The Great Pumpkin
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The Great Pumpkin is an unseen character in the comic strip Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz.
The Great Pumpkin is a holiday figure (comparable to Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny) that seems to exist only in the imagination of Linus van Pelt. Every year, Linus sits in a pumpkin patch on Halloween night waiting for the Great Pumpkin to appear. Invariably, the Great Pumpkin fails to appear, and a humiliated but undefeated Linus vows to wait for him again the following Halloween.
This premise was reworked by Schulz many times throughout the run of the Peanuts strip, and also forms the basis for the 1966 animated television special It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. The best-known quote regarding Linus and the Great Pumpkin, originally from the comic strip but made famous by the TV special, is "There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin."
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[edit] Characteristics
According to Linus, on Halloween night, the Great Pumpkin rises out of the pumpkin patch he deems the most "sincere". The Great Pumpkin then flies through the air to deliver toys to all the good little children in the world. Apparently, one can cause the Great Pumpkin to pass him or her by merely saying "if he comes", as opposed to "when he comes". This could mean that the Great Pumpkin is likely to pass by anyone who doubts his existence.
[edit] Differences between the Great Pumpkin and Santa Claus
According to Linus, when writing to the Great Pumpkin, you don't ask him to bring you anything specific: you wait for whatever he brings you. In this way, Linus states a difference between the Great Pumpkin and Santa Claus (children writing to Santa include in their letters lists of exactly what they want). Also, Linus states that Santa gives away toys because it's his job and it's expected of him, whereas the Great Pumpkin gives away toys because he feels he is fulfilling a moral obligation.
[edit] Non-Linus believers
Throughout the duration of the comic strip, characters other than Linus have been seen believing in the Great Pumpkin (although this almost never lasts too long, often it only lasts one night when he does not show).
- In one strip, Linus claims that the Great Pumpkin has in fact been seen by people other than himself in pumpkin patches across the country, if not the world, indicating that if the Great Pumpkin is indeed imaginary, his existence is at least believed in by people other than (and even more suggestible than) Linus.
- Linus's sister Lucy never directly expressed belief in the Great Pumpkin (Indeed, she usually has the most vehement criticism of Linus's belief). The punch line of one strip comes after Linus writes to the Great Pumpkin. After subjecting her brother to a barrage of criticism, Lucy nonetheless asks as he mails the letter "Did you tell him I tried to be good, too?" possibly indicating a secret belief in the Great Pumpkin that she simply hides behind her crabby personality and adeptness at disagreeing with others. Another is Lucy building a pumpkin patch for her and Linus to sit in. But when Linus sees it he rebukes Lucy saying, "This is the most hypocritical pumpkin patch I've ever seen!" The last frame of the strip sees Lucy sighing in a patch of pumpkins — at the local supermarket.
- Linus tries to pass on his beliefs to his younger brother Rerun in a 1996 strip [1]. Rerun responds with "You're just trying to mess with my mind, aren't you?" But Rerun goes along with Linus as he goes door-to-door telling others about the Great Pumpkin, often trying his best to keep his distance.
- Charlie Brown's little sister, Sally, is usually the one person who Linus convinces to sit in the pumpkin patch. Sally's number of Halloweens spent in the pumpkin patch, in fact, are surpassed only by Linus's. Sally's belief in the Great Pumpkin is squashed every year she waits in the pumpkin patch, yet the next time, presumably out of love for Linus, she believes in the Great Pumpkin just as strongly. The animated television special It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown depicts one such Halloween, with Sally joining Linus in the pumpkin patch. Someone does arise from the pumpkin patch that night — Snoopy, in his Roy Brown flying ace outfit from the Great War. Sally then screams outrage over missing tricks-or-treats and the kids' Halloween party. In the newspaper comic version[when?] it is Charlie Brown who stays with Linus in the pumpkin patch when Snoopy "arises". (A 1981 storyline gives the premise an ironic role reversal: it is Sally, not Linus, who tells another character - her friend Eudora - about the Great Pumpkin and brings her to the pumpkin patch. When the Great Pumpkin fails to appear, Eudora berates Sally for wasting her time in the same manner that Sally usually turns on Linus.)
- Peppermint Patty has been depicted waiting in the pumpkin patch for the Great Pumpkin. She says she does so because she is very superstitious, as well as trusting, and, as she admits, a little bit stupid. On another occasion, she informs Linus that she asked the Great Pumpkin for a baseball glove, and an outraged Linus banishes her from the pumpkin patch for "offending the Great Pumpkin and the spirit of Halloween."
- Marcie sat with Linus in the Pumpkin patch on at least one occasion, and generally shows belief in the Great Pumpkin, albeit usually calling it the "Great Squash" or the "Great Grape".
- Snoopy can occasionally be seen sitting in the pumpkin patch with Linus, albeit all the evidence points to his presence there being against his will or he was bribed to go with cookies. There was one occasion, however, where it suggests that Snoopy was there willingly. Lucy had said to Linus "Anyone who sits in a pumpkin patch for five days waiting for the Great Pumpkin is crazy!" She then sees Snoopy sitting in the pumpkin patch, looking rather embarrassed, indicating that he had indeed been sitting there for five days waiting for the Great Pumpkin.
- Charlie Brown, in one instance, gave evidence that points to the idea that he might believe in the Great Pumpkin. In the strip published on November 1, 1961, Charlie Brown stated that he had heard on the radio that the Great Pumpkin had appeared in a "very sincere" pumpkin patch owned by someone named Freeman in New Jersey.
[edit] Objects Linus mistakes for the Great Pumpkin
Over the years, Linus would continue to mistake obscure objects for the Great Pumpkin. Once, Linus had Snoopy sit with him, and they heard rustling, which Linus and perhaps even Snoopy thought to be the Great Pumpkin. The next day's strip, however, revealed that it was just a "bird hippie". In a later year, it was a bowling ball badly thrown by Charlie Brown in a nearby bowling hall that was mistaken for the Great Pumpkin. In another year, Spike was traveling across the country with his pet cactus to visit his brother Snoopy. By the time Halloween came around, Spike's story was still being told in parallel with the Halloween-preparations strips. The two stories concluded together when Spike finally arrived in Snoopy's city: he wandered into the pumpkin patch and Linus mistook his cactus to be the Great Pumpkin. Also, in 1999 — which was Schulz's final Halloween before his passing in the following year — Linus convinced Sally to join him in the pumpkin patch once more. Although they did see something creep up on them in the pumpkin patch, Sally was again outraged when it turned out to be Snoopy driving a Zamboni.[2]
[edit] Informing the public
Linus takes his mission to inform the public of the Great Pumpkin's existence very seriously, and once jeopardized his campaign for student body president by mentioning him in a campaign speech (a storyline adapted as the animated special You're Not Elected, Charlie Brown). He regularly goes from door to door to spread the word of the Great Pumpkin, having a very embarrassed Charlie Brown help him on one occasion.
[edit] Religious metaphors
Linus's seemingly unshakable belief in the Great Pumpkin, and his desire to foster the same belief in others, has been interpreted as a parody of Christian evangelism by some critics. Others have seen Linus's belief in the Great Pumpkin as symbolic of the struggles faced by anyone with beliefs or practices that are not shared by the majority. Still others view Linus's lonely vigils, in the service of a being that may or may not exist and which never makes its presence known in any case, as a metaphor for mankind's basic existential dilemmas.[3] Charles Schulz himself, however, claimed no motivation beyond the humor of having one of his young characters confuse Halloween with Christmas. (In the 1959 sequence of strips in which the Great Pumpkin is first mentioned, Schulz also has Linus suggest that he and the other kids "go out and sing pumpkin carols", something he asks the trick-or-treating kids in the special itself.)
When Charlie Brown asks Linus when he's going to "stop believing in something that isn't true", Linus retorts that he'll stop when Chalie Brown stops believing in Santa Claus. Charlie Brown ultimately resolves that they "are obviously separated by denominational differences".
[edit] Other Great Pumpkins
In the late 1970's, Braniff Airways painted their fleet in bright primary colours, in order to give their fleet visual appeal and marketability. The airline's first 747-200 airliners were delivered painted in a striking shade of orange, causing several ATC's across the USA to welcome the new Braniff acquisitions with the phrase "Welcome, Great Pumpkin". The 1973 Petersen Publications annual, Air Progress : World's Greatest Aircraft, had its chapter devoted to the 747 headed "The Great Pumpkin Lives!".
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
- ^ Schulz, Charles (2002), The World According To Lucy, page 133, Ballantine Books, New York, NY, ISBN 0-345-44271-7
- ^ Schulz, Charles (2000), Peanuts 2000, page 134, Ballantine Books, New York, NY, ISBN 0-345-44239-3
- ^ Koresky, Michael. "The Book of Linus." Reverse Shot, Spring 2004.
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