The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

One of the “seven deadly sins,” gluttony is a danger and temptation in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. When the Witch first meets Edmund Pevensie, she plies him with enchanted Turkish delight in order to mine him for information on his siblings and convince him to bring his brother and sisters to meet her. It is important to note that the spellbound sweets do not bewitch Edmund to behave without knowledge of his actions; they simply make thoughts of anything else almost irrelevant in comparison to obtaining more of the charmed candies. Edmund succumbs to temptation but acts of his own free will. The boy’s only thought is “trying to shovel down as much Turkish Delight as he could, and the more he ate the more he wanted to eat, and he never asked himself why the Witch should be so inquisitive” (43).

Edmund’s freedom to choose to eat the Turkish delight recalls the Christian creation story, in which Eve succumbs to eating the forbidden apple and opens the door to sin. Like Eve, Edmund does not intend to sin at first—only to taste the food he desires and indulge his sensual pleasure. Edmund’s gluttony and greed for the Turkish delight act as stepping stones toward his greater sin—betraying his siblings to the Witch. Even when Edmund realizes the Witch is evil, “[H]e still want[s] to taste that Turkish Delight again more than he want[s] anything else” (49). Edmund’s desire for Turkish Delight also symbolizes his craving for luxuries and power: “He did want Turkish delight and to be a Prince (and later a King)” (99). The possessions and earthly powers of a king are an extension of the limited enjoyment the Turkish delight provides; Edmund sees both the sweets and kingship as a means to physically indulge himself. The fact that Edmund does not acknowledge the many qualities a king needs, such as the courage, compassion, and wisdom that Aslan possesses, shows his immaturity and small-mindedness.

Not only does greed for the Turkish delight drive Edmund to betray his siblings, but it also deprives him of appreciating any of the nutritious food his siblings enjoy. At the Beavers’ home, the children share in a delicious and hearty meal that they jointly prepare with care, but Edmund can’t enjoy the dinner because “he was thinking all the time about Turkish Delight—and there’s nothing that spoils the taste of good ordinary food half so much as the memory of bad magic food” (98). Gluttony for the Witch’s “bad magic food” therefore begins to starve Edmund of the type of food his body needs to grow and develop. Edmund’s pursuit of the Turkish delight also stops him from enjoying the Beavers’ stories and his siblings’ company or appreciating what he already has; thus, gluttony has the potential to stunt both Edmund’s physical and emotional growth. Lewis goes further, revealing that the Witch knows that anyone who tastes the Turkish delight “would want more and more of it, and would even, if they were allowed, go on eating it till they killed themselves” (44). The sin of gluttony is actively poisoning Edmund from the inside, both body and soul, in a way that evokes the conceptual link between death and sin in Christian belief.