that will give your story its feel of
authenticity. The dialogue zips along, crackling with tension. The descriptions
burst with colour, contrast and telling detail. Really, your story can
only be great. But it all adds up to nothing. In spite of the obvious, shining
promise of it, there comes a moment when you realize that the whisper that
has been pestering you all along from the back of your mind is speaking the
flat, awful truth: it won’t work. An element is missing, that spark that
brings to life a real story, regardless of whether the history or the food is
right. Your story is emotionally dead, that’s the crux of it. The discovery is
something soul-destroying, I tell you. It leaves you with an aching hunger
.

From Matheran I mailed the notes of my failed novel. I mailed them
to a fictitious address in Siberia, with a return address, equally fictitious,
in Bolivia. After the clerk had stamped the envelope and thrown it into a
sorting bin, I sat down, glum and disheartened. “What now, Tolstoy?
What other bright ideas do you have for your life?” I asked myself
.

Well, I still had a little money and I was still feeling restless. I got up
and walked out of the post office to explore the south of India
.

I would have liked to say, “I’m a doctor,” to those who asked me what
I did, doctors being the current purveyors of magic and miracle. But I’m sure
we would have had a bus accident around the next bend, and with all eyes
fixed on me I would have to explain, amidst the crying and moaning of
victims, that I meant in law; then, to their appeal to help them sue the government
over the mishap, I would have to confess that as a matter of fact
it was a Bachelor’s in philosophy; next, to the shouts of what meaning such
a bloody tragedy could have, I would have to admit that I had hardly
touched Kierkegaard; and so on. I stuck to the humble, bruised truth
.

Along the way, here and there, I got the response, “A writer? Is that so?
I have a story for you.” Most times the stories were little more than anecdotes,
short of breath and short of life
.

I arrived in the town of Pondicherry, a tiny self-governing Union
Territory south of Madras, on the coast of Tamil Nadu. In population and
size it is an inconsequent part of India—by comparison, Prince Edward
Island is a giant within Canada—but history has set it apart. For
Pondicherry was once the capital of that most modest of colonial empires,
French
India. The French would have liked to rival the British, very much
so, but the only Raj they managed to get was a handful of small ports. They
clung to these for nearly three hundred years. They left Pondicherry in
1954, leaving behind nice white buildings, broad streets at right angles to
each other, street names such as rue de la Marine and rue Saint-Louis, and
képis, caps, for the policemen
.

I was at the Indian Coffee House, on Nehru Street. It’s one big room
with green walls and a high ceiling. Fans whirl above you to keep the
warm, humid air moving. The place is furnished to capacity with identical
square tables, each with its complement of four chairs. You sit where you
can, with whoever is at a table. The coffee is good and they serve French
toast. Conversation is easy to come by. And so, a spry, bright-eyed elderly
man with great shocks of pure white hair was talking to me. I confirmed to
him that Canada was cold and that French was indeed spoken in parts of
it and that I liked India and so on and so forth—the usual light talk between
friendly, curious Indians and foreign backpackers. He took in my
line of work with a widening of the eyes and a nodding of the head. It was
time to go. I had my hand up, trying to catch my waiter’s eye to get the bill
.

Then the elderly man said, “I have a story that will make you believe
in God
.”

I stopped waving my hand. But I was suspicious. Was this a Jehovah’s
Witness knocking at my door? “Does your story take place two thousand
years ago in a remote corner of the Roman Empire?” I asked
.

“
No
.”

Was he some sort of Muslim evangelist? “Does it take place in seventh-
century Arabia?
”

“
No, no. It starts right here in Pondicherry just a few years back, and
it ends, I am delighted to tell you, in the very country you come from
.”

“
And it will make me believe in God?
”

“
Yes
.”

“
That’s a tall order
.”

“
Not so tall that you can’t reach
.”

My waiter appeared. I hesitated for a moment. I ordered two coffees.
We introduced ourselves. His name was Francis Adirubasamy. “Please tell
me your story,” I said
.

“
You must pay proper attention,” he replied
.

“
I will.” I brought out pen and notepad
.

“
Tell me, have you been to the botanical garden?” he asked
.

“
I went yesterday
.”

“
Did you notice the toy train tracks?
”

“
Yes, I did
.”

“
A train still runs on Sundays for the amusement of the children. But
it used to run twice an hour every day. Did you take note of the names of
the stations?
”

“
One is called Roseville. It’s right next to the rose garden
.”

“
That’s right. And the other?
”

“
I don’t remember
.”

“
The sign was taken down. The other station was once called Zootown.
The toy train had two stops: Roseville and Zootown. Once upon a time there
was a zoo in the Pondicherry Botanical Garden
.”

He went on. I took notes, the elements of the story. “You must talk to
him,” he said, of the main character. “I knew him very, very well. He’s a
grown man now. You must ask him all the questions you want
.”

Later, in Toronto, among nine columns of Patels in the phone book, I
found him, the main character. My heart pounded as I dialed his phone
number. The voice that answered had an Indian lilt to its Canadian
accent, light but unmistakable, like a trace of incense in the air. “That was
a very long time ago,” he said. Yet he agreed to meet. We met many times.
He showed me the diary he kept during the events. He showed me the
yellowed newspaper clippings that made him briefly, obscurely famous. He
told me his story. All the while I took notes. Nearly a year later, after
considerable difficulties, I received a tape and a report from the Japanese
Ministry of Transport. It was as I listened to that tape that I agreed with
Mr. Adirubasamy that this was, indeed, a story to make you believe in
God
.

It seemed natural that Mr. Patel’s story should be told mostly in the
first person—in his voice and through his eyes. But any inaccuracies or
mistakes are mine
.

I have a few people to thank. I am most obviously indebted to Mr. Patel.
My gratitude to him is as boundless as the Pacific Ocean and I hope that my
telling of his tale does not disappoint him. For getting me started on the story,
I have Mr. Adirubasamy to thank. For helping me complete it, I am grateful
to three officials of exemplary professionalism: Mr. Kazuhiko Oda, lately of
the Japanese Embassy in Ottawa; Mr. Hiroshi Watanabe, of Oika Shipping
Company; and, especially, Mr. Tomohiro Okamoto, of the Japanese Ministry
of Transport, now retired. As for the spark of life, I owe it to Mr. Moacyr
Scliar. Lastly, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to that great institution,
the Canada Council for the Arts, without whose grant I could not
have brought together this story that has nothing to do with Portugal in 1939.
If we, citizens, do not support our artists, then we sacrifice our imagination
on the altar of crude reality and we end up believing in nothing and having
worthless dreams
.