August BookClub: Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Author: Yann Martel
Publisher:  Seal Books
Page Count: 460
Publication Date: 2001
Category/Genre: Fiction, Classics, Fantasy, Adventure
Good Reads Rating: ★★★★☆ (3.9)

Life of Pi is a fantasy adventure novel by Yann Martel published in 2001. The protagonist, Piscine Molitor “Pi” Patel, a Tamil boy from Pondicherry, explores issues of spirituality and practicality from an early age. He survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a boat in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

*Questions are a mix from Rabbit Hole Blogger and the publisher. Questions may contain spoilers.

1. What do you make of Pi’s assertion at the beginning of chapter 16 that we are all “in limbo, without religion, until some figure introduces us to God”? Do you believe that Pi’s faith is a response to his father’s agnosticism?
2. Pi is polytheistic. Is that really possible or believable? Think
   about the similarities between world religions. Is it difficult to
   embrace several religions at once? Why? What is the difference
   between an agnostic and an atheist?
3. What do you make of Pi’s assertion at the beginning of chapter 16 that we are all “in limbo, without religion, until some figure introduces us to God”? Do you believe that Pi’s faith is a response to his father’s agnosticism?
4. Early in the novel, we discover that Pi majored in religious studies and zoology, with particular interests in a sixteenth-century Kabbalist and the admirable three-toed sloth. In subsequent chapters, he explains the ways in which religions and zoos are both steeped in illusion. Discuss some of the other ways in which these two fields find unlikely compatibility.
5. “We commonly say in the trade that the most dangerous animal in a zoo is Man…we mean how our species’ excessive predatoriness has made the entire planet our prey.” says Pi.  In what ways do you think this might be true?
6. What is the significance of the floating islands with the meerkats?
7. How do human beings in your world reflect the animal behavior observed by Pi? What do Pi’s strategies for dealing with Richard Parker teach us about confronting the fearsome creatures in our lives?
8. Pi’s story of surviving on a lifeboat with zoo animals is rather incredible. Did the far-fetched nature of the story ever bother you? Was Pi a convincing storyteller?
9. What did you think of Pi’s interview with the investigators from the Japanese Ministry of Transport? Do you think Pi’s mother, along with a sailor and a cannibalistic cook, was in the lifeboat with him instead of the animals? Which story do you believe, the one with animals or the one without animals?

10. When the investigators state that they think the story with animals is the better story, Pi answers “Thank you. And so it goes with God.” What do you think Pi meant by that?
    
11. How does it relate to the claim that this is a story “that will make you believe in God”?