![]() The ship the family is on sinks in a storm. ![]() In the book’s second part, set in 1976, the family emigrates to Canada, in reaction to Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s imposition of ‘The Emergency’, a period when the Indian constitution was suspended, now recognised as a particularly shameful chapter in the subcontinent’s tumultuous political history. His innocent questioning leads to answers that are not at all satisfying. Pi is raised as a Hindu but as a teenager decides to investigate both Islam and Christianity, eventually deciding to adopt all three religions, telling his shocked parents that he “just wants to love God”. Pi quickly discovers an innate curiosity for matters of a spiritual and religious nature. In the first, Pi, now an adult living in Canada, reminisces about his childhood in India, where his father owns a zoo. The story is told through the voice of the eponymous Piscine “Pi” Patel, an Indian Tamil boy growing up in the city of Pondicherry. It can be read as a literary novel par excellence (it won the Booker Prize in 2002) an adventure survival story or a metaphysical treatise on religion. ![]() The Life of Pi is one of those rare books that defy attempts at classification. In this series of articles I profile 10 great Indian novels… ![]()
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