Yann Martel crafts a deliberately deceptive narrative in an attempt to challenge readers. What questions does Martel seek to raise with his readership?

Life of Pi is a novel that encourages readers to ask the question: what is truth? Yann Martel intentionally structures Pi Patel’s story to confuse readers into believing even the seemingly irrelevant so as to affirm the core messages in the book. From shifting perspective, providing a unique narrative, and offering two sides too one story, Martel poses important concepts for consideration regarding what really matters.

The Author’s Note of the book begins by laying the foundation of the story through a first-person perspective as Yann Martel explains how the book came to be. Martel speaks of a man in a coffee house in Pondicherry, Mr Adirubasamy, and how he told him of Pi Patel’s story as if such a meeting were factual. However, the illusion of truth is later understood to be utterly false, but not before the reader is drawn in far enough to want to believe the fantastic parts of Pi’s story. The regular revisiting of this perspective throughout Part One solidifies the notion that Pi Patel is a real person whom the author has encountered. Yann Martel’s fabrication parallels the story that the Japanese investigators question so heavily from Pi, a detail likely intended to make readers ask which part of the story is true and which is false. Furthermore, his clear embellishments on the supposedly factual recounts of meetings with Pi Patel give it even more credibility when considered alongside Pi’s story, and give the reader more reason to believe that with every truth comes a story influenced by perspective and added flourishes. In one of the most important parts of the book, Pi assures readers that “this story has a happy ending”, thus showing that, as with faith, the desired outcome is not the subject being questioned, but rather how it is that this is possible.

The crux of Martel’s narrative is a uniquely bizarre one, with a 16-year-old Indian boy being confined to a lifeboat with a 450-pound Royal Bengal Tiger named Richard Parker. The extremity of the circumstances is only furthered by the duration of time spent afloat across the Pacific Ocean, the almost hallucinatory encounters with another sailor and a carnivorous island, and the background of the protagonist. With all of these aspects considered, the far-fetched story should in theory be hard to swallow. However, the slow pace of its retelling and the realistic format push the reader to a point of frustration that emulates the feeling that Pi has whilst on his journey. Once the reader is as thirsty as Pi, as hungry, and as psychologically nauseated, Yann Martel introduces the key to Pi’s ultimate survival: faith. Central to the intentions of the story is the value and effect of religious practise and faith, as well as science. When Pi has used logic and reason to establish himself on the lifeboat, he then turns to religious routines to restore and maintain his psychological wellbeing. This faith in the face of seemingly inescapable hardship is astounding to the reader, yet believable after being brought to the point of Pi’s hopelessness. As Pi seeks God to carry him through the ordeal, the reader realises that it is not the place of faith to justify tragedy, but simply to show that there will be salvation. As Pi explains that “so long as God is with (him), (he) will not die”, the readership is forced to ask whether justifying truth is necessary to proving it, or whether it is simply faith in its validity that makes it reality.

Upon the investigation conducted by the Japanese men in Part Three of the novel, Pi is implored to give the “true” story. Once he has provided a second narrative that associates all of the animals that he encountered with people aboard the Tsimtsum, including family, the Japanese investigators are satisfied. But it is when Pi questions them about the relevance of the story to the sinking of the ship that they begin to understand why believability is not necessarily what defines truth. For Pi, just because something is improbable does not make it impossible. Pi Patel tells them that the “dry, yeastless factuality” of the second story may be easier to accept, but neither story makes a factual difference to their investigation. Thus, he poses the question “which is the better story?” and they all agree that the less likely, embellished story is, resulting in Pi’s response “and so it goes with God”. This leaves the reader pondering how the existence of a greater force, the creation of the universe, and other such inevitable elements of life that are yet to be explained are not justified by science or religion, but merely given meaning by the belief that they need no explanation. Which is the better story, the one with life and colour, or the one without?

Yann Martel’s novel is an intricate exploration of some of the biggest questions to be pondered. Once the reader is drawn in enough that they want to believe the story, it becomes apparent that faith is less about proving something than it is wanting it to be true. Reality is not defined by believability; it is personal for each individual. Martel puts forward the notion that fact is not important when “the better story” gives purpose, and asks readers as a result, what is truth?