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Summary
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Custody of the Pumpkin, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Aristocracy and Power
Nature vs. Modernization
Subversion of Social Class
Summary
Analysis
As the sun rises on the idyllic pastures of the Blandings estate, Lord Emsworth, accompanied by his faithful butler, Beach, sits with his eye to a powerful telescope. Emsworth quickly announces that the telescope is a sham, and that he can see nothing but black. Beach, an “observant man,” gently reminds his employer that in order to see through the instrument, one must first remove the cap from the lens. Doing so, Emsworth can now see a cow. Pleased by this development, the “fluffy-minded” man watches the animal until his son, Freddie Threepwood, waltzes into view.
The opening scene shows Lord Emsworth surrounded by symbols of enlightenment, bathed in light and wielding a telescope. At first glance, the reader might mistake him for a dignified or intelligent figure. However, his inability to use the telescope quickly proves this first impression false, and when Beach corrects him, the audience learns which of the two men is truly the more intelligent. This exchange introduces the story’s core theme of class subversion: despite the symbolism surrounding the Lord and his aristocratic title, he is no better than his supposed subordinates.
Active
Themes
Freddie is an endless source of anxiety to his father, who has no idea what to do with the boy. Though Freddie loves London, Emsworth has banned him from the city due to his habit of amassing debt and getting into “mischief.” At the same time, Freddie despises the “purer surroundings” of Blandings and is generally weighed down beneath a “crushing misery” when forced to be there. As such, Emsworth finds his son’s cheerful demeanor suspicious, and he watches the boy with the telescope until an unknown woman emerges from the woods and rushes into Freddie’s arms.
Here the narration immediately establishes an ideological divide between Emsworth and his son. While Emsworth considers the Blandings to be a “pure” kind of paradise, Freddie only lives there because of his wrongdoings and feels stifled or “crushed” by his lack of freedom. In this respect, to Freddie the family estate is closer to a punishment than a paradise.
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Emsworth is devastated by this revelation. He had hoped that someday Freddie would marry an “eligible girl, belonging to a good family, and possessing a bit of money of her own.” However, the Earl reasons that if this were an eligible girl, his son would not being meeting her in secret. Emsworth ambushes Freddie on the terrace and demands to know the girl’s identity. Freddie assures his father that the relationship is nothing inappropriate—the girl is his fiancée, Niagara “Aggie” Donaldson. She’s an American, and a “sort of cousin” of the estate’s Scottish head gardener, Angus McAllister. This information rattles Emsworth even further. While he had imagined many “unpleasant visions” of his son’s future, not one of them had involved the cousin of a gardener.
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Following this conversation, Emsworth rushes across the terrace to confront McAllister. Despite being “well aware that modern earls must think twice before pulling the feudal stuff on their employés,” Emsworth threatens to fire McAllister if he does not send the girl away. McAllister is overcome by a curious expression—the “look of a man who has not forgotten Bannockburn, a man conscious of belonging to the country of William Wallace and Robert the Bruce.” The gardener bluntly resigns from his position, and Emsworth leaves the “battlefield” without any remorse. That is, until, he realizes that with McAllister gone, the pumpkin may suffer.
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The pumpkin is a matter of grave importance to Lord Emsworth, as it marks a gap in his family’s “scroll of honour.” While at first glance his ancestors might appear to have a lengthy record of “notable deeds,” no Earl of Emsworth has ever won first prize for pumpkins at the Shrewsbury Show. Emsworth feels this mark on his family’s history deeply. Ten days after McAllister’s departure, the Lord suffers a terrible dream in which King George himself arrives to view the pumpkin, only to find that it has shriveled to the size of a pea.
Emsworth wakes with the “Sovereign’s disappointed screams ringing in his ears,” and decides that while reinstating McAllister would mean “surrender,” he needs the gardener back for the pumpkin’s sake. The following morning, Emsworth sends a telegram to McAllister, demanding his immediate return. McAllister refuses. After this exchange, Emsworth decides to visit London, where he is confident he will find a new and even better head-gardener.
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On the third day of this visit, after failing to find a single suitable candidate, Emsworth reflects on his hatred of the city, in particular “its crowds, its smells, its noises; its omnibuses, its taxis, and its hard pavements.” It is here that he stumbles across Freddie. To avoid any conflict, Freddie hands his father a note and quickly exits the scene. The note informs Emsworth that, despite his disapproval, Freddie and Aggie have eloped—and have also borrowed his car for the honeymoon. Emsworth finds himself overwhelmed by the news, and an “imperative need for flowers and green trees” comes over him. In a daze, he hails a cab to Kensington Gardens.
A short time later, peace comes across Lord Emsworth as he enters the park, and takes in the “consoling glory” of nature. Recovering from shock and entranced by the flowerbeds, the Earl becomes dazed. Believing himself to be “back in his paradise of Blandings,” he scales the low railing and, to the resolute horror of the nearby park-keeper, begins picking flowers.
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Themes
With this act, the park-keeper labels Emsworth “a dangerous criminal” and “the blackest type of evil-doer.” The keeper begins to scold Emsworth, which attracts the attentions of both a police constable and a small crowd. When Emsworth identifies himself as a Lord, the crowd—who merely sees a man in a “badly fitting tweed suit and a hat he ought to be ashamed of”—begins to laugh. They scorn him even further when he fails to produce his card-case (a wallet that contains confirmation of his title).
It is at this moment Emsworth glances at his spectators and finds among them McAllister and Mr Donaldson. The Lord appeals to McAllister for help, and despite what has passed between the two men, the Glaswegian affirms his former employer’s story. The constable—a “staunch admirer of the aristocracy”—regrets his zeal, and commands the crowd to move along.
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With his ordeal over, Emsworth finally meets with Aggie’s father, Mr Donaldson. Emsworth prepares for this conversation by drawing himself up “with hauteur,” but he quickly finds himself outmatched by the other man’s “authoritative appearance.” Donaldson introduces himself as the founder of Donaldson’s Dog-Biscuits, and apologetically admits that he is not a rich man—he doubts, “if, all told, that [he has] as much as ten million dollars in the world.” This figure renders Emsworth speechless, and Donaldson surprises him further when he offers Freddie a career in Long Island City. Emsworth, in awe, gives his hearty approval.
With this conversation done, Emsworth turns his attentions to McAllister. Though Emsworth’s “tongue seem[s] to cleave his palette,” he puts aside his pride and begs the gardener to return. After negotiating a new salary, McAllister agrees.
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Some time later, Emsworth and McAllister attend the Shrewsbury Show. Lord Emsworth’s sworn enemy, Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe, offers the Earl his congratulations, while McAllister stands to the side as a “silent, beard waggling witness of the scene.” The pair turn and stare into a large packing case. Affixed to the outside of this case is a card, which reads “PUMPKINS. FIRST PRIZE.”
