"Life of Pi" is a fantasy/adventure novel written by the Canadian writer Yann Martel and published in 2001. The novel was an immediate success after it's release and has since sold more than ten million copies worldwide. It has … [Read more...] about Life of Pi
Yann Martel
Yann Martel was born in Salamanca, Spain on June 25th, 1963. The son of military parents, Martel lived in many different countries around the world as a child. He completed high school while living in Ontario, Canada and then went on to get an undergraduate degree in philosophy at Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario. After this, Martel worked a series of odd jobs until 1988, when his first short story was published in "The Malahat Review", a Canadian literary magazine.
The Review posted more of his short stories in the early 1990's for which he won the Journey Prize (1991) and the Pushcart Prize (1992).
In 1993, a bookstore where Martel had done some readings of his short stories issued a limited edition, handcrafted volume of a collection of his stories.
Martel published his first novel, "Self" in 1996. The novel tells the story of a writer who one day wakes up to find that he has become a woman overnight. The book received little attention although it was on the short list for the Canada First Novel Award.
In 2002, Martel met fellow writer Alice Kuipers and the two began a romantic partnership that continues to this day.
Martel's second novel, 'Life of Pi' was published on September 11th, 2001. Unlike his first novel, this book was well received and very successful. It has since sold more than ten million copies worldwide and received the Man Booker Prize as well as spending a year on the New York Times Bestseller list and the bestseller lists of other newspapers.
Martel has since become an important literary figure and a Visiting Scholar at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada. In 2010, Martel put out his third novel, "Beatrice and Virgil", an allegorical tale about the Holocaust. In 2014, Martel was asked to be a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and he sat on the Board of Governors of the Saskatoon Public Library until 2015.
In early 2016, he published his fourth novel, "The High Mountains of Portugal" and made the New York Times Bestseller list once again. Martel currently lives in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Canada with his partner, Alice Kuipers and their four children.