Life of Pi

Author: Yann Martel
Date Finished: April 5, 2006

I finished a book! It's been a long month since the last time I could say that. I've started many books, but this past month nothing much held my interest long enough to ignore everything else I needed to do and keep on reading.

I'm late to the table for Life of Pi; it won the Man Booker prize in 2002 and many people on and off the Internet were talking about it at that time. I thought it started out slowly but then became completely fascinating in that can't-put-it-down sort of way that is such a satisfying read.

The premise is that a young boy named Pi is alone on a lifeboat after the ship carrying him, his parents and animals from the zoo his parents operated in India, sank in the Pacific Ocean. Complicating his survival at sea is the fact that a tiger named Richard Parker also made his way to the lifeboat, giving Pi an additional obstacle to surviving, but also a reason to persevere as Pi promises Richard Parker that he won't let him die. The story is part documentary about the art and science of zookeeping and part magical realism, but overall is an amazing description of the mechanisms, physical, mental and emotional, a human being can devise in order to survive in a hopeless situation.

My sense of hope has never been seriously challenged. Sure, I have the normal thirty-something feeling that maybe some of the more interesting opportunities are closing for me, but in general I feel completely optimistic that if I think about it enough and work hard enough, I can get pretty much whatever I want out of this life of mine. It's all about balancing what I'm willing to do in order to achieve what I want. While reading this book, I couldn't help but wonder how I would respond in a similar situation. No matter how clever or determined Pi remained during his ordeal, it didn't help him get closer to land or rescue, other than that he remained alive long enough for his boat to drift to Mexico. Would I have the inner grit to keep fishing, keep making fresh water out of sea water, keep myself the boss of the tiger on board?

I've read that this book is being circulated among the YA crowd, and I really like to think that middle school kids would open themselves up to this kind of reading experience. Like the mirage in front of you while driving down the highway on a hot summer's day, the meeting of fantasy and reality shimmers more vibrantly than either alone. Books like this give me hope that reading will never become something that I just can't find the time for; like a hungry tiger, I swallowed this story and with my belly still full, begin to look around for more.