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441800d
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I can only tell my story, what you believe is up to you.
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Yann Martel |
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c56e6d6
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The lower you are, the higher your mind will want to soar. It was natural that, bereft and desperate as I was, in the throes of unremitting suffering. I should turn to God
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Yann Martel |
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8c73979
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So, Swami Jesus, will you go on the hajj this year?" Ravi said, bringing the palms of his hands together in front of his face in a reverent namaskar. "Does Mecca beckon?" He crossed himself. "Or will it be to Rome for your coronation as the next Pope Pius?" He drew in the air a Greek letter, making clear the spelling of his Mockery. "Have you found time yet to get the end of your pecker cut off and become a Jew? At the rate you're going, if..
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Yann Martel |
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c750eb3
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I felt I was beating a rainbow to death
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Yann Martel |
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e150b74
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Was it the forgetfulness of old age or personal incapacity that made the man able to say please but not thank you?
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old-age
rudeness
study-in-character
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Yann Martel |
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c8f0d60
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But once a dead God, always a dead God, even resurrected. The Son must have the taste of death forever in his mouth. The Trinity must be tainted by it; there must be a certain stench at the right hand of God the Father. The horror must be real. Why would God wish that upon Himself? Why not leave death to mortals? Why make dirty what is beautiful, spoil what is perfect? -- Love. That was his answer.
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Yann Martel |
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dd6d975
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Art is the suitcase of history, carrying the essentials. Art is the life buoy of history. Art is seed, art is memory, art is vaccine.
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Yann Martel |
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8505b8e
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Don't you bully me with your politeness!
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Yann Martel |
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3964eda
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Things didn't turn out the way they used to, but what can you do? You must take life the way it comes at you and make the best of it.
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Yann Martel |
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c21b8f7
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We believe what we see. So did Columbus. What do you do when you're in the dark?
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Yann Martel |
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ba0520d
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What a thing to acknowledge in your heart! To lose a brother is to lose someone with whom you can share the experience of growing old, who is supposed to bring you a sister-in-law and nieces and nephews, creatures to people the tree of your life and give it new branches. To lose your father is to lose the one whose guidance and help you seek, who supports you like a tree trunk supports its branches. To lose your mother, well, that is like l..
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death-of-a-loved-one
family
relationships
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Yann Martel |
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1f79dfd
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At moments of wonder, it is easy to avoid small thinking, to entertain thoughts that span the universe, that capture both thunder and tinkle, thick and thin, the near and the far.
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vast-universe
wonder
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Yann Martel |
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f6ccb44
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Jesus, Mary, Muhammad and Vishnu, how good to see you Richard Parker!
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Yann Martel |
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0697d1d
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Fiction and nonfiction are not so easily divided. Fiction may not be real, but it's true; it goes beyond the garland of facts to get to emotional and psychological truths. As for nonfiction, for history, it may be real, but its truth is slippery, hard to access, with no fixed meaning bolted to it. If history doesn't become story, it dies to everyone except the historian.
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Yann Martel |
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7f634ca
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I think art comes from some sense of discomfort with the world, some sense of not quite fitting with it.
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world
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Yann Martel |
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af01886
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Despair was a heavy blackness that let no light in or out. It was a hell beyond expression.
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despair
expression
hell
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Yann Martel |
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98c4d11
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What his uncle does not understand is that in walking backwards, his back to the world, his back to God, he is not grieving. He is objecting. Because when everything cherished by you in life has been taken away, what else is there to do but object?
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loss
walking
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Yann Martel |
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0fb39c5
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The world isn't just the way it is. It's how we understand it, no? And in understanding something, we bring something to it, no? Doesn't that make life a story?
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Yann Martel |
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a7510e8
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And that wasn't the end of it. There are always those who take it upon themselves to defend God, as if Ultimate Reality, as if the sustaining frame of existence, were something weak and helpless. 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..
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Yann Martel |
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04bfbe2
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This tiny habitation on wheels, with bit parts of the living room, the washroom, and the fireplace, is a pathetic admission that human life is no more than this: an attempt to feel at home while racing towards oblivion. He
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Yann Martel |
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faa9e99
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How true is that necessity is the mother of invention, how very true.
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martel
yann-martel
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Yann Martel |
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a78a3da
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if you fall into a lion's pit, the reason the lion will tear you to pieces is not because it's hungry-be assured, zoo animals are amply fed-or because it's bloodthirsty, but because you've invaded it's territory.
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lions
nature
wild-animals
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Yann Martel |
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8bec0d6
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We fight no matter the cost of battle, the losses we take, the improbability of success. We fight to the very end. It is not the question of courage. It is something constitutional, an ability to let go. It maybe nothing more than life-hungry stupidity.
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Yann Martel |
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ca6e160
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The reason death sticks so closely to life isn't biological necessity - it's envy. Life is so beautiful that death has fallen in love with it, a jealous, possessive love that grabs at what it can.
