Criticism > Contemporary Literary Criticism > Zindel, Paul (Vol. 26) - Zena Sutherland

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ZENA SUTHERLAND

[The protagonists of The Pigman, John and Lorraine,] have two great bonds: they are both in conflict with their parents and they both have capricious and inventive minds. Out of this comes their friendship with an elderly man they call the Pigman (his name is Pignati and he collects china pigs) whom they met when pretending to be collecting for a charity. They are not criminal, but John and Lorraine have the pliant amorality of the young. Mr. Pignati comes home from the hospital to find a wild party going on; shocked by his young friends' behavior, the trusting and loving Pigman succumbs to a stroke. For John and Lorraine, "there was no one to blame anymore … And there was no place to hide … Our life would be what we made of it—nothing more, nothing less." Although the writing (by John and Lorraine, alternately) has the casual flavor of adolescence, the plot has an elemental quality. Sophisticated in treatment, the story is effective...

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1. Introduction
2. Diane Farrell
3. Zena Sutherland
4. The Times Literary Supplement
5. Marilyn R. Singer
6. John Rowe Townsend
7. Diane Gersoni-Edelman
8. The Times Literary Supplement
9. Mary Silva Cosgrave
10. Zena Sutherland
11. BEVERLY A. HALEY and KENNETH L. DONELSON
12. Isabel Quigly
13. Zena Sutherland
14. Isabel Quigly
15. Stanley Hoffman
16. Joyce Milton
17. Maxine Fisher
18. Jack Forman
19. Cyrisse Jaffee
20. Sally Holmes Holtze
21. Peter Fanning
22. David Rees
23. Paxton Davis
24. Judith N. Mitchell
25. Margery Fisher
26. A. Thatcher
27. Copyright

1. Paul Zindel