The Magic Pudding

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The Magic Pudding
Cover design for first edition
Author	Norman Lindsay
Country	Australia
Language	English
Genre(s)	Children's novel, Picaresque novel
Publication date	1918
Media type	Print

The Magic Pudding: Being The Adventures of Bunyip Bluegum and his friends Bill Barnacle and Sam Sawnoff is an Australian children's book written and illustrated by Norman Lindsay. It is a picaresque comic fantasy, a classic of Australian children's literature.

1 Plot introduction
2 Plot summary
3 Illustrations
4 Significance and reception
5 Adaptations
6 External links
7 References

[edit] Plot introduction

The story features a walking, talking pudding that likes to be eaten and never runs out. The pudding is owned by three companions (Bill Barnacle the sailor, Bunyip Bluegum the koala, and Sam Sawnoff the penguin) who engage in various adventures, happily eating all the while except when forced to defend their property from pudding thieves.

The book is divided into four "slices" instead of chapters. There are many short songs interspersed throughout the text, often additional verses to a sea song.

[edit] Plot summary

Bunyip Bluegum, wanting to see the world, sets out on an adventure taking only a walking stick. At about lunchtime, feeling more than slightly peckish, he meets Bill Barnacle, Sam Sawnoff and Albert, the magic pudding itself, sitting round enjoying a slice. He is intrigued and goes over to investigate. Although Bill and Sam are suspicious at first, with encouragement from Albert they quickly warm to Bunyip and offer him a slice. Later that day walking down the road they have the story's first encounter with the Pudding Thieves. These nasty varmints are the scum of the earth barely fit to own the air that fills their lungs. The owners bravely defend their pudding while Bunyip sits on Albert so that he cannot escape while they are not looking. Later that night sitting round the fire, Bill and Sam, grateful for his contributions of the day, invite Bunyip to join them and become a member of the Pudding Owners' Collective. Later the next day, through some well-thought-out trickery, the Pudding Thieves make a successful grab for the Pudding. Upset and outraged it is again Bunyip’s quick thinking that calms the others and sets them off with a plan. Asking several insignificant poorer working class characters along the way if they had seen the pudding and receiving unsatisfactory answers, they move along until they encounter a rooster who points them in the right direction.

Giving up the chase, they set a trap luring the thieves into their clutches right outside one of the Pudding Thieves' houses and steal back their pudding. So they continue along their merry way until stumble along Bunyip's uncle. Mistaking him for a Pudding Thief in disguise they attack him. This is where they meet the Pudding Thieves a third time. They come proclaiming they bear gifts of good will, and will present them to the pudding owners if they would only look inside their sack. When doing so they pull it over their heads and tie it off leaving them defenceless as the thieves take their pudding and run off.

Another clever plan by Bunyip lures them into a second trap where they yet again retrieve the pudding. Continuing along their way they stumble upon the sleepy town of Tooraloo where they meet the thieves disguised in top hats and they abuse and insult them till the mayor and constable come along and arrest Albert deciding that he is the common factor. Then they go into a court case to decide pudding ownership. Deciding the judge is inadequate, they appoint the mayor as “12 good men and true” and the mayor rules that our heroes are the rightful owners of the pudding. They then retire to a tree house in the field of one of the characters they met along the way against his will for the rest of their days.

[edit] Illustrations

Norman Lindsay, a well-known artist, illustrated the book himself with numerous black and white drawings, and also designed the cover.

The Magic Pudding Sculpture by Louis Laumen, based on Lindsay's illustrations, is the centrepiece of the Ian Potter Children's Garden in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne.^[1]

[edit] Significance and reception

First published in 1918, The Magic Pudding is considered to be a children's classic, and continues to be reprinted. It is said to have been written to settle an argument: a friend of Lindsay's said that children like to read about fairies, while Lindsay asserted that they like to read about food. ^[2]

Philip Pullman has described The Magic Pudding as "the funniest children's book ever written." ^[3]

[edit] Adaptations

An animated feature-length film adaptation was released in 2000, with John Cleese in the title role, Hugo Weaving as Bill, Geoffrey Rush as Bunyip and Sam Neill as Sam. It deviated heavily from Lindsay's book, was critically derided and was not a financial success.^[4]