摘 要

《少年派的奇幻漂流》是李安于2012年执导的奇幻冒险电影，改编自扬·马特尔于2001年发表的同名小说。电影中主人公派向小说家扬·马特尔讲述了他经历海难后，如何与一只孟加拉虎在救生小船上漂流了227天，并最终获救。

本文旨在通过分析《少年派的奇幻漂流》中的隐喻内涵，理解影片中意象的真正含义，揭示电影的人性主题，探讨人类内心深处的本我，并对人性进行反思。本文分为五个部分。第一部分介绍《少年派的奇幻漂流》的基本背景以及研究现状，简述本文的研究目的。第二部分具体分析影片中的隐喻内涵，如派的名字、鱼和食人岛、水、老虎这些意象，阐释其真正的含义。第三部分根据影片的隐喻内涵和人性主题，探讨人性中的理性与兽性。老虎是整部电影中最重要的隐喻，象征派心中的本我。第四部分通过讲述人性残忍的真实案例，对人性中的本我进行反思。最后一部分总结主旨：每个人心中都有一只老虎，只有控制好人性中的兽性，人们才能获得真正的理性。

关键词：隐喻；人性；本我

Abstract

Life of Pi is a 2012 American adventure drama film directed by Ang Lee, which is based on Yann Martel's 2001 novel of the same name.The protagonist, Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, tells a novelist about his life story and how at 16 he survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker in the Pacific Ocean.

With the analysis of the metaphor connotations in Life of Pi, the thesis aims at understanding the meanings of the images in the film, revealing the theme about human nature, exploring the id in human’s depth of heart and reflecting on human nature. The thesis will generally be divided into five parts. The first part is the introduction to the background information of Life of Pi, the current research status and the research objective. The following part will analyze concretely the metaphor connotations, such as Pi’s name, the fish and the carnivorous island, water and the tiger. In light of the metaphor connotations and the movie theme, the third part is about the two sides in human nature, the divine rationality and the brutal instinct. The tiger is the most significant metaphor throughout Life of Pi, which represents the id in Pi’s mind. In the fourth part, through telling Life of Pi in real life, human nature will be reflected. The last part is the conclusion about the theme. There is a tiger in everyone’s heart. Only when we can control the brutality will we acquire the real rationality.

Key Words: metaphor; human nature; id

Contents

1 Introduction 1

2 The Metaphors in Life of Pi 3

2.1 The Metaphor of Pi’s Name 3

2.2 The Metaphors of the Fish and the Carnivorous Island 3

2.3 The Metaphor of Water 4

2.4 The Metaphor of the Tiger 6

3 The Two Sides in Pi’s Human Nature 7

3.1 The Divine Rationality 7

3.2 The Brutal Instinct 8

4 The Reflection on Human Id 10

4.1 Life of Pi in Real Life 10

4.2 The Balance of Rationality and Brutality 10

5 Conclusion 12

References 14

Acknowledgements 15

The Exploration of the Id in Human Nature:

The Study of Metaphors in Life of Pi

1 Introduction

Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, is a Canadian fantasy adventure novel published in 2001. The novel has sold more than ten million copies worldwide. In 2012 it was adapted into a survival drama film directed by Ang Lee. It was nominated for three Golden Globe Awards and won the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score. At the 85th Academy Awards, Life of Pi had eleven nominations, including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, and won four awards including Best Director for Ang Lee. The storyline revolves around an Indian man named "Pi", telling a novelist about his life story and how he survives a shipwreck, and is stranded in the Pacific Ocean on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger for 227 days.

Life of Pi received highly positive reviews worldwide. However, there are few academic researches concentrated on the metaphors in Life of Pi abroad. Most of the praises directed towards the visual effects: Ang Lee’s Life of Pi achieves the near impossible—a 3D adaptation of a supposedly “unfilmable” book. It’s an astonishing technical achievement which is also emotionally rewarding. Instead of metaphors, only some comments about the 3D technology can be found. From which it can be inferred that foreign researchers have not paid much attention to the metaphors in Life of Pi.

On the contrary, more domestic researches have done concerning metaphors in Life of Pi. An Yang studied this movie from the view of id, ego and superego (安杨, 2013). Li Lixia explored the images of animals, especially the image of tiger in Life of Pi (李丽霞, 2015). Wang Xin pointed the dual narrative structure in this film (王欣, 2015). However, little research has been done to explore the metaphors in Life of Pi systematically and comprehensively. As a result, it is necessary to understand more about metaphors and their meanings that correlate with western religions and culture.

Modern scholars do not study the metaphor as a pure rhetorical device any more. Instead, metaphors contain extremely expansive connotations. To some extent, metaphors reflect cultural backgrounds, social customs, religious beliefs and psychological statuses. This is the so-called mapping principle (王岩, 2004). The purpose of the paper is applying the mapping principle, to discuss the id in human nature through the analysis of metaphors. To have a better understanding of Ang Lee’s Life of Pi, a deep research on the metaphors can enable us to better comprehend the real meanings of the images, which can also help us to explore more about metaphors as a figure of speech as well as some western religions and culture. Moreover, these images in Life of Pi show meanings concerning with religion and morality, which can provoke our thoughts about human nature. With the study of these metaphors, the id in human nature can be reflected philosophically. This is why these metaphors are worth studying deeply in this paper.

The thesis analyzes systematically the metaphors in Ang Lee’s movie Life of Pi, and summarizes the human nature expressed in this film. The study is based on scientific methods, such as looking over relevant documents and papers, textual analysis, and comparative analysis to explore the metaphor as a figure of speech and its significance in the film Life of Pi. The paper combines with the specific texts of Ang Lee’s film to analyze the metaphors of images in Life of Pi and how these images reflect on human nature. These metaphors are thought-provoking. To discuss the religions and cultural background, more about the implied meanings of the metaphors in Life of Pi can be learned and the id in human nature can be explored.

2 The Metaphors in Life of Pi

2.1 The Metaphor of Pi’s Name