Quotes from book
Life of Pi

Yann Martel

Life of Pi is a Canadian philosophical novel by Yann Martel published in 2001. The protagonist is Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, an Indian Tamil boy from Pondicherry who explores issues of spirituality and metaphysics from an early age. He survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger which raises questions about the nature of reality and how it is perceived and told.

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“The presence of God is the finest of rewards.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

Yann Martel photo

“If there's only one nation in the sky, shouldn't all passports be valid for it?”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“There are always those who take it upon themselves to defend God… These people fail to realize that it is on the inside that God must be defended, not on the outside.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“Why can't reason give greater answers? Why can we throw a question further than we can pull in an answer? Why such a vast net if there's so little fish to catch?”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“Repetition is important in the training not only of animals but also of humans." Yann Martel in Life of Pi, Page 25”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“I must say a word about fear. It is life's only true opponent. Only fear can defeat life.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 56, p. 178

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“Hindus, in their capacity for love, are indeed hairless Christians, just as Muslims, in the way they see God in everything, are bearded Hindus, and Christians, in their devotion to God, are hat-wearing Muslims.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 16, pp. 54–55

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“Scientists are a friendly, atheistic, hard-working, beer-drinking lot whose minds are preoccupied with sex, chess and baseball when they are not preoccupied with science.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 1, p. 5

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“Socially inferior animals are the ones that make the most strenuous, resourceful efforts to get to know their keepers. They prove to be the ones most faithful to them…it is a fact commonly known in the trade.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“Life on a lifeboat isn’t much of a life. It is like an end game in chess, a game with few pieces. The elements couldn’t be more simple, nor the stakes higher.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“Time is an illusion that only makes us pant. I survived because I forgot even the very notion of time." Page 212.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Variant: I did not count the days or the weeks or the months. Time is an illusion that only makes us pant. I survived because I forgot even the very notion of time.
Source: Life of Pi

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“I couldn't get Him out of my head. Still can't. I spent three solid days thinking about Him. The more He bothered me, the less I coul forget Him. And the more I learned about Him, the less I wanted to leave Him.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi

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“There were many seas. The sea roared like a tiger. The sea whispered in your ear like a friend telling you secrets. The sea clinked like small change in a pocket. The sea thundered like avalanches. The sea hissed like sandpaper working on wood. The sea sounded like someone vomiting. The sea was dead silent.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 78, p. 239

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“For evil in the open is but evil from within that has been let out. The main battlefield for good is not the open ground of the public arena but the small clearing of each heart.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 25, p. 78

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“If you stumble at mere believability, what are you living for? Isn't love hard to believe?”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 99, p. 330

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“My greatest wish — other than salvation — was to have a book.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 73, p. 230

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“Animals in the wild lead lives of compulsion and necessity within an unforgiving social hierarchy in an environment where the supply of fear is high and the supply of food is low and where territory must constantly be defended and parasites forever endured.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 4, p. 17

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“"Bapu Gandhi said, 'All religions are true.' I just want to love God," I blurted out, and looked down, red in the face.”

Yann Martel book Life of Pi

Source: Life of Pi (2001), Chapter 23, p. 76