Believability on the Axes of Structuralism: Yan Martel’s Life of Pi

Authors

  • Seyed Javad Habibi University of Mysore, India
  • Sara Soleimani Karbalaei Department of Studies in English University of Mysore, India

Abstract

Elaborating on parallel, substitutional and correlated elements of the narrative in Yan Martel’s Life of Pi, this study aims at examining Martel’s technique for presenting a believable story in his novel. To discuss the way the believability of Pi’s narrative gets solidified, this enquiry takes advantage of the organizing principles of structuralism, namely, the metonymical-syntagmatic and the metaphorical-paradigmatic axes. Attributing the various correlating elements of the novel to these axes shows that what actually makes Pi a reliable narrator and simultaneously his narrative believable are the very parallel structures of the novel. Keywords: structuralism; metonymical-syntagmatic axis; metaphorical-paradigmatic axis; believability 

References

Lacey, A. R (1996). A dictionary of philosophy. 3rd Ed. London: Routledge.

Martel, Y. (2002). Life of Pi. 2001. New Delhi: Penguin Books.

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Scholes, R. (1982). Semiotics and interpretation. New Haven: Yale University Press.

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Turner, T. (1973). Piaget’s Structuralism. American Anthropologist 75. 351-373.

Runes, D.D. (Ed.) (1983). The dictionary of philosophy. New York: Philosophical Library.

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Published

2014-09-17

Issue

Vol. 20 No. 3 (2014)

Section

Articles

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