Quotes by Yann Martel

About Yann Martel:

Yann Martel is an author best known for the Man Booker Prize-winning novel Life of Pi, a #1 international bestseller published in more than 50 territories. It has sold more than 12 million copies worldwide and spent more than a year on the New York Times Bestseller list. It was adapted to the screen by Ang Lee.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

And what of my extended family-birds, beasts, and reptiles? They too have drowned. Every single thing I value in life has been destroyed. And I am allowed no explanation? I am to suffer hell without any account from heaven? In that case, what is the ...

Yann Martel

Come aboard if your destination is oblivion - it should be our next stop.

Yann Martel

I wept like a child. It was not because I was overcome at having survived my ordeal, though I was. Nor was it the presence of my brothers and sisters, though that too was very moving. I was weeping because ....fill in the blank with whatever/whoever ...

Yann Martel

Survival starts by paying attention to what is close at hand and immediate. To look out with idle hope is tantamount to dreaming one's life away.

Yann Martel

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.

Yann Martel

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.

Yann Martel

You might have noticed that I have been sending you used books. I have done this not to save money, but to make a point which is that a used book, unlike a used car, hasn't lost any of its initial value. A good story rolls of the lot into the hands o...

Yann Martel

A plain is what a mountain aims to be: the closest you can come to being in outer space while yet having your feet on this planet.

Yann Martel

Cinema is visually powerful, it is a complete experience, reaches a different audience. It's something I really like. I like movies.

Yann Martel

If I didn't have children, I think my life would be a failure.

Yann Martel

Every book I've written has been a different attempt to understand something, and the success or failure of the previous one is irrelevant. I write the book I want.

Yann Martel

Most of us get our history through story.

Yann Martel

You can't quantify human pain the way you can measure out sugar. Death comes one individual at a time.

Yann Martel

A great literary work can be completely, completely unpredictable. Which can sometimes make them very hard to read, but it gives them a great originality.

Yann Martel

Words aren't very good at describing complicated, strange visual things. You can try, and the reader will have some sort of image in their mind, but words aren't good at that.

Yann Martel

Any writer will be happy and good only if they know what they're doing and why they're doing it.

Yann Martel

I love Canada. It's a wonderful political act of faith that exists atop a breathtakingly beautiful land.

Yann Martel

Fanatics do not have faith - they have belief. With faith you let go. You trust. Whereas with belief you cling.

Yann Martel

Reality is how we interpret it. Imagination and volition play a part in that interpretation. Which means that all reality is to some extent a fiction.

Yann Martel

In all big cities the style of life is the same. Same endless array of restaurants; same big museums with the usual suspects; same anonymity, which can be thrilling when you're young but which I found got tiresome.

Yann Martel

'Life of Pi' was actually a very simple novel to write.

Yann Martel

Author Bio

  • NameYann Martel
  • DescriptionA Canadian author best known for the book Life of Pi
  • BornJune 25, 1963
  • CountryCanada
  • ProfessionWriter; Novelist
  • WorksLife Of Pi