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Sunday 23 November 2014

Oscars 2013: Life of Pi – a book in numbers

As Life of Pi wins four Oscars and sells its 3,141,593rd copy in UK, Catherine Scott sums up Yann Martel's book in ten numbers

A still from the film Life of Pi, directed by Ang Lee
A still from the film Life of Pi, directed by Ang Lee 

The film version of Yann Martel’s novel, The Life of Pi, won four Oscars at last night’s ceremony, including best director for Ang Lee. But here in Britain the novel has just achieved an arguably even greater feat. According to Canongate, its UK publishers, it has now sold 3,141,593 copies.

Number crunchers everywhere will appreciate the significance of this numerical milestone (even with a bit of rounding up), for the book – and film – is, of course, a hymn to Pi, “that number [which] runs on forever”. The main character, Pi, used to be called Piscine Patel, but changed his name after he was teased at school.

We take a look at ten other numbers that knit this fantastically successful book together.

5 – The number of London publishers who rejected the book, before it was picked up in Canada by Knopf.

41 – the number of languages the book has been translated into.

7,000,000 (and rising) – worldwide sales.

227 – Number of days Pi survives at sea.

3,901 – number of reviews for Life of Pi on Amazon.com.

4 – Number of literary awards won. Life of Pi won Canada’s Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction 2001, the Booker Prize 2002, South Africa’s Boeke Prize in 2003, and the Asian/Pacific American Award for Best Adult Fiction in 2004.

1977 – the year Life of Pi is set.

1 – Number of US Presidents who have written to the book’s author praising Life of Pi. In 2010 Barack Obama wrote to Yann Martel describing Life of Pi as “an elegant proof of God, and the power of storytelling”.

1118% – percentage rise in sales of Life of Pi following Booker Prize win.

3113343753957.4380922023093124418 – The result of dividing the book’s 13-number ISBN by pi to 11 places.

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