Editing 1980: Turkish Delight

Jump to: navigation, search

Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.

The edit can be undone. Please check the comparison below to verify that this is what you want to do, and then save the changes below to finish undoing the edit.
Latest revision Your text
Line 8: Line 8:
  
 
==Explanation==
 
==Explanation==
 +
{{incomplete|Created by A DELIGHTFUL TURK- I guess we could expand the second paragraph? But I don't know what to add... Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
 +
 
''{{w|The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe}}'' is a fantasy novel by British novelist {{w|C. S. Lewis}}, the first published and best known of seven novels in ''{{w|The Chronicles of Narnia}}''. In it, a group of four sibling children discover another world called Narnia. At the beginning of the story, the land is in a perpetual winter caused by the {{w|White Witch}} (the antagonist of the story). One of the children, {{w|Edmund Pevensie}}, is approached by the White Witch and offered {{w|Turkish delight}}, a type of confection, in exchange for leading the other children to her.  What the book says and what the movie leaves out is he doesn't know the sweets are enchanted by the White Witch to make the eater want them the more they eat them.  Not a full mind control, but more of a strong urge to get more.
 
''{{w|The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe}}'' is a fantasy novel by British novelist {{w|C. S. Lewis}}, the first published and best known of seven novels in ''{{w|The Chronicles of Narnia}}''. In it, a group of four sibling children discover another world called Narnia. At the beginning of the story, the land is in a perpetual winter caused by the {{w|White Witch}} (the antagonist of the story). One of the children, {{w|Edmund Pevensie}}, is approached by the White Witch and offered {{w|Turkish delight}}, a type of confection, in exchange for leading the other children to her.  What the book says and what the movie leaves out is he doesn't know the sweets are enchanted by the White Witch to make the eater want them the more they eat them.  Not a full mind control, but more of a strong urge to get more.
  
−
Turkish delight is very different from typical confections found in the modern Western world and isn't very popular in the United States. The primary flavoring agent of Turkish Delights, rosewater, has a strong perfume-like taste and is generally considered an acquired taste for western palates. [[Randall]], who has made comics about [[388: Fuck Grapefruit|being unimpressed by food]] in the past, comments that he was very disappointed when he tried Turkish delight, especially after having read in the novel about how delicious the characters considered it. If he were in Edmund's shoes, he would not have been persuaded.
+
Turkish delight is very different from typical confections found in the modern Western world and isn't very popular in the United States. [[Randall]] comments that he was very disappointed when he tried Turkish delight, after having read in the novel about how delicious the characters considered it. If he were in Edmund's shoes, he would not have been persuaded.
 +
 
 +
[http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2005/12/the_lion_the_witch_and_the_really_foul_candy.html It is not uncommon for present-day Narnia fans to be disappointed when they try Turkish delight], as different as it is to modern confections. However, in the late Victorian era when Lewis grew up, [https://www.tor.com/2016/08/08/why-was-turkish-delight-the-ultimate-temptation-in-c-s-lewis-narnia/ Turkish delight was very popular in England].  Because it was nearly impossible for local confectioners to make properly, it had to be imported from Turkey, at great expense, making it a status symbol for the wealthy and a rare treat for those with less money. When Lewis wanted to come up with the perfect temptation for Edmund, he drew on his own childhood memories of a favorite rare and expensive treat--which would have been even harder to come by because of [https://flashbak.com/sugar-rationing-in-world-war-2-photos-13598/ sugar rationing during World War II], when the story was written.  
  
−
[http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2005/12/the_lion_the_witch_and_the_really_foul_candy.html It is not uncommon for present-day Narnia fans to be disappointed when they try Turkish delight], as different as it is to modern confections. However, in the late Victorian era when Lewis grew up, [https://www.tor.com/2016/08/08/why-was-turkish-delight-the-ultimate-temptation-in-c-s-lewis-narnia/ Turkish delight was very popular in England].  Because it was nearly impossible for local confectioners to make properly, it had to be imported from Turkey, at great expense, making it a status symbol for the wealthy and a rare treat for those with less money. When Lewis wanted to come up with the perfect temptation for Edmund, he drew on his own childhood memories of a favorite rare and expensive treat--which would have been even harder to come by because of [https://flashbak.com/sugar-rationing-in-world-war-2-photos-13598/ sugar rationing during World War II], when the story was set. It also serves to emphasize how powerful the White Witch is for her to be able to offer such an expensive and hard-to-obtain treat so easily.
+
{{w|Cinnabon}} (referenced in the title text) is a popular chain restaurant in the USA which serves mostly {{w|cinnamon roll|cinnamon buns}} covered in a thick, sugary glaze. The chain is not well known in Britain, but has recently opened a [https://www.cinnabon.co.uk/store-locator/ few restaurants], mainly in the London area. (A more common UK equivalent of the cinnamon bun is the {{w|Chelsea bun}}.) There are presumably no branches of Cinnabon in Narnia.{{Citation needed}}
  
