George's Marvelous Medicine

“When George’s mother or father was home, Grandma never ordered George about like this. It was only when she had him on her own that she began treating him badly.”

Grandma’s treatment of George worsens when his parents are away and her verbal abuse is calculated and intentional. Her willingness to take advantage of any opportunity to dominate others is reinforced when she grows in size and energy. She uses her extra strength as an excuse to belittle others and even overpowers George when she takes the cup of medicine from him.

“‘Never grow up,’ she said. ‘Always down.’”

Grandma accuses George of growing too quickly and nearly matching her own size. Her inversion of the usual phrase “grow up” into “grow down” demonstrates how she became the way she is: She got a little meaner and more selfish each day. It also reveals the basis of her hostility toward George and other children: jealousy. Grandma prefers that others not surpass her own size, which she associates with importance.

“The whole point of medicine, surely, was to make a person better. If it didn’t do that, then it was quite useless.”

George’s determination to make Grandma “better” takes on double meaning, as he refers not merely to her physical health, the usual meaning in the context of medicine, but also to her attitudes and behaviors. The medicine symbolizes George’s willingness to intervene, as well as his hopes for Grandma’s reformation.

“He had made solemn promises to his parents about this, and he wasn’t going to break them. There were things in there, they had told him, that could actually kill a person, and although he was out to give Grandma a pretty fiery mouthful, he didn’t really want a dead body on his hands.”

While George plays a key role in Grandma’s eventual downfall, he doesn’t set out to destroy her. Instead, George is presented as a kind and thoughtful boy with a playful streak. George’s mixed feelings about Grandma place his views between those of his parents, with Mrs. Kranky feeling a strong responsibility to care for Grandma while Mr. Kranky sees Grandma as a burden.

“FOR PIGS WITH PORK PRICKLES, TENDER TROTTERS, BRISTLE BLIGHT AND SWINE SICKNESS. GIVE ONE PILL PER DAY. IN SEVERE CASES TWO PILLS MAY BE GIVEN, BUT MORE THAN THAT WILL MAKE THE PIG ROCK AND ROLL.”

The satirical labels on many of the ingredients George adds to the mix serve not only as parodies of medical and advertising jargon but also provide figurative commentary on Grandma’s ills. Some, like this one, also reveal Dahl’s knack for tongue-twisting alliteration and off-the-wall imagery. For instance, readers are sure to associate rocking and rolling with music rather than the medical discomfort referenced here.

“Half a pint of ENGINE OIL—to keep Grandma’s engine going smoothly. Some ANTIFREEZE—to keep her radiator from freezing up in the winter. A handful of GREASE—to grease her creaking joints.”

As he adds ingredients to the medicine, George imagines how they might prove beneficial to Grandma. Along the way, he likens her to various farm animals, home appliances, and more. The comparison between Grandma and a vehicle suggests her need for maintenance, with George filling the role of automotive technician.

“Fiery broth and witch’s brew

Foamy froth and riches blue

Fume and spume and spoondrift spray

Fizzle swizzle shout hooray

Watch it sloshing, swashing, sploshing

Hear it hissing, squishing, spissing

Grandma better start to pray.”

As his concoction nears completion, George finds himself chanting these words as if involuntarily. The trochaic meter echoes the witches in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, while the onomatopoeias in lines five and six imitate the sound of the bubbling pot. The closing reference to prayer suggests the traditional opposition of certain religions and witchcraft.

“You’re a lazy and disobedient little worm and you’re growing too fast.”

Grandma’s complaints about George reveal more about her than they do about him. Underlying her concerns about “growing too fast” is the assumption that children should stay as they are, but Grandma objects to many of the childlike behaviors she notices in George. She also embodies many of those same qualities, such as laziness. Due to these contradictions, nothing George can do or say will earn her approval.

“‘Who’s all right? There’s jacky-jumpers in my tummy! There’s squigglers in my belly! There’s bangers in my bottom!’ She began bouncing up and down in the chair. Quite obviously, she was not very comfortable.”

Grandma’s immediate reaction after taking George’s medicine is to panic. Her alarm takes on humorous overtones as she uses several made-up words, a hallmark of Dahl’s prose style. The droll observation that she is “not very comfortable” is an example of litotes, or ironic understatement. Here, it serves to further distance readers from Grandma’s distress, making her an object of ridicule rather than genuine concern.

“A new medicine? You? What rubbish!”

Grandma scoffs at George’s suggestion that he created the medicine responsible for her growth. Her unwillingness to recognize any goodness or capability in George hints at her own massive ego, since giving any credit to George detracts from her own claims to have magical powers. Grandma views life as a zero-sum game, where others’ successes are threats rather than causes of celebration.

“It’s not as tall as me! […] Compared with me, that hen is titchy small! I am the tallest of them all!”

After George’s medicine enlarges a nearby chicken, Grandma reasserts herself as the center of attention. In doing so, she contradicts her earlier stated view that it is best not to grow larger. Her quick change from opposing growth to celebrating her own growth reveals her hypocrisy. George’s medicine reveals Grandma’s true nature, but it doesn’t reform her.

“Bring the medicine! For years and years I’ve been trying to breed bigger and bigger animals. Bigger bulls for beef. Bigger pigs for pork. Bigger sheep for mutton….”

Mr. Kranky sees an immediate use for George’s medicine: the enlargement of his farm animals, resulting in more meat. His combination of anaphora, or starting several phrases in a row with the same word, with alliteration, or repetition of consonant sounds, provides fitting emphasis to this passage about big plans and big animals. The failure of Mr. Kranky’s plans, which backfire when George’s medicine causes a chicken to grow smaller, demonstrates that the magic George taps into lies beyond the realm of capitalistic enterprise.

