Everyone laughs at something, or someone, though not necessarily the same things or ones. Humour is notoriously culture-specific and often does not translate across ethnic, religious, linguistic and other borders, even those of taste. 

On the other hand, global storying is full of tricksters and funsters who carry out a remarkably similar set of pranks, japes and general mischief. 

Often, these are designed to puncture the pretensions of the high and mighty, to ridicule the rich and to take the pompous down a peg or two.

Others revolve around the most basic common denominator of bodily functions. A Korean story of a character called ‘General Pumpkin’ belongs to a group of stories concerned with titanic farts, a theme that also appears in German tradition and in the 1001 Nights.

General Pumpkin

The son of a rich man eats nothing but pumpkins. Fields of them. So greedy for pumpkins was the boy that he eventually bankrupted his family. He was not popular in his home village because his gluttonous pumpkin consumption made him fart loudly, frequently and with overpowering odour. When they could no longer stand the stink, they turned the boy out of their village.

The boy wandered from village to village, working frequently because he was so big and string from eating pumpkins and because he only wanted to be paid in pumpkins. But after a few days he always lost these jobs because his titanic farting was too much for everyone to bear.

One day he arrived at a famous and wealthy temple, high up in the mountains. The Abbot saw the large boy and thought that he would be able to help the monks deal with the robbers who were harassing the temple. The robber leader would disguise himself as a traveller and stay at the temple so that he could let his band of brigands in during the night. This had been going on for some time and the monks were sick of losing their property. 

So, the Abbott quickly invited the boy inside and asked him what he liked to eat. The monks happily cooked the enormous amount of pumpkins the gluttonous boy demanded, then asked for his help. That night, the robber chief again entered the temple with his usual intention of letting his men inside. He was curious about the many pumpkins he saw and was told that a ‘General Pumpkin’ was staying at the monastery. The robber asked how many men the General had and was told that he was alone and would eat all the pumpkins himself. The robber decided to hold off letting his men into the buildings while he waited to witness this startling sight.

Meanwhile, General Pumpkin told the monks to take their drums to every corner of the monastery and hide until midnight. As the robber chief waited, inside the monastery and his men massed outside the walls, a sudden rumble thundered through the premises filling the air with a dreadful stench. General Pumpkin had farted. The monks pounded on their drums and at the same time, a great wind sprang up and blew down the monastery walls, killing the robber chief and all his men.

The Abbott and the monks were grateful, despite the stink, and allowed General Pumpkin to live at the monastery and supplied him with as many pumpkins as he wanted. He lived there for many years and in old age was asked to help three rich young brothers rid their family of a white tiger that has killed their father. In the process of helping, General Pumpkin accidentally let go one of his great farts, killing the tiger. Unfortunately, so explosive was the fart that it killed him as well. The three brothers found his remains in a pool of shit. They gave him a fitting burial and mourned him as they did their father.^[i]

General Pumpkin’s humorous gluttony is put to good purpose, though eventually ends his life. The incongruous nature of the story is found in many other forms of folk humour. 

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^[i] Retold from Zong In-Sob, Folk Tales from Korea (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., 1952), no. 36, pp. 66-68, who apparently had the story from an earlier collection published in Seoul in 1925. Several other versions on the internet.