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''Life of Pi'' is a Canadian fantasy adventure novel by Yann Martel published in 2001. The protagonist, Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, an Indian boy from Pondicherry, explores issues of spirituality and practicality from an early age. He survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. The novel, which has sold more than ten million copies worldwide,〔('Life of Pi' a surprise success story around the world )〕 was rejected by at least five London publishing houses before being accepted by Knopf Canada, which published it in September 2001. The UK edition won the Man Booker Prize for Fiction the following year.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 ''Life of Pi'' )〕 It was also chosen for CBC Radio's ''Canada Reads'' 2003, where it was championed by author Nancy Lee. The French translation, ''L'Histoire de Pi'', was chosen in the French CBC version of the contest ''Le combat des livres'', where it was championed by Louise Forestier.〔 〕 The novel won the 2003 Boeke Prize, a South African novel award. In 2004, it won the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature in Best Adult Fiction for years 2001–2003.〔(【引用サイトリンク】 Asian Pacific American Award for Literature (APAAL) 2001–2003 )〕 In 2012 it was adapted into a theatrical feature film directed by Ang Lee with a screenplay by David Magee. == Plot == The author's note is an integral part of the novel. Unusually, the note describes entirely fictional events. It serves to establish and enforce one of the novel's main themes: the relativity of truth. ''Life of Pi'' is subdivided into three sections. In the first section, the main character, by the name of Piscine Patel, an adult Canadian, reminisces about his childhood in India. His father owns a zoo in Pondicherry. The livelihood provides the family with a relatively affluent lifestyle and some understanding of animal psychology. Piscine describes how he acquired his full name, Piscine Molitor Patel, as a tribute to the swimming pool in France. After hearing schoolmates tease him by transforming the first name into "Pissing", he establishes the short form of his name as "Pi" when he starts secondary school. The name, he says, pays tribute to the irrational number which is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. In describing his experiences, Pi describes several other unusual situations involving proper names: two visitors to the zoo, one a devout Muslim, and the other a committed atheist, bear identical names; and a memorably 450-pound tiger at the zoo bears the name Richard Parker as the result of a clerical error in which human and animal names were reversed.〔Martel, p. 14〕 Pi is raised a Hindu who practices vegetarianism. At the age of fourteen, he investigates Christianity and Islam, and decides to become an adherent of all three religions, much to his parents's dismay, saying he "just wants to love God."〔Martel, p. 69〕 He tries to understand God through the lens of each religion, and comes to recognize benefits in each one. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Life of Pi」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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