“‘But we can’t leave her up there, Dad,’ George said. ‘What if it rains?’”

George questions his father’s suggestion that they leave Grandma stuck with her head poking through the roof. Although George doesn’t enjoy Grandma’s company, he does desire her welfare. Thematically, George and Mr. Kranky’s discussion examines whether the responsibility to treat others with respect diminishes when others behave poorly.

“In a way, the medicine had done Grandma good. It had not made her any less grumpy or bad-tempered, but it seemed to have cured all her aches and pains, and she was suddenly as frisky as a ferret.”

George longs for a medicine to make Grandma a better person. His medicine ends up making her a bigger, stronger person, but her personality remains the same. George’s disappointment at the result hints at what his idea of a good person is: Someone who uses their power and influence to help others, not to dominate them.

“My dear boy, […] we need barrels and barrels of it! Tons and tons! Then we will sell it to every farmer in the world so that all of them can have giant animals! We will build a Marvelous Medicine Factory and sell the stuff in bottles at ten dollars apiece. We will become rich, and you will become famous!”

Mr. Kranky’s comments reveal him as a would-be capitalist and entrepreneur. Not content simply to boost his own farm animals, Mr. Kranky recognizes the opportunity for massive international business. His proposal that they sell George’s medicine by the barrel calls to mind other commodities, particularly oil. His promise of riches and fame reveals the superficial values underlying his goals.

“You’re going to have some mighty queer chickens around here if you go on like this.”

Mrs. Kranky quickly recognizes the potential for George’s medicine to cause harm. Her concern foreshadows Grandma’s later disappearance after consuming an overdose of George’s final batch of medicine. Mrs. Kranky becomes a foil to Mr. Kranky, since she recognizes the costs and harms of the medicine, while Mr. Kranky imagines the potential benefits.

“‘I’m sorry, Mother,’ Mrs. Kranky said. ‘We’ve been terribly busy. I’ll get you something right away.’”

Mrs. Kranky apologizes to Grandma for failing to provide her customary cup of tea during the excitement about George’s medicine. Mrs. Kranky’s respectful tone reveals her relationship with her mother to be one of duty and concern, despite Grandma’s bitter and manipulative attitude. Only after Grandma’s disappearance does Mrs. Kranky admit how hurtful Grandma was. Mrs. Kranky’s sense of family duty, while admirable, facilitates and enables Grandma’s dominance.

“Ha-ha! So that’s your little game, is it! You look after yourself all right, don’t you! You make quite sure you’ve got a nice cup of morning tea! But you didn’t think to bring one to your poor old grandma! I always knew you were a selfish pig!”

When Grandma spots the cup of medicine in George’s hand, she mistakes it for tea and accuses him of selfishly forgetting to take care of her. Perhaps out of habit, Grandma characterizes herself as a “poor old” woman even though she is now surprisingly spry. In so doing, and in using her newfound strength to forcefully take the cup of medicine from George, Grandma reveals the selfishness she attributes to George in herself.

“‘Drink it up, Grandma,’ Mr. Kranky said, grinning hugely. ‘Lovely tea.’”

Mr. Kranky takes obvious pleasure in seeing Grandma take an excessive dose of George’s medicine. His attitude toward Grandma is one of contempt, and her downfall amuses him. Earlier in the story, he favored merely neglecting Grandma by leaving her caught in the roof, but here he intervenes to spite her. His attitude toward Grandma questions the limits of family loyalty.

“Grandma’s tiny face still bore the same foul and furious expression it had always had. Her eyes, no bigger now than little keyholes, were blazing with anger.”

Moments before Grandma vanishes completely, her attitude remains unchanged. Throughout the story, her changes in size and fitness accompany changes in power. Grandma’s arc reveals her as a stubbornly antagonistic character regardless of her condition. Perhaps knowing more of her history would make her sympathetic, but no hint of her past is given, leaving Grandma as a uniformly negative presence throughout the story.

“‘How do I stop her getting smaller still?’ ‘You can’t,’ said Mr. Kranky. ‘She’s had fifty times the right amount.’ ‘I must stop her!’ Mrs. Kranky wailed.”

Mrs. Kranky watches helplessly as Grandma shrinks, then vanishes. Her inability to stop Grandma from shrinking mirrors her inability to change Grandma’s characteristics and behaviors, just as George was unable to change Grandma, other than physically. Mr. Kranky’s reminder that Grandma took too large a dose of medicine emphasizes the inevitability of Grandma’s trajectory, morally as well as physically.

“‘That’s what happens to you if you’re grumpy and bad-tempered,’ said Mr. Kranky. ‘Great medicine of yours, George.’”

Mr. Kranky is quick to pronounce a moral of the story following Grandma’s disappearance. His words imply that Grandma’s downfall was the natural result of her characteristics and behavior. Grandma’s physical disappearance is quickly followed by her disappearance from the minds and hearts of her family members, who do not mourn her loss. In the long run, Grandma’s selfishness, rather than making her more important or significant, has the opposite effect, contributing to her erasure.

“For a few minutes, Mrs. Kranky kept wandering around with a puzzled look on her face, […] But she calmed down quite quickly. And by lunchtime, she was saying, ‘Ah well, I suppose it’s all for the best, really. She was a bit of a nuisance around the house, wasn’t she?’”

Mrs. Kranky’s initial reaction to Grandma’s disappearance is one of confusion rather than sorrow, highlighting that her devotion to her mother was based more on habit and social expectation than genuine emotion. Within a few hours, she accepts Mr. Kranky’s view of Grandma’s fate as a fortunate outcome. This seems to justify Mr. Kranky’s view that George and Mrs. Kranky were too tolerant of Grandma’s hateful behavior up to that point.