Maturity Through Trail and Error in the Pigman

The novel strictly surrounds the topic of maturity through trial and error. It is portrayed many times throughout the novel. The ordeals mainly surround two of the main characters, John and Lorraine. It shows the mistakes they have made and how they resolve and handle them. They learn a lot throughout the story, the biggest being how to handle problems with maturity and help from each other.

John, one of the main characters, starts out in the story as being childish and cruel to the school with various incidents. For example, the bathroom bomb and the apple roll explained in chapter one. Yet, as the story goes on it shows how he progresses maturity wise. Instead of physical situations, he resorts to show his rebellious attitude through verbal abuse towards others. This shows how he matures, although there is a physical altercation in the story, this is because he was trying to guard the Pigman’s home from Norton. This scene showed how he does really care about other people and he’s willing to fight for them. Towards the end of the novel John throws a party in the Pigman’s home while he is in the hospital recovering from a heart attack. Out of nowhere, the Pigman shows up at the house and sees what John and Lorraine have done. At the John apologizes through the phone and this shows a major occurrence of maturity. This is because he usually never apologizes to anyone. John has really matured throughout the novel with many situations showing it.

Lorraine, on the other hand, was introduced in the beginning as having a little maturity. She is just shy of being a good-goody, unlike John she truly cares about school and her grades. Secretly Lorraine has a bit of a crush on John because of his looks and attitude. Lorraine isn’t that a...

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...est friend. When Mr.Pignati was in the hospital he had told the two to check on Bobo everyday. The two had failed to do so and when they got to the monkey exhibit where Bobo stays, they learned he had died a week earlier from what looked like pneumonia. Mr.Pignati looked shocked for an instance and grasped his chest in pain. He let out a squeal before falling to the ground like an old tree in the forest. Mr.Pignati died not only because of being in shock because his best friend died, but he learned that John and Lorraine had not checked on him and let him down. Lorraine escapes to go cry and John stays next to Mr.Pignati’s lifeless body until the paramedics arrived. They both have matured immensely throughout the novel. All the predicaments combined taught them to be strong and handle things as adults. This is what shows “the coming of age” in the novel, The Pigman.