−
{{w|Cinnabon}} (referenced in the title text) is a popular chain restaurant in the USA which serves mostly {{w|cinnamon roll|cinnamon buns}} covered in a thick, sugary glaze. The chain is not well known in Britain, but has recently opened a [https://www.cinnabon.co.uk/store-locator/ few restaurants], mainly in the London area. (A more common UK equivalent of the cinnamon bun is the {{w|Chelsea bun}}.) There are presumably no branches of Cinnabon in Narnia.{{Citation needed}} Randall is saying that he finds cinnamon buns delicious, to the point where he would betray anyone for them. It should be noted that, in the books, it was Edmund who requested the Turkish Delight, implying that they're his favorite treat. Thus, had it been Randall instead of Edmund, he very well could have requested cinnabons.
+
A prescriptivist might claim that the title text contains a grammatical mistake: the word should be "whomever," as that is the objective case. However, a descriptivist would point out that many dialects no longer maintain this distinction except in highly formal contexts.
  
 
==Transcript==
 
==Transcript==
−
:[A person wearing a cap, a fur coat, and gloves sits in a sled handing over a plate with small cubic pieces on it to a small boy with dark hair standing beneath. The boy reaches one hand to the plate.]
+
:[A person wearing a cap, a fur coat, and gloves sits in a sled handing over a plate with small cubic pieces on it to a small boy with dark hair standing beneath. The boy's reaches one hand to the plate.]
−
:Person in the sled: Have some Turkish delight. If you betray your family, there's more where that came from.
+
:Person from the sled: Have some Turkish delight. If you betray your family, there's more where that came from.
  
 
:[The boy tastes one piece.]
 
:[The boy tastes one piece.]
Line 26: Line 30:
 
:[The boy looks up, to the direction where the gift came from, the piece still in his hands.]
 
:[The boy looks up, to the direction where the gift came from, the piece still in his hands.]
 
:Boy: Wow.
 
:Boy: Wow.
−
:Boy: This is ... not great.
+
:Boy: This is...
 +
:Boy: not great.
  
 
:[Caption below:]
 
:[Caption below:]
Line 32: Line 37:
  
 
==Trivia==
 
==Trivia==
−
*The world of Narnia is a recurring theme in [[xkcd]], with previous prominent appearances in [[665: Prudence]], [[821: Five-Minute Comics: Part 3]], [[969: Delta-P]], and [[1786: Trash]]. The forests in [[442: xkcd Loves the Discovery Channel]] panel 21 and [[269: TCMP]] may also be references to Narnia, namely, the Wood Between the Worlds in {{w|The Magician's Nephew}}.
+
*The world of Narnia is a recurring theme in [[xkcd]], with previous prominent appearances in [[665: Prudence]], [[821: Five-Minute Comics: Part 3]], [[969: Delta-P]], and [[1786: Trash]].
−
*Randall has previously expressed disappointment when the taste of a food item does not match a promise implicit in its name. If Turkish Delight is not a delight, likewise Red Delicious apples are not delicious, according to [[388: Fuck Grapefruit]] and [[1766: Apple Spectrum]] and a footnote on [https://books.google.com/books?id=tgZIBAAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PA97#v=onepage&q&f=false this What If page].
 
  
 
{{comic discussion}}
 
{{comic discussion}}
 +
[[Category:Fiction]]
 
[[Category:Chronicles of Narnia]]
 
[[Category:Chronicles of Narnia]]
−
[[Category:Food]]
 

Please note that all contributions to explain xkcd may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here.
You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see explain xkcd:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission!

To protect the wiki against automated edit spam, we kindly ask you to solve the following CAPTCHA:

Cancel | Editing help (opens in new window)

Templates used on this page:

Retrieved from "https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1980:_Turkish_Delight"