Life of Pi

Death's Intent

Author's Note: In this piece, I decided to the prompt "without death, life is meaningless". I am kind of frustrated with myself for two things on this piece. One, I forgot to use syntactic/semantic devices which I thought was going to be this essay's goal and two is that this essay just didn't come out the way I wanted it to. I don't necessarily know how to explain this, but the ideas that I had sounded much better in my head.

Days, months, years pass leaving only marks on the calendar. Dry of events, dry of emotion. Your sense of urgency withers into ashes as it tears down every speck of personality that has ever filled your innards. Everything that has ever had significance fades away with each passing night. A rock, you become, of solitude, without love, hate, or meaning. In Life of Pi, Yann Martel presents the theory that without death life would be pointless. If you whisk the urgency away from life you simultaneously take any value you obtained along with it.

Urgency is an emotion that gets humans to actually do something, frankly. An example of this is when a due date is given on a certain assignment, whether for someone's occupation or a child's education. Often times, we procrastinate until the last minute and then finally get the project done. This showcases  how without due dates, important tasks may never be done.

Now I ask you, isn't death a type of due date? We have an agenda of things we must do before the time runs out. It is common to see people become more radical when they know that the end is drawing to a close. Before they know it, their agenda is the past and memories have been made. This is important, because memories have immense value in the journey to meaning. Memories are made because something you care about has been triggered, whether it be positive or negative, and when your life is filled with items that you care about, then I believe you have successfully obtained what many strive for, importance, all because you finally went out into the world, socialized, and did something.

In Life of Pi, death drives Pi. It leads him to training Richard Parker, to bringing himself to leave the island, and basically, to surviving. If death, was non-existent Pi could have floated in the seemingly infinite ocean for all of eternity, letting time slowly tick by, losing all humanity and civilization that he gathered throughout his life. With the presence of death though, Pi prevails in the face of challenge and his urgency pushes him to land, to life, all because of the driving force of death.

People of this new generation have let life slip by slowly, mainly through technology, and I believe that people forget the reality of death every day. I myself have the attitude of "I'll do it tomorrow" when this only leads to me accomplishing nothing, and I guarantee that there are millions of people exactly like me, letting our one shot at life slip past us like water down a drain. Once we have the epiphany that maybe we should go out and change the world and make memories, then I think the challenge of getting to that state of importance has been met. Pi realized this, so why can't we? Fear death and do everything you have ever wanted and I guarantee your footprint will be left on this earth in glory even past the day that eternal fate comes.

Visible Insanity

Helplessness and insanity have a direct relationship that with time grows. As the control that one obtains diminishes from their grasp, so does their grip on their sanity. They must do whatever they can to let themselves know that the sanity, which they once had, is still there. But through time even this will be lost. All sanity will be gone and all control will disappear.

Pi’s attempt at getting control was by making a diary. At the end of Chapter 89 you see some of his entries. At first his entries are a good paragraph and capture what is happening. Yet, with each post they get shorter and shorter to the point where they consist of only one word. His diary shows the digression of his sanity with each passing day and he becomes more helpless than he's ever been before. When the ink of his pen runs out, it symbolizes that his sanity has also run out. He is just a helpless soul fighting for his life without prevail.

People are seen every day fighting for a lost cause, while at the same time slowly losing their minds. With every turn, there is a brick wall. A singular person cannot fight this. The only way for them to be saved is by an outside force. Someone who will come into the scene and lift them from the ashes saving everything at the last moment. Pi needs this outside force soon, whether it be land or another human or else he will wither away with Richard Parker in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

The Test of Belief

For all of Pi’s life the people surrounding him affirmed his belief in religion. He thought that the existence of God was a fact and he lived his life with God in mind. Then Mr. Kumar came in and challenged his faith. The questions and information he brought to the table twisted up Pi’s conscience, leaving him in a whirlwind of confusion. Yet through this, Pi’s respect for Mr. Kumar strengthens and he himself strengthens, too. Mr. Kumar was the first person, let alone one of authority, to debate religion with Pi. He makes Pi doubt something that has always been true to him and this is what the importance of Mr. Kumar was.

Many people nowadays have narrow views on beliefs and only see and believe what they want to. When they proclaim something that is alien to them as foolish they are putting on display the ignorance in which fills them to the core. If one of these figures can have a Mr. Kumar, and will listen to him instead of turning their back to them, they will have understanding and be wise, yet can still be true to what they believe in. Mr. Kumar taught Pi a lesson of great proportion, so it fits quite perfectly for him to be a teacher. With one conversation Mr. Kumar changed Pi’s outlook for the better in a great way and though they may be different in beliefs they share a significant understanding.