Why Were C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien Frenemies?!
Part-Time Genius
iHeartPodcasts and Kaleidoscