The Pigman

The plot of The Pigman, by Paul Zindel is the key element in understanding and clarifying the situations that this book’s characters go through. The setting of The Pigman is a neighborhood in New York City and more specifically Franklin High School. The protagonists of this story are John Conlan and Lorraine Jensen. The story does not have a specific person or character that is the antagonist, but is several different challenges that John and Lorraine are faced with throughout the story. The title of the book comes from the nickname that John and Lorraine gave to their new friend, Angelo Pignati, partly because of his name but also because of the collection of pigs that belonged to his late wife. The author of the book, Paul Zindel, is from Staten Island, New York. The Pigman was Zindel’s first novel and he won many awards for this novel including “Children’s Book of the Year” in 1968. The three reasons I selected plot as the most important literary element of this novel is: 1) John and Lorraine become friends with an older man who has no wife and no children of his own, 2) John and Lorraine face many conflict and complications that teenagers still face today, and 3) John and Lorraine have to deal with death which is unexpected. John and Lorraine meet and become friends with Mr. Angelo Pignati after prank calling him and getting him to agree to donate money to their fake charity. The kids feel guilty about taking Mr. Pignati’s money and so they take him to the zoo to see his friend, Bobo, a baboon. The friendship continues to grow from that point on because John and Lorraine enjoy spending time with the Pigman because they do not get to spend time like this with their own parents. John and Lorraine realize how lonely the Pigman is and decide to try to make his life more fun by visiting him every day after school and on the weekends. They did many activities with the PIgman that they had never got to experience at home with their own parents.