Hello
everyone, and welcome back to my blog! There has been a slight change of plans;
we are now reading the book Life of Pi, by Yann Martel. I am currently
about ¼ through the book, and it is truly interesting.
Something
interesting that I have seen so far is that the book’s main perspective is Pi’s
(I love how he got that nickname), but there is also another perspective that
comes into view every few chapters or so. As I read those chapters, I saw that
the perspective belonged to a man who is first meeting Pi, but a much older
version of himself. He describes the setting that he meets him in: a house full
of different religious books, symbols, and shrines. He also notes his
personality, talents, and history (as far as he can tell).
Moving
back to Pi’s perspective, his background of growing up in a zoo make for a good
sort of “hook” for the reader to get caught onto. Childlike wonder plus a zoo
can never go wrong. However, some of the statements that he makes involving
zoos, rights, and free will, I somewhat don’t agree with; one of them is when
he says that living in a zoo is luxury for the animals rather that being in the
wild. His defense for this is that the animals have everything the need in a
zoo, and that in the wild it is always by chance and risk that animals find the
next thing the need. I say that it is true that the animals get everything they
need in a zoo, but some animals are specifically designed to live better in the
wild. A wolf in the wild would know how to hunt in using it’s smell and agility
to its full power, rather, a wolf in the zoo would just know when feeding time
is.
The
thing in the book that I am the most intrigued about is Pi’s conversion to Christianity.
Pi was confused as to why a god would send his son to be rejected, trampled on,
and murdered, but his thought process shows the beauty of what Christianity is
about: Christ’s love for us. He finally sees Christ’s love in His sacrifice.
However, after accepting Christ, he says, “thanks to Lord Krishna for having
put Jesus of Nazareth, who’s humanity I found so compelling, in my way”. This
shows that he is still devoted to being a Hindu, even after accepting Christ
(not to mention that later he becomes a Muslim). In Pi’s quest to find the
truth, after accepting Christ why does he still hold on to Hinduism and later
hold on to Islam? Does this mean that he actually doesn’t have faith in Christ?
