In C. S. Lewis's series of children's books, The Chronicles of Narnia, the depictions of food evoke nostalgia for the simple pleasures missing during post-World War II rationing in the United Kingdom, and act as a symbol of positive or negative spiritual nourishment. Lewis himself wrote in his essay "On Three Ways of Writing for Children": "I myself like eating and drinking, I put in what I would have liked to read when I was a child and what I still like reading now that I am in my fifties."
Context
Lewis began writing the first book in the series, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, in 1939, inspired by the London evacuees staying at his Oxford home. He completed the book in the late 1940s, during the period of post-war rationing in the United Kingdom, when strict control of food made even simple items such as bread, potatoes, or tea seem valuable. The Narnia books elevate the value of "good ordinary food," such as the tea, fish, and potatoes provided by the Beavers to the children. According to James Herbert Brennan, "the first sense you get in Narnia about Lewis's attitude toward food is an air of profound nostalgia for the lost paradise of a varied, ample diet, and a willingness to wallow in the nostalgia somewhat."
Themes
Enchanted and Wholesome Foods
Lewis draws a contrast between "bad magic" and "good ordinary" food. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the narrator comments on Edmund's inability to enjoy the Beavers' tea: "There's nothing that spoils the taste of good ordinary food half so much as the memory of bad magic food." In The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the wholesome meal Lucy eats with Corakin the Magician—"an omelette, piping hot, cold lamb and green peas, a strawberry ice, lemon-squash to drink with the meal and cup of chocolate to follow"—immediately follows her discovery that he is a good magician, not an evil one.
Tea
The prevalence of meals, especially tea, in the Narnia Chronicles is a trope of British children's literature. When Lucy first steps through the wardrobe, she is invited to "a wonderful tea" by Mr. Tumnus the faun, who serves her "a nice brown egg...sardines on toast, and then buttered toast, and then toast with honey, and then a sugar topped-cake." This classic middle-class British tea would have been out of reach for Lucy, who escapes to Narnia in the midst of the war. The children are also served a hot tea by talking beavers with "a great and gloriously sticky marmalade roll, steaming hot." When pursued by the White Witch on Christmas Morning, Father Christmas appears with a pot of tea, and the beavers prepare sliced ham sandwiches for the children.
Turkish Delight
In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Edmund accepts a "very sweet and foamy and creamy" drink from the White Witch, followed by "several pounds of the best Turkish Delight." The sweet was a rare luxury in post-war Britain, and its inclusion has become iconic. The release of the 2005 film adaptation corresponded with a jump in Turkish Delight sales.
The significance of the Turkish Delight has been debated. Some interpret it as a representation of uncontrollable desire or greed: the Turkish Delight is said to be enchanted so that anyone who eats it "would want more and more of it, and would even, if they were allowed, go on eating it till they killed themselves." Mary Werner compares it to the fruit in Christina Rossetti's Goblin Market. Michael Ward, however, has argued that the Turkish Delight itself is secondary to the real temptation: the White Witch's promise to make Edmund King.
Food as Temptation
The motif of food in Narnia has been considered by some scholars to suggest the value of pleasure, indulgence, and celebration even as it also suggests its role in temptation. Food is a common motif in fairy tales, where it is sometimes associated with famine, danger, and temptation. Mary Werner has argued that Christina Rossetti's lavish depiction of fruit in Goblin Market may have influenced Lewis's portrayal of food as temptation in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