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love
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Yann Martel |
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08da1da
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Isn't it ironic, Richard Parker? We're in hell yet still we're afraid of immortality
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Yann Martel |
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03b164b
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Life on a lifeboat isn't much of a life. It is like an end game in chess, a game with few pieces. The elements couldn't be more simple, nor the stakes higher. Physically it is extraordinarily arduous, and morally it is killing. You must make adjustments if you want to survive. Much becomes expendable. You get happiness where you can. You reach a point where you're at the bottom of hell, yet you have your arms crossed and a smile on your fac..
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Yann Martel |
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75efa78
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As for fame, fame felt like nothing. Fame was not a sensation like love or hunger or loneliness, welling from within and invisible to the outside eye. It was rather entirely external, coming from the minds of others. It existed in the way people looked at him or behaved towards him. In that, being famous was no different from being gay, or Jewish, or from a visible minority: you are who you are, and then people project onto you some notion ..
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Yann Martel |
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dac0e84
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Books, like people, can't be reduced to the cost of the materials with which they were made. Books, like people, become unique and precious once you get to know them.
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Yann Martel |
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c335171
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In a healthy individual, a broken bone that has healed properly is strongest where it was once broken. You have not lost any life, Henry told himself. You will still get your fair share of years. Yet the quality of his life changed. Once you've been struck by violence, you acquire companions that never leave you entirely: Suspicion, Fear, Anxiety, Despair, Joylessness. The natural smile is taken from you and the natural pleasures you once e..
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Yann Martel |
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9a5a89d
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Kematian selalu membuntuti Kehidupan dengan begitu dekat, bukanlah karena keharusan biologis, melainkan karena rasa iri. Kehidupan ini begitu indah, sehingga maut pun jatuh cinta padanya. Cinta yang pencemburu dan posesif, yang menyambar apapun yang bisa diambilnya
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cinta
hidup
indah
iri
kehidupan
kematian
mati
maut
posesif
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Yann Martel |
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e4e3484
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lymn bllh hw nqtH kml, tslym mTlq, thqh `myqh, f`l Hb Hr, lkn 'Hynan kn mn shbh lmstHyl 'n 'sh`r blHb. 'Hynan kn qlby yGrq bsr`@ blGDb, w lHbT w lqlq, knt 'khsh~ 'n yGrq ymny fy q` lmHyT lhdy' fl y`wd bmkny nshlh
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Yann Martel |
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978f76a
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We are all born like Catholics . . . in limbo, without religion.
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religion
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Yann Martel |
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2065953
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I have a fierce will to live. Others fight a little, then lose hope. Still others - and I am one of those - never give up. 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.
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Yann Martel |
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01d535f
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Life and death live and die in exactly the same spot, the body. It is from there that both babies and cancers are born.
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Yann Martel |
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b704132
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An adult female orang-utan cannot defeat an adult male spotted hyena. That is the plain empirical truth. Let it become known among zoologists. Had Orange Juice been a male, had she loomed as large on the scales as she did in my heart, it might have been another matter. But portly and overfed though she was from living in the comfort of a zoo, even so she tipped the scales at barely 110 pounds. Female orang-utans are half the size of males. ..
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Yann Martel |
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b236a87
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The tennis challenger starts strong but soon loses confidence in his playing. The champion racks up the games. But in the final set, when the challenger has nothing left to lose, he becomes relaxed again, insouciant, daring. Suddenly he's playing like the devil and the champion must work hard to get those last points.
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Yann Martel |
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e12922e
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Fanatics do not have faith - they have belief. With faith you let go. You trust. Whereas with belief you cling.
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Yann Martel |
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5ac4b06
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If you don't let technology help you, if you resist good ideas, you condemn yourself to dinosaurhood.
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Yann Martel |
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c4f5f13
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God is universal," spluttered the priest. The imam nodded strong approval. "There is only one God." "And with their one god Muslims are always causing troubles and provoking riots. The proof of how bad Islam is, is how uncivilized Muslims are,: pronounced the pandit. "Says the slave-driver of the cast system," huffed the imam. "Hindus enslave people and worship dressed-up dolls." "They are golden calf lovers. They kneel before the cows," th..
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Yann Martel |
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4865d0f
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I knelt a mortal; I rose an immortal.
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elevation-after-prayers
life-of-pi
praying
salah
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Yann Martel |
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d26ba76
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I preferred to set off and perish in search of my own kind than to live a lonely half-life of physical comfort and spiritual death on this murderous island.
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Yann Martel |
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51a7711
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Christianity is a religion in a rush. Look at the world created in seven says. Even on a symbolic lovel, that's creation in frenzy.
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Yann Martel |
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d8bea70
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You may not believe in life, but I don't believe in death. Move on!
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Yann Martel |
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52ca50d
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The matter is difficult to put into words. For fear, real fear, such as shakes you to your foundation, such as you feel when you are brought face to face with your mortal end, nestles in your memory like a gangrene: it seeks to rot everything, even the words with which to speak of it. So you must fight hard to express it. You must fight hard to shine the light of words upon it. Because if you don't, if your fear becomes a wordless darkness ..
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life
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Yann Martel |