Quotes from Yann Martel

It's a joke in the zoo business, a weary joke, that the paperwork involved in trading a shrew weighs more than an elephant, that the paperwork involved in trading an elephant weighs more than a whale, and that you must never try to trade a whale, never.

We fight and fight and fight. We fight no matter the cost of battle, the losses we take, the improbability of success. We fight to the very end. It's not a question of courage. It's something constitutional, an inability to let go. It may be nothing more than life-hungry stupidity.

It is not atheists who get stuck in my craw, but agnostics. Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.

the only Raj they managed to get was a

Her fear was something useless that only hampered her.

We left Madras on June 21st, 1977, on the Panamanian-registered Japanese cargo ship Tsimtsum.

So tell me, since it makes no factual difference to you and you can't prove the question either way, which story do you prefer? Which is the better story, the story with animals or the story without animals?" Mr. Okamoto: "That's an interesting question . . ." Mr. Chiba: "The story with animals." Mr. Okamoto: "Yes. The story with animals is the better story." Pi Patel: "Thank you. And so it goes with God.

I just want to love God.

Isn't it ironic, Richard Parker? We're in hell yet still we're afraid of immortality.

Do you understand? You've been praying to a crucified chimpanzee all these years. Your Son of Man is not a god-he's just an ape on a cross!

Cuesta creer que existe el amor, si no pregúnteselo a cualquier amante. Cuesta creer que existe la vida, si no pregúnteselo a cualquier científico. Cuesta creer que existe Dios, si no pregúnteselo a cualquier creyente. ¿Qué problema tienen con lo que cuesta creer?

I know zoos are no longer in people's good graces. Religion faces the same problem. Certain illusions about freedom plague them both.

if it weren't for this hyena, the sailors wouldn't have thrown me into the lifeboat and I would have stayed on the ship and I surely would have drowned; and if I had to share quarters with a wild animal, better the upfront ferocity of a dog than the power and stealth of a cat.

Things floated in the water but none that brought me hope. I could see no other lifeboats.

We loved our son like the sea loves an island, always surrounding him with our arms, always touching him and crashing upon his shore with our care and concern. When he was gone, the sea had only itself to contemplate.

These people walk by a widow deformed by leprosy begging for a few paise, walk by children dressed in rags living in the street, and they think, "Business as usual." But if they perceive a slight against God, it is a different story. Their faces go red, their chests heave mightily, they sputter angry words. The degree of their indignation is astonishing. Their resolve is frightening.

Animals that escape go from the known into the unknown - and if there is one thing an animal hates above all else, it is the unknown. Escaping animals usually hind in the very first place they find that gives them a sense of security, and they are dangerous only to those who happen to get between them and their reckoned safe spot.

In the wild, animals stick to the same paths for the same pressing reasons, season after season.

Until it knows its rank for certain, the animal lives a life of unbearable anarchy.

Reality escapes us. It's beyond description, even a simple pear. Time eats everything.

and the three-toed sloth, such a beautiful example of the miracle of life, reminded me of God.

Come aboard if your destination is oblivion—it should be our next stop. We can sit together. You can have the window seat, if you want. But it's a sad view. Oh

My developing sense was that the foundation of a story is an emotional foundation. If a story does not work emotionally, it does not work at all.

That I was a swimmer made no waves; it seems to be a law of human nature that those who live by the sea are suspicious of swimmers, just as those who live in the mountains are suspicious of mountain climbers.