Life of Pi: Part Two (The Pacific Ocean) ~ Chapters 48 – 57 HKASL ~ Literature in English

Summary The story of Richard Parker’s capture: –A panther had been killing people near Bangladesh –A professional hunter, Richard Parker, called in to try to capture it –Leaving a goat as bait –Attracted two tigers, a mother and her cub, instead –The mother sedated and the cub picked up –Sent off to the Pondicherry Zoo –The cub was named Thirsty –The names of Richard Parker and Thirsty get mixed up in the documents –The mix-up amuses Mr. Patel so much that he decides to call the tiger cub Richard Parker

Summary Back on the lifeboat… –Pi cheers up a bit: certain the tiger will kill him (nothing he can do) –Overcome by thirst –Explores the lifeboat for water –Details of the boat: Its benches and oarlocks Its bright orange color Its dimensions — twenty-six feet long and eight feet wide A locker containing emergency supplies under the end of the lifeboat under the tarpaulin, where Richard Parker has his “den”

Summary Back on the lifeboat… –Opens the locker and assesses the contents –Greedily drinking some canned water –Eagerly eating emergency rations –Pi tallies his supplies: he has 31 cartons of rations and 124 cans of water, among other survival items

Summary Building a raft: –To survive with Richard Parker as a companion –To put some distance between himself and the tiger –Using oars, a lifebuoy, and life jackets –Tethers it to the lifeboat

Summary Another battle… –The hyena (whining) Vs. Richard Parker (growling) –The hyena dies without a whimper –Richard Parker turns around –Starts to approach Pi –Distracted by the rolling of the boat and the bounciness of the tarpaulin –A rat appears and runs up onto Pi’s head –Pi grabs and throws it at Richard Parker, devouring it –Just enough time for Pi to escape into his raft

Summary Worries in the raft… –The raft: seaworthy –Floating just above a vast ocean –With sharks all around –Rain falls: to trap fresh water for drinking with a rain catcher –Pi continually checks the knots in the ropes holding together the parts of the raft –Why??

Summary Fanciful ways of killing Richard Parker –Unable to sleep –For entertainment –To wait for the tiger to run out of water and starve –Flaws: Bengal tigers can swim and drink saline water Hungry: jump into the ocean and swim out to Pi Thirsty: drink seawater

Summary The scene after the battle: The first encounter –Richard Parker: Sated + having drunk rainwater and feasted on the hyena Looking at Pi: an unusual noise that sounds like prusten The rare sound tigers use to express harmless intentions –Pi’s decision: try to tame Richard Parker Uses a whistle on one of the lifejackets as a whip Shouts across the water To prove his alpha status Richard Parker: –Intensely dislikes the sound of the whistle –Lies down in the bottom of the lifeboat

Analysis (The Idea of Fear) Fear takes numerous forms in the text, but its very omnipresence eventually reduces its power over Pi. Pi: –Terribly self-aware –Recognizes and catalogs the gradations of anxiety he feels from minute to minute: The blind terror: he jumps into the ocean only to see a shark fin slice through the water The defensive panic: from facing down a carnivorous, hungry hyena Dread over his family’s fate

Analysis (The Idea of Fear) Pi’s enormous and all-encompassing fear of Richard Parker makes him feel a little better: –Richard Parker aboard the boat: Death: inevitable, not just possible –Able to stop worrying about what might happen –Comforted: knowing what will happen, regardless of how horrible that fate is –Accepting his own death: Makes his fear less paralyzing Enables him to take action

Analysis (The Idea of Fear) Richard Parker’s unexpected and welcome snort of prusten –Pi’s early inclination: To run as far away from Richard Parker as he can As far as the lifeline between the lifeboat and raft will allow –Prusten: A tiger’s way of stating his benevolent intentions –Pi’s fear tempered –A quasi-human thing by Richard Parker rather than his pure animalistic brute strength: a willingness to negotiate –Pi: the courage to begin training the tiger to reconsider boarding the lifeboat and not confining himself to his raft

Analysis (Similarities between Animals and Human Beings ) Such a movement of Pi and Richard Parker toward one another –Literally: lessening of physical distance –Message: animals and humans aren’t such different creatures after all (to be amplified over the novel) Pi: –Omega animals (such as Richard Parker) be obedient to a human trainer –In an effort to climb up the social hierarchy –Tolerating the human alpha creature’s odd demands –Mimicking human behavior –Pi mimics Richard Parker out of respect for the tiger

Analysis (Similarities between Animals and Human Beings ) Names –Zoomorphic ambiguity in their names –The Bengal tiger: Richard Parker (a man’s name) –Pi: a shortened form of the word pisces, or fish –The gray area between humanity and animal nature

The End