Stanley
Yelnats and the members of his family blame their bad luck and misfortune on their
"no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather." According to Stanley's
family history, his great-great-grandfather, Elya Yelnats, once "stole" a pig from an
old woman in his town, and as a result, she cursed Elya along with all of his descendants.
Because of this family legend, whenever something goes awry in the Yelnats family, they all
blame Elya for their problems.
Later in the story, the audience learns that,
when Elya Yelnats was very young, he fell in love with an attractive (but empty-headed girl)
girl: Myra Menke. When Elya sought her hand in marriage, another man had already approached her
father asking for her hand. So Myra's father requested both men to give him a pig, declaring
that whoever had the fattest pig could therefore have his daughter. Elya knew that he had no
chance of bringing Myra's father a fatter pig than Igor Barkov, so he solicits advice and help
from one of his friendsan old woman named Madame Zeroni.
After trying to
dissuade him from his choice of bride, Madame Zeroni proceeded to give Elya a little piglet,
instructing him to carry the pig every day to the top of a mountain where the water flows
upstream. She told him that if he sang a special song to the pig while it drank, it would become
very large. She promised that, by the day of Myra's fifteenth birthday (when he and Igor would
need to present their pigs), Elya's pig would be bigger than Igor's, and Elya would win Myra's
hand in marriage.
However, Madame Zeroni also instructed Elya that he needed
carry her up the mountain and sing to her as she drank from the stream in
exchange for her help and the pig. Unfortunately, Elya forgets his end of the bargain, and he
leaves Latvia (after deciding that Myra is not worth marrying) without carrying Madame Zeroni up
the mountain.
And ever since Elya ignored Madame Zeroni's instructions, his
family has suffered an incredible streak of terrible luck (culminating in the events that land
Stanley at Camp Green Lake), leading them to attribute all of this bad luck to Madame Zeroni's
curse. It is only after Stanley carries Zero, Madame Zeroni's descendant, to the top of God's
Thumb while singing to him that the long-standing family curse is broken.
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