The Peppermint Pig

The Peppermint Pig is a 1977 children’s coming-of-age novel by American author Nina Bawden. A work of realist fiction, it tracks four siblings, George, Lily, Theo, and Polly Greengrass, whose family raises a pet pig only for their parents to slaughter it to support them. Much darker than an ordinary children’s novel, The Peppermint Pig reflects the harsh realities that impoverished children experience, as well as a more universal experience, the loss of innocence. Bawden lightens the novel’s tragic trajectory with some situational irony, describing the Greengrass family’s idiosyncratic struggles and showing how humor and storytelling can help people transcend hardship.

The novel begins with a story about Granny Greengrass, the family’s elderly matriarch. One day, while out at the market, Granny Greengrass lost her finger at the butcher’s shop while trying to purchase half a leg of lamb. She held up a shank of lamb and tried to point the butcher to the right place to cut but changed her mind at the last moment, moving her finger as he brought the cleaver down. The finger flew across the shop into a pile of sawdust. Both Granny and the butcher, Mr. Grummett, were speechless. Granny accepted the serious injury with good humor, telling the butcher, “I could never make up my mind and stick to it, Mr. Grummett, that’s always been my trouble.”

After hearing Granny’s story about the finger, Theo asks if her hand bled much. She replies that it did not, and she wished she had thought of having her finger sewn back on, but the thought didn’t cross her mind.



Next, the story turns to the Greengrass children. Lily, Theo, Polly, and George live with their mother, an avid storyteller, and their gregarious father in London. Father, a coach painter, brings home extra materials from work for his children to make arts and crafts. They live a comfortable life until Father is unfairly accused of stealing money from his boss. Though Father knows the real thief, he takes the blame to save the thief’s elderly father from learning that his only son is a criminal. After that ordeal, Father leaves for America to join his brother, Uncle Edmund, and to make enough money to send for his family. In the meantime, he sends them all, including Mother, to Norfolk to stay with Aunt Harriet and Aunt Sarah.

At first, the children struggle in their new home. Polly worries that they will never hear back from Father. She and Theo, the eldest two, realize that the only reason they can make ends meet is that their family is being sustained on charity. Though Aunt Sarah and Aunt Harriet are charitable people, the children realize their situation is precarious. Nevertheless, they eventually settle into Norfolk, spending the winter going to their new school and skating on the village pond.

It is on such a winter day that they first meet Johnnie from a litter owned by the milkman. Johnnie is called the peppermint pig because he is the runt of the litter and is therefore cheapest. Mother buys Johnnie for a shilling, telling the children that pigs are “a poor man’s investment.” Though this foreshadows Johnnie’s fate, Theo and Polly have no idea what the expression means. Johnnie turns out to be a loving and intelligent companion for the children. He follows their directions and becomes beloved throughout the town. Under the children’s care, he also becomes much bigger than anyone expected. Johnnie has a vibrant life: he has tea with the town’s wealthiest woman, Lady March, and crashes a town fair, leaving destruction in his wake.



Eventually, Johnnie’s time as the Greengrass family pet ends. Mother still considers him a poor man’s investment, and the time comes for him to be slaughtered to support the family. The children are distraught to lose their pet. Moreover, they start to understand that Mother always knew that Father never intended to come back for them. Though at first, Polly is so frustrated and angry that she does not know how to move on, she eventually understands that the pain of sacrifice and loss are everywhere in life, and it is up to individuals to decide how to respond to them. The Peppermint Pig ends with this sobering and bittersweet revelation, as Polly and her siblings look forward to their future in Norfolk.