Comparative Commentary: extracts from "The Life of Mammals" by David Attenborough and "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel

The two texts being compared are texts about tigers. Text A is an extract from The Life of Mammals by David Attenborough, Text B is from Life of Pi by Yann Martel. The texts discuss tigers and their characteristics, but from very different points of view; Text A is from a non-fictional book of mammals, Text B is a passage from a novel. Text A describes tigers from a distance. The extract involves statistical details …

…telling about lions. In text B, the question of tigers is literally about life and death. The tiger is the main focus. Completely the opposite is the view conveyed by text A; the author could just as well be saying, "tigers are becoming extinct, but so what, life goes on". The existence of tigers is in no ways discussed or nobody cares that they are becoming extinct, they just move on to a new species.