Calormenes Smell of Garlic and Onion?

jasmine tarkheena

jasmine tarkheena

Active member
This may sound random, but there's an implication that Calormenes smell of garlic and onion.

Then the dark men came round them in a thick crowd, smelling of garlic and onions, their white eyes flashing dreadfully in their brown faces.
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Some might find the line a big offensive. There's been debate about that the depiction of the Calormenes was racist. Well, when I read the series as a ten year old, I actually didn't really think about the racist aspect.

How is that Calormenes smell of garlic and onion? Was onion and garlic part of their diet or something?
 
Interestingly, in some Hindu and Buddhist beliefs, eating garlic and onions is forbidden. I wonder if Lewis knew about that and added it for some interesting reason. Or maybe he just didn't like the smell of onions and garlic and had issues with others who ate it a lot.

Personally, I love both of them, not minding eating onions raw and adding garlic powder to my dinner as one might use salt.
 
It's just a descriptive thing - a thing people from cultures (such as the UK) that don't eat a lot of those notice about people from countries that do. I do think that Lewis's descriptions often reflect the time he was living and some of them might not be appropriate if expressed in the same ways today, but I don't think noticing differences between people of different cultures and ethnicities is inherently racist. Or is it also sexist to notice whether someone is male or female?

Peeps
 
Susan turned down Rabadash not because he was a Calormene; it was that he was a "cruel, luxurious, and self-pleasing tyrant", let alone that he eats garlic and onions.

"Yet when he was with us in Narnia, truly this Prince bore himself in another fashion than he does now in Tashbaan. For I take you all to witness what marvelous feats he did in that great tournament and hastily which our brother the High King made for him, and how meekly and courteously he consorted with us the space of seven days. But here, in his own city, he eats GARLIC and ONIONS."
 
I believe there is an inherent falability involved in looking into texts outside our generation and attempting to "figure out" what their motives and virtues or vices may have been.
I feel we are ill equipped. Our thoughts and values, mores and beliefs have been shaped by our time; good, bad, or indifferent, as were theirs.

We see things through the filter of our present understanding. But was that understanding the same 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 200?

I don't find it fair or neccessary. What we may, or may not, consider wildly racist in 2023 may have been a complete nonentity in 1945. Whether it was right or wrong , good or bad is for history to reflect on and learn from if we can, but with a grain of salt and a barrel of humility because what we can't do is know the intentions of men's hearts beside our own. Do you think Lewis, if born and raised in our time would have written it that way? Possibly not, we can never know. Do you think he treated his fellow man with dignity and respect in his own day? I would guess yes, but it would still be as much guess work as the guy who guesses no. So many things change so fast: technology, travel, culture, music, it all effects our understanding.

There is only one incontrovertible truth which hasn't changed through the generations and that's not the issue on the table. So picking apart elements of writing from a man who wrote during an era I can only read about but never fully understand doesn't interest me. No matter how many books I read on that time, I will never have lived it, so my understanding will always be colored by my own experiences and the society in which i was brought up. No matter how much I learn about and try to understand the past I am a child of the present and it informs my very thoughts and filters. We all are.

The question is, does it bother you? What do you think of Lewis's character based on these things and does it matter to you? If it's an issue, don't read it. He's just a guy who wrote some books!😆
If it doesn't, enjoy!
 
Bottom line: He does not feel people have the right to be offended by weaponizing his breath. In other words, clean and tidy is for peasants that have a head to chop off and want the pleasure indefinitely postponed.
 
The bitter, envious Phillip Pullman seriously wanted it to be true that Mister Lewis was a racist. He ignored the fact that Lewis depicted EUROPEAN-descended Telmarines as villains BEFORE he depicted darker-skinned Calormenes as villains.
 
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