Life of Pi

One day, Pi spots a ship on the horizon and tries to flag it down. The tanker nearly crushes Pi’s lifeboat as it approaches, but it remains oblivious to Pi’s presence. Rather than feeling dejected, Pi professes his love for Richard Parker. Pi begins drifting in and out of consciousness as his body becomes skeleton-like. He attempts to escape mentally by asphyxiating himself with what he calls a “dream rag” to induce strange thoughts. His last diary entry reads, “Today I will die” (240).

After going blind, Pi starts hearing voices. In a state of delirium, he thinks Richard Parker is speaking to him with a French accent. He then realizes he is speaking with another blind castaway who attaches his boat to Pi’s. After exchanging bizarre stories, the man boards Pi’s boat and announces his intention to cannibalize him by eating his liver and flesh. Richard Parker suddenly attacks the man and rips him to pieces. Pi is thankful that Richard Parker has given him life, but he is forever traumatized when his vision returns, and he sees the man’s butchered body.

After taking the other castaway boat, Pi makes an “exceptional botanical discovery:” an algae-covered low island (256). After disabusing himself that it must be a mental delusion, Pi and Richard Parker disembark to explore the island, which is overrun with meerkats. Pi makes observations about the flora of the island. He says, “As my heart exalted Allah, my mind began to take in information about Allah’s work” (260). He marvels over the vast greenness, which is the color of Islam. Pi and Richard Parker explore separately during the day, but they return to the boat to sleep at night.

After learning about the freshness of the water and how the algae absorbs the salt from the seawater, Pi suddenly witnesses Richard Parker slaughtering the meerkats. He then learns the island is carnivorous, and the algae becomes acidic at night. Ultimately, Pi decides to leave the island rather than “live a lonely half-life of physical comfort and spiritual death” (283).

Eventually, Pi lands on a Mexican beach, where Richard Parker bolts off into the jungle without so much as glancing back at Pi. Pi never sees Richard Parker again. Weeping at the “unceremonious” loss of his companion, a group of villagers rescues Pi. Pi is taken care of by Mexican doctors whose language he cannot understand, and in a dream-like trance, he vaguely recalls his journey to Canada and the University of Toronto.