One could definitely argue that Zindel's The Pigman addresses the question of our environment affecting our behavior. Zindel shows that our environment does contribute to our character and behavior through John, Lorraine, and Norton. All three characters are teenagers who have untraditional home lives in the 1960s; and, because of this, each teen develops certain survival skills or rebellious attitudes in order to find comfort and acceptance that they so dearly desire.
First, there's John. His parents are older than his other friends' and his siblings are grown up and moved out of the house. Hence, there seems to be quite a generation gap of understanding between them. Growing up, his father would also give him swigs of alcohol and then joke around at parties that his son would grow up to be a drunk:
"'Johnny wants a sip of beer,' Bore used to say in the old days. He got a big kick out of it when I was about ten years old, and I'd go around emptying all the beer glasses lying around the house.
'That kid's going to be a real drinker,' he'd say in front of company, and then I'd go through my beer-drinking performance for everybody, and they'd laugh their heads off. It was about the only thing I ever did that got any attention" (103).
As a result, and by way of subconscious, self-fulfilling prophecy, John becomes a trouble-maker at school as well as a smoker and a drinker. It is also possible that he's acting out for attention because he doesn't get any quality time or attention at home. If drinking is the only way a kid gets attention, then that's probably what he is going to do.
Next, Lorraine lives with her single mother who struggles to make ends meet. Lorraine suffers through her mother's negative attitude towards life and men because first, her husband cheated on her; then, they got a legal separation; and finally, he died. Lorraine diagnoses herself as the following:
"They call that paranoia. I knew that because some magazine did a whole article on mental disturbances, and after I read the symptoms of each of them, I realized I had all of them--but most of all I had paranoia. That's when you think everybody's making fun of you when they're not" (14).
Lorraine also probably feels paranoia because her mother is always warning her to keep away from boys and not to do anything for fear she will get hurt. It's as if her mother's fear of men and fear for life have been transferred over to her daughter in a very negative way. If Lorraine's mother had not created a fearful and negative environment, Lorraine may have had more confidence in life.
Finally, Norton suffers from a childhood stigma of having played with dolls up until he was ten years-old. Once his school friends found out, they mercilessly teased him. In an effort to fight against this hostile environment, Norton turned into a bully, a creep, and a thief. John describes Norton as follows:
"Norton actually did play with dolls when he was a kid. That was his mother's fault. . . He was the only berserk ten-year-old in the neighborhood. From then on he turned tough guy all the way. He was always picking fights and throwing stones and beating up everybody" (99).
All of these kids have one thing in common--incapable parents. Had these parents been able to teach them to overcome the affects of their environments, they would have been better, more well-rounded people. Left to their own devices, however, the environment can wreak havoc on a person's understanding of the world around them.
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