The Pirate Who Does Not Know the Value of Pi

The Pirate Who Does Not Know the Value of Pi - NYRB/Poets

Paperback (14 Mar 2017)

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Publisher's Synopsis

An original collection from one of the most active poets in contemporary literature.

Winner of the 2019 International Poetry Prize from the City of Münster


The Pirate Who Does Not Know the Value of Pi
is a poem-novel about the relationship between a pirate and a parrot who, after capturing a certain quantity of prizes, are shipwrecked on a deserted island, where they proceed to discuss whether they would have been able to communicate with people indigenous to the island, had there been any. Characterized by multilingual punning, humor puerile and set-theoretical, philosophical irony and narrative handicaps, Eugene Ostashevsky's new large-scale project draws on sources as various as early modern texts about pirates and animal intelligence, old-school hip-hop, and game theory to pursue the themes of emigration, incomprehension, untranslatability, and the otherness of others.

Book information

ISBN: 9781681370903
Publisher: New York Review Books
Imprint: New York Review Books
Pub date:
DEWEY: 811.54
DEWEY edition: 23
Language: English
Number of pages: 135
Weight: 120g
Height: 116mm
Width: 177mm
Spine width: 10mm