The Candy Country (1885)

AUTHOR: Alcott, Louisa May
PUBLICATION:  Lulu's Library, Vol. 1. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1890 [1885]. 36-63.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40682/40682-h/40682-h.html#the-candy-country
https://archive.org/details/luluslibrary00alcogoog/page/n42/mode/1up

This story operates as a moral and ethical allegory to promote the veg*n dietary regime devised by Sylvester Graham (explicit reference is made to "Graham bread") and to condemn the eating of other living beings. As in other of her writings for children, Alcott advocates for a moderate and healthy dietary regime, which is predominantly vegetarian and conforms to broad Temperance principles.  In this story, the protagonist's delight in tormenting small creatures and eating (or simply killing) the candy-people who "look like real people" (38) represents an allegorical commentary on the evils of carnist behavior. The conclusion of the narrative underlines this thematic, when Lily reforms her behavior under the influence of a diet structured along Grahamite lines. Thus, the narrative allegory works to dramatize the connection between dietary consumption and ethical conduct.

KEYWORDS: food and diet, carnism, animal welfare, moral education, reform

In “The Candy Country,” a blast of wind transports the protagonist Lily into a parallel world, the titular Candy Country. Interestingly, this happens at the precise moment when the narrator explains that Lily enjoys throwing stones at turtles for sport: “She got on very well till she came to the bridge and stopped to look over the railing at the water running by so fast, and the turtles sunning themselves on the rocks. Lily was fond of throwing stones at them; it was so funny to watch them tumble, heels over head, splash into the water” (37). Lily's lack of empathy with her fellow beings returns in a different context later.

In the Candy Country everything, including its inhabitants, is made out of sugar, candy, chocolate, and all kinds of sweets. Lily does not hesitate to consume the candy-people: “The dear babies melted in her mouth, and the delicately flavored young ladies she was very fond of” (42). This stark image of cannibalism by proxy makes clear that an indulgent diet is dangerous to health -- one has to be careful to evade “the clutches of Giant Dyspepsia” (49) -- but above all the narrative insists upon the moral danger of treating the world as if it were composed entirely of objects for human consumption:

But by and by, when she had seen everything, and eaten so much sweet stuff that at last she longed for plain bread and butter, she began to get cross, as children always do when they live on candy; and the little people wished she would go away, for they were afraid of her. No wonder, when she would catch up a dear sugar baby and eat him, or break some respectable old grandmamma all into bits because she reproved her for naughty ways. Lily calmly sat down on the biggest church, crushing it flat, and even tried to poke the moon out of the sky in a pet one day. The king ordered her to go home; but she said, "I won't!" and bit his head off, crown and all (44-45).

Eventually, Lily leaves the Candy Country. After passing through lands inhabited by gingerbread men she arrives in “the blessed land of bread” (49), where “[t]he children were very bright; for they were fed on the best kinds of oatmeal and Graham bread, with very little white bread or hot cakes to spoil their young stomachs” (59). Here, Lily is served “the best bread and milk for dinner that she ever tasted” (59-60). She attends school, getting a proper education in healthy baking, staying until she “had made the perfect loaf” (62). When she has learned the trade and, one should add, her lesson, Lily returns home and becomes “a nice little housekeeper,” having grown “from a sickly, fretful child into a fine, strong woman” (63). While the story focuses on the detrimental effects of “cake and candy” (63), it also makes clear that a proper diet, consisting of “good plain food” (60), produces both good health and good moral conduct.

 

Last updated on February 10th, 2024

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