Anthropomorphism In Yann Martel's Life Of Pi

Martel’s anthropomorphism of the animals in Life of Pi serves to allow readers the choice of believing Pi’s original story or the alternate story he gives the Japanese investigators. Considering how often Pi interacts with animals throughout the novel, it is evident how Martel purposely personifies them in order to leave the reader in a daze. When two Japanese investigators come to question Pi towards the end of the novel, he describes his experience on the boat with Richard Parker; however, the original story was not sufficient for them. As a result, Pi retells his story replacing animals with humans to make his adventure more appealing to the men. Specifically, he replaces the zebra with a sailor, the hyena with a villainous cook, and the orangutan with his mother. At first the substitution may …show more content…
He had no expression on his face, neither of despair nor of anger, neither of fear nor of pain...I stabbed him repeatedly. His blood soothed my chapped hands. His heart was a struggle-all those tubes that connected it. I managed to get it out. It tasted delicious, far better than turtle. I ate his liver. I cut off great pieces of his flesh” (295). The personification was intentional, but the way she wrote the story the reader cannot tell if they are animals are human since both are so similar. Based on Pi’s alternate story in which he unforgivingly stabs the cook, his cold-blooded attitude could only be linked to one animal on the boat- Richard Parker. To save himself from the villainous treatment she’d receive the chef, Pi had to tap into his survival mode, which animals have the natural instinct to do. Martel intentionally blurs the line between what's real and what's not with regard to humans and animals in the novel. As a result of sharing similar instincts, there is no way for readers to know the difference between a human and an animal in Life of