Answer the following questions in full sentences in your exercise books. These answers will form your notes for the opening of the novel. Use quotes from the novel wherever appropriate in order to develop your answers further.
Make sure that you highlight and annotate any parts of the book that you think could be useful! Pay particular attention to any references to STORYTELLING, RELIGION or NATURE!
Chapter 1
The novel changes to Pi Patel’s voice now, told in the first person as a memoir. The narrator first introduces himself as a graduate in both Religious Studies and Zoology at the University of Toronto. He describes his thesis on the thyroid gland of a three-‐toed sloth and goes on in detail about that sloth. He was given great credit for his knowledge in the zoology field but also held back because of his inability to divide religion and science. He describes the Goddess Lakshmi, a Hindu deity and how he misses India despite his love for Canada. He also describes how he misses Richard Parker. He goes on to mention his time in Mexico and a situation in an Indian restaurant in Canada.
- Why does Pi say he chose the three-toed-sloth as his subject of study? How might the sloth “soothe [his] shattered self”? (p 3)
- In what way does the three-toed-sloth remind Pi of God?
- Pi suggests that “[w]hen you’ve suffered a great deal in life, each additional pain is both unbearable and trifling.” (p 5) Explain what he means.
- Pi explains that Oxford “is fifth on the list of cities I would like to visit before I pass on, after Mecca, Varanasi, Jerusalem and Paris.” (p 6). Explain Pi’s choice of cities.
- Why do the waiter’s comments in the restaurant wound Pi?
Chapter 2
Returning to the Author’s narration, we learn that Pi Patel lives in Scarborough and is a small man of about forty. He speaks very fast and begins his story. This Chapter reminds the reader that Chapter one was the beginning of an interview, which will continue.
Chapter 3
Pi relates about Francis Adirubasamy, a friend of the Patel family. As a world champion swimmer, he always tried to teach the Patel family to swim, but only succeeded with Pi. We also learn that Francis was a great fan of the swimming pools of Paris, including one in particular, the Piscine Molitor, which his family subsequently named Pi after. It is only at this point that the reader is given Piscine Molitor Patel’s full name.
- Why was swimming Mamaji’s “gift” to Pi?
- What is it about Mamaji’s stories that captivate Pi’s father? Why might he have chosen to name his son after a swimming pool in Paris when Pondicherry has the expanse of the Indian Ocean at its feet?
Chapter 4
Pi describes the beautiful Pondicherry Zoo, run by his father, a former hotel operator. He compares the keeping of a zoo to the keeping of a hotel and how animals are similar to hotel occupants. While growing up in a zoo, Pi learns much of the world of nature. He loves the beauty and perfection of it all and sees the animals as happy for having their own territories. He claims that animals in the wild do not truly have freedom because they are dictated by their predators and the space restrictions.
- Pi questions the notion that animals are unhappy in zoos because their freedom is curtailed. Explain the reasons he gives.
- The Chapter ends with Pi comparing peoples’ problems with zoos with their problem with religion and suggests that “Certain illusions about freedom plague them both.” (p 19) What might he mean?
Chapter 5
Pi was unhappy as a child with his name (Piscine), as it was often mispronounced as “pissing” when it is meant to be pronounced as “pea-‐seen” . For that reason as he grows up and enters the next level of school, he makes a show of jumping up during roll call and announcing to the class that his name is “Pi” even illustrating it with the mathematical symbol on the chalkboard.
- Why is it, as Pi suggests, “a law of human nature that those who live by the sea are suspicious of swimmers”? (p 22)
- Pi explains “in that elusive, irrational number with which scientists try to understand the universe, I found refuge.” (p 24) How does this explain Pi’s character and nature?
Chapter 6
The author interjects again, describing Patel’s cooking ability as an adult and his back stock of food, enough to “last the siege of Leningrad.”
Chapter 7
Pi meets with Satish Kumar, a very particular teacher of his – a communist, atheist, biology teacher, and one of Pi’s favourites. Satish Kumar begins to relay his belief that all things can be described scientifically, describing his bout with polio and how medicine saved him as a child, not God. Pi comments on how atheists are more acceptable than agnostics, who are full of doubt.
- Explain the reason Mr Kumar sees religion as darkness and Pi sees religion as light.
- Pi sees atheists and agnostics very differently. Why is this?
Chapter 8
Visitors to the zoo are responsible for performing a great deal of horrible things with the animals, declaring humans as the worst of all animals. Pi’s father shows the boys a tiger that has not been fed for three days, a standard condition in the wild. Watching what occurs when a goat is introduced to the cage scares “the living vegetarian daylights” out of Pi. His father goes on to describe the strength of every animal in the zoo against human beings; that is of course except guinea pigs.
- Why does Pi suggest that the most dangerous animal in a zoo is man and that even more dangerous is Animalus anthropomorphicus?
- Why might Pi have “anthropomorphized the animals until they spoke fluent English”? (p 34)
Chapter 9
Starting here, Pi describes some of the science of zoology and zoo keeping. Here he goes on about flight distance and how far an animal will stay from an enemy. That distance can be diminished by offering ample food, water, and shelter.
- What does Pi’s father’s “intuitive gift” say about the relationship between animals and humans?
Chapter 10
Pi describes animals that would not enjoy captivity, those that were captured and brought to the zoo or those few zoo bred creatures that temporarily feel the instinctual call to leave. He describes how animals are leaving something not seeking something when they escape.
KEY IDEAS: Storytelling, Religion, Nature
Building upon your answers to chapters 1 to 9, explain in detail how the following ideas are established and explored in this early part novel:
- STORYTELLING: what makes good storytelling/what makes stories come to life/why are stories important to people?
- RELIGION: what is the role of religion in peoples’ lives/what is the purpose of religion/how can religion give meaning to existence?
- NATURE: what is the relationship between people and nature/what is the relationship between animals and nature/what is the relationship between humans and animals?
Be aware that these three key ideas will form much of the main focus of the novel. Keep them in mind as you continue to work through the novel, and consider what Pi’s tale reveals about each key concept.
