James And The Giant Peach

The hole turns out to be the entrance to a tunnel, heading into the heart of the peach. James crawls up the tunnel, taking bites of juicy peach along the way until he reaches the stone, which has a small door cut into it. James pushes the door open and crawls through. He is immediately greeted by two voices that exclaim, “look who’s here!” and “we’ve been waiting for you!” (31) says the other. Terrified, James stares at the creatures who are speaking to him. A grasshopper as large as “a large dog”, a huge spider, and a giant ladybug “with nine black spots on her scarlet shell” (33) are sitting on grandiose chairs and a huge centipede and earthworm are curled up comfortably on a sofa. In the corner, fast asleep is a large silkworm.

To James, these boy-sized insects are “terrifying to behold” (34), and to make matters worse, the spider announces that she is hungry while staring at James. The other insects chime in that they are “famished” too, and they all look at James who is too frightened to move or speak. When it dawns on the insects that James thinks they want to eat him, they all burst out laughing and Ladybug explains “We wouldn't dream of hurting you. You are one of us now, didn't you know that? You are one of the crew” (35). The grasshopper, Old-Green-Grasshopper, tells James that they’ve been waiting for him, and Centipede kindly asks James to help him take off his many boots.

As James helps Centipede take of his many boots, his fear fades as he realizes that he is in the company of some friendly, jovial, albeit very unusual insects. Earthworm pokes fun at Centipede for bragging about his many legs when he only has 42 (not 100), and Centipede teases Earthworm for being a “slitherer”. Centipede grins as Ladybug tells James that Centipede is proud of being a “pest,” and James can tell that, despite the bickering, these insects are close and care for each other. Once Centipede finishes bragging about being a “marvelous colossal” creature, he explains to James what happened in the garden. As James suspected, the crocodile tongues burrowed into the peach tree and were eaten by the insects he is sitting and chatting with.

After many jokes and hysterical laughter by Centipede when Ladybug tells him to “stop pulling Earthworm’s leg” (38), Old-Green-Grasshopper says it’s time for bed. James feels happy, realizing that he has not heard laughter for a very long time. Spider spins beautiful, soft, hanging beds for everyone. James finishes unlacing and removing all of Centipede’s boots and climbs into his comfortable hammock. Centipede calls “lights out” (40) to the Glowworm hanging from the ceiling, startling James who hadn’t noticed her there. Glow-worm is already asleep, so Centipede throws one of his boots at her to wake her up and put out her light. She wakes up and sees James, smiles, and says “Welcome, my dear boy, welcome—and good night” (42). James lies in the dark, trying to process the incredible things that happened. He decides that he likes his new friends a lot, and that they are “not nearly as terrible as they look” (43). He whispers goodnight to them and falls asleep.