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Yann Martel
Life
Even though Yann was born in Spain, he has been to Costa Rica, France, Mexico and the United States.
Education
Yann Martel was born to Émile Martel and Nicole Perron on June 25th, in Salamanca, Spain, 1963.
He completed his secondary education in Canada at Trinity College School in Port Hope, Ontario (1979–81), and continued his studies at Trent University (1981–84; 1986–87) and Concordia University (1984–85), earning a Bachelor of Arts. in philosophy.
He is currently 54.
Works
Although Life of Pi was his award winning novel, it was not the first novel he wrote. He wrote his first novel Self in 1996.
In 2001 Martel received international acclaim for Life of Pi, which features elements of fable, fantasy, and magic realism. The book was awarded the prestigious Booker Prize and was published in more than 30 languages. It later was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film (2012) directed by Ang Lee.
Propelled by the success of Life of Pi, in 2010 Martel published Beatrice and Virgil.
Presenter: Ryan Christian
Book: Life of Pi
Author: Yann Martel
Life of Pi
Life of Pi won the Booker prize in 2002
Characters
Pi Patel
Piscine Molitor Patel, known to all as just "Pi", is the narrator and protagonist of the novel. He was named after a swimming pool in Paris. The story is told as a narrative from the perspective of a middle-aged Pi, now married with his own family, and living in Canada.
Richard Parker
A Bengal tiger.
Works Cited
https://www.shmoop.com/life-of-pi/summary.html
http://www.gradesaver.com/author/yann-martel/
Part 3 isn't long at all. Two civil servants for the Japanese Maritime Department in the Ministry of Transport interview Pi to try and shed some light on the sinking of the cargo ship. While they don't get any answers about the ship's sudden shipwreck, they do get Pi's story. When they question the more implausible portions of Pi's story, Pi delivers an impassioned defense of "the better story." To prove his point, he tells a version of his story without any of the animals mentioned above. It's an utterly ghastly story since human beings, instead of animals, literally tear each other to shreds.
Pi asks the investigators which story they prefer. They prefer the story with animals. There's some wrapping up, but the book basically ends there. The reader is left having to decide whether Pi has concocted a totally elaborate story with animals instead of human beings to explain the horrific events on the lifeboat.
At the time of the main events of the story, he is sixteen years old. He recounts the story of his life and his 227-day journey on a lifeboat when his ship sinks in the middle of the Pacific Ocean during a voyage to North America.
Part 1 details Pi's childhood in Pondicherry, India. His father owns a zoo and Pi spends a lot of his time thinking about animals: after all, they're always around. But zoology is only one of Pi's passions: he also loves religion.
Pi's parents decide to leave India. They sell most of the animals and pack up their belongings. They board, along with some of the animals they're selling to North American zoos, a Japanese cargo ship. They're headed for Canada.
All of Part 2 takes place at sea, but without many of the characters we met in Part 1. Tragedy strikes and the ship sinks halfway to its destination. No one survives except Pi and a few animals: a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan, and a Bengal tiger. All these creatures, including Pi, are packed into a twenty-six-foot-long lifeboat. The hyena then kills the zebra and the orangutan. And then the bengal tiger, whose name is Richard Parker kills the hyena.
Richard Parker and Pi, however, work out an uneasy living arrangement—Pi slowly trains RP until he's more or less master of the lifeboat. Pi is often despondent, though Pi and RP manage to survive. Pi catches fish and he has a few tools from the lifeboat's locker. It's true that Pi's survival skills develop, but it's also true that he's just lost his entire family. Pi is alone except for a man-eating tiger. He endures through cleverness, prayer, and willpower.
Pi lands on an island made entirely of algae. Pi and RP are malnourished at this point and it's not far-fetched to think Pi has gone mad. The chapter ends with Pi and RP landing in Mexico. RP bounds off into the jungle without so much as a goodbye.