Pied Beauty : a critical inquiry into the postmodern techniques employed in Yann Martel's Life of Pi

Abstract

Yann Martel's Life of Pi (2000) has received much positive attention from adults and children alike both as a popular and a critical success. This dissertation, titled Pied Beauty: A Critical Inquiry into the Postmodern Techniques employed in Yann Martel 's Life of Pi, studies how the novel initially appears to confuse the reader in its use of postmodernist techniques. However, a closer reading of the text reveals that the hook undermines and parodies the very notion of having a poetics of postmodernism. The book is analysed through two characteristics which have been associated with the postmodern. These involve self-reflexivity and undecidability. The extent to which Life of Pi adheres to these characteristics is examined and the question of the extent to which it can be called a postmodern text addressed on that basis.