No matter what our situation entails we all have one common goal: to survive. Throughout life we experience tragic events, dire circumstances and strive to find our happiness and survive at all costs. The novel The Life of Pi written by Yann Martel and Shakespeare’s Hamlet both have this in common. Both males experience heart-wrenching encounters along their paths in life.
Hamlet and Pi deal with discovering their place in the world, as well as making the correct choices in order to get where they desire to be. Both stories follow alongside these characters with the theme of determination. After Pi’s family is killed at sea aboard the shipwreck of the Tsimtsum, he is forced to turn to his survival instincts and his animalistic side. “I had to tame him. It was at that moment that I realized this necessity. It was not a question of him or me, but of him and me.” (Ch.57) It is at this moment that Pi realizes it is not an option to kill Richard Parker, but neither is letting the tiger win; Pi must tame the tiger and gain authority through assertiveness. Hamlet gains the same feeling of determination after watching a traveling player’s speech. “Had he the motive and the cue for passion/That I have? / O, vengeance!” (2.2.58) Hamlet believes he must become like the hero in the speech delivered by the actor and get revenge for his beloved father’s murder. It is at this point in the play where Hamlet is set on his path of revenge, allowing nothing to get in his way. Both of these characters are inspired to carry on down their chosen paths with a strong sense of determination to back them up.
A prominent theme throughout both of these stories is religion and its power in all situations, wonderful or disastrous. Pi tries to stay strong while lost at sea by pulling from all of the faiths he identifies with: Hindu, Islam and Christianity. “I practiced religious rituals that I adapted to the circumstances – […] Sometimes my heart was sinking so fast with anger, desolation...