Life of Pi Reading Notes

"for the guests are as unhygienic as alcoholics" (page 18) -metaphor

"I don't mean to defend zoos. Close them all down (and let us hope that what wildlife remains can survive in what is left of the natural world). I know zoos are no longer in people's good graces. Religion faces the same problem. Certain illusions about freedom plague them both." (Page 27)

"I couldn't bear to have yet another French speaker guffawing at my name, so when the man on the phone asked, 'Can i'ave your name?' I said, 'I am who I am.' Half an hour later two pizzas arrived for 'Ian Hoolihan'. It is true that those we meet can change us, sometimes so profoundly that we are not the same afterwards, even unto our names."

"When I was your age, I lived in bed, racked with polio. I asked myself every day, 'where is God? Where is God? Where is God?' God never came. It wasn't God who saved me - it was medicine." (Page 39)

"To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation." (Page40-41) - Pi's belief on the way that agnostics are

"All living things contain a measure of madness that moves them in a 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" (page 58)

"Islam followed right behind, hardly a year later. I was fifteen years old and I was exploring my hometown." (Page 83) -it seems Pi is very curious about the things he doesn't know, one of them being faiths not being his own. Pi is Hindu but is curious about the Christian and Islam faith.

"One such time I left town and on my way back, at a point where the land was high and I could see the sea to my left and down the road a long ways, I suddenly felt I was in heaven. The spot was in fact no different from when I had passed not long before, but my way of seeing it had changed." (Page 89) - it seems the more things that Pi learns of things he never knew before, it is beginning to change him as a person and shape him into the man he will soon become

"They didn't know that I was practicing Hindu, Christian and Muslim" (page 93)

"Listen, my darling, if you're going to be religious, you must be either a Hindu, a Christian or a Muslim... I don't see why I can't be all three. Mamaji has two passports... Why can't I be a Hindu, a Christian and a Muslim?" (Page 106) - Pi believes that the ability to have two passports is the same as being able to be more than one faith, however everyone else disagrees with him
"Mother chuckled. 'Last week he finished a book called The Imitation of Christ.'...I wonder how far he'll go with these interests!' cried Father. They laughed" (page 109) - it seems that both of Pi's parents aren't taking him seriously and instead making a joke out of the whole thing hoping it is just a phase. When Pi hears this there is nothing good that can come because something like this may make Pi angry at his parents and want to run away

"The baker, a shy but dignified man, nodded at the teacher, who nodded back... I broke the carrot in two and gave one half to Mr.Kumar and one half to Mr.Kumar... Mr.Kumar went first, dipping his hand over the fence." (Page 120) - Here both the teacher and baker are on a side of Pi's. They both have the same name confusing you as to which one Pi is speaking about. Especially when it says that Mr. Kumar went to feed the zebra. It seems that they do this not to confuse you but almost think they are the same person because both make Pi go into the same direction.

"Isn't it ironic Richard Parker?We're in hell yet still we're afraid of immortality. Look how close you are!" (Page 139)

"Ravi spent his days there, watching the men work. Something was wrong with the engines, he said. Did something go wrong with the fixing of them? I don't know. I don't think anyone will ever know. The answer is a mystery lying at the bottom of thousands of feet