Humorous Names in Yann Martel’s The Life of Pi

Pi’s father was the manager of the Zoo in Pondicherry, India so we know that 16-year-old Pi has grown up with animals and knows a lot about them, but still as the story unfolds we have to engage in a “suspension of disbelief.”

Martel starts this survival-at-sea story with a water-related story of how Pi got his name. Pi explains, “I was named after a swimming pool. Quite peculiar considering my parents never took to water.” (pages 11-12) Mamaji, Pi’s father’s business partner and friend of the family, was a world class swimming champion, and his favorite swimming pool was the Piscine Molitor in Paris where he had competed in the Olympics.

In school, Piscine had trouble with his strange name. Some people thought that he was an Indian Sikh by the name of “P. Singh.” Pi’s classmates called him Pissing Patel, and they would ask “Where’s Pissing? I’ve got to go,” or they would say, “You’re facing the wall. Are you Pissing?” After these taunts, “the sound would disappear, but the hurt would linger, like the smell of piss long after it has evaporated.” Even the teachers would forget to use his full name and would call on him with “Yes, Pissing” (p. 20-23).

This lasted through all the years at St. Joseph’s elementary school. On the first day at Petit Séminaire (high school), when it came time for each student to announce his name, Piscine went to the chalkboard and wrote: MY NAME IS PISCINE MOLITOR PATEL, KNOWN TO ALL AS PI PATEL (Martel 20-23). Then for good measure, he added, “π = 3.14. Then he drew a large circle and sliced it in two “with a diameter to evoke the basic lesson of geometry” (pp. 20-23).

Pi’s father decides the family should emigrate to Canada. So Pi, his parents, his older brother Ravi, and the most valuable of the zoo animals prepare to sail across the Pacific Ocean aboard the Tsimtsum, a Panamanian-registered Japanese cargo ship. Pi had been awake and so made it to a life boat. From the lifeboat Pi saw something, and cried, “Richard Parker, is that you? It’s so hard to see. Oh, that this rain would stop! Richard Parker? Richard Parker? Yes, it is you!”

Pi is a Christian, but he is also a Muslim and a Hindu, and when he first sees Richard Parker, he shouts “Jesus, Mary, Muhammad and Vishnu, how good to see you, Richard Parker!” “I could see his head. He was struggling to stay at the surface of the water…. He had seen me. He looked panic-stricken. He started swimming my way. The water about him was shifting wildly. He looked small and helpless.” “Richard Parker, can you believe what has happened to us? Tell me it’s a bad dream. Tell me it’s not real. Tell me I’m still in my bunk on the Tsimtsum…and I’ll soon wake up from this nightmare.” (p. 97).

Pi suddenly realizes that he does not want to share his future with Richard Parker even though Richard Parker is the only familiar thing Pi sees swimming in the water. Richard Parker is a 450 pound Bengal Tiger. By the time Pi comprehends what this means, he has already thrown out a life buoy and the tiger is pulling himself onto the boat, and so begins the “real” survival story.