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By applying Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and how it contributes to the development of Pi’s characterization in Life of Pi, by Yann Martel, the author conveys that man’s divine understanding of God is only limited to his natural inclination to survive without suffering.

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Pi describes the barbarity of his suffering in the presence of desperation.

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Pi describes the barbarity of his suffering in the presence of desperation.

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“When your own life is threatened, your sense of empathy is blunted by a terrible, selfish hunger for survival” (150).

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Pi describes the dual nature of his dynamic with Richard Parker as both a competitive predator and spiritual companion.

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Pi describes the dual nature of his dynamic with Richard Parker as both a competitive predator and spiritual companion.

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“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. We were, literally and figuratively, in the same boat” (165).

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As Pi is deprived both mentally and physically, he explains the threat fear constitutes when it is evaded.

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As Pi is deprived both mentally and physically, he explains the threat fear constitutes when it is evaded.

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“If your fear becomes a wordless darkness that you avoid, perhaps even manage to forget, you open yourself to further attacks of fear because you never truly fought the opponent who defeated you” (204).

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Pi expresses the camaraderie and sense of humanity he feels in the presence of his companion, Richard Parker. 

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Pi expresses the camaraderie and sense of humanity he feels in the presence of his companion, Richard Parker. 

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“But there’s more to it. I will come clean. I will tell you a secret: a part of me was glad about Richard Parker. A part of me did not want Richard Parker to die at all, because if he died I would be left alone with despair, a foe more formidable than a tiger” (207).

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As he continues to fall down a void of despair, Pi describes his suffering as an act of compassion from God.

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As he continues to fall down a void of despair, Pi describes his suffering as an act of compassion from God.

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“I felt like the sage Markandeya, who fell out of Vishnu's mouth while Vishnu was sleeping and so beheld the entire universe, everything that there is. Before the sage could die of fright, Vishnu awoke and took him back into his mouth. For the first time, I noticed-as I would notice repeatedly during my ordeal, between one throe of agony and the next-that my suffering was taking place in a grand setting. I saw my suffering for what it was, finite and insignificant, and I was still” (223).

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Through his religious connection with God, Pi finds the will to survive in the divine sense of salvation he feels on the island.

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Through his religious connection with God, Pi finds the will to survive in the divine sense of salvation he feels on the island.

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“My suffering does matter. I want to live! I can't help but mix my life with that of the universe. Life is a peephole, a single tiny entry onto a vastness-how can I not dwell on this brief, cramped view I have of things? This peephole is all I've got! I mumbled words of Muslim prayer and went back to sleep.” (223)

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Pi is conflicted and sorrowful in that his desperation to satisfy his selfish hunger violates his religious and cultural abstinence from the consumption of meat.

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Pi is conflicted and sorrowful in that his desperation to satisfy his selfish hunger violates his religious and cultural abstinence from the consumption of meat.

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“I wept heartily over this poor little deceased soul. It was the first sentient being I had ever killed. I was now a killer. I was now as guilty as Cain. I was sixteen years old, a harmless boy, bookish and religious, and now I had blood on my hands. It's a terrible burden to carry. All sentient life is sacred. I never forget to include this fish in my prayers” (231).

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Pi feels his humanity being stripped away as he drowns further into starvation and malnutrition.

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Pi feels his humanity being stripped away as he drowns further into starvation and malnutrition.

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“It fell into my cup with a clink, and no doubt I will be considered to have abandoned the last vestiges of humanness by those who do not understand the degree of my suffering” (270).

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Pi is no longer hindered by his susceptibility to false salvation and is able to strengthen his divine understanding of God.

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Pi is no longer hindered by his susceptibility to false salvation and is able to strengthen his divine understanding of God.

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“Ah, how I wish that moment had never been! But for it, I might have lived for years-why, for the rest of my life on that island. Nothing, I thought, could ever push me to return to the lifeboat and to the suffering and deprivation I had endured on it-nothing!” (353)

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Pi expresses that suffering and salvation are dynamically complimentary of one another as you can only attain one by enduring the other.

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Pi expresses that suffering and salvation are dynamically complimentary of one another as you can only attain one by enduring the other.

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“I grew weary of my situation, as pointless as the weather. But life would not leave me. The rest of this story is nothing but grief, ache, and endurance. High calls low and low calls high. I tell you, if you were in such dire straits as I was, you too would elevate your thoughts. 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” (358).

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As Pi is interviewed by the Japanese shipping company, he expresses the idea that a story, no matter its various interpretations, is only true in its ability to induce a feeling in another.

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As Pi is interviewed by the Japanese shipping company, he expresses the idea that a story, no matter its various interpretations, is only true in its ability to induce a feeling in another.

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"Isn't telling about something-using words, English or Japanese-already something of an invention? Isn't just looking upon this world already something of an invention? The world isn't just the way it is. It is how we understand it, no? And in understanding something, we bring something to it, no? Doesn't that make life a story?” (380)

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Pi describes the empathy and gratitude he feels towards the cook after having been granted an ounce of salvation.

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Pi describes the empathy and gratitude he feels towards the cook after having been granted an ounce of salvation.

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"When your life has been given a reprieve, it's impossible not to feel some warmth for the one to whom you owe that reprieve” (389).

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As Pi, a lonely, stranded wanderer of the sea (appositive), endures a pioneering sensation of isolation during his second night on the lifeboat, Pi expresses an essential continuity of suffering and its relation to Maslow's hierarchy of needs present in the novel. Pi describes it as "the broken-down kind of suffering, consisting of weeping and sadness." This is characterized as spiritual pain rather than material suffering. This is then indicative of its relation to God in which he experiences this sensation on a more divine plane of feeling: "Still, that second night at sea stands in my memory as one of exceptional suffering, and different from later ones in that I still had the strength to appreciate fully what I felt" (155). In relation to Maslow's hierarchy of needs, physical deprivation, in this part of the novel, is neglected in the presence of emotional despair;  however,(; transition,) this very dreadful state is what allows Pi to understand what he feels- a sort of introspection that the author is conveying. This then contributes to the development of the theme in the novel in the sense that Pi, sustaining his humanity in isolation (participle), has the ability to refuse this natural inclination to avoid his inevitable suffering. From this realization, when Pi accepts his suffering and understands its spiritual purpose as an act of compassion, he feels a closer empathy and connection with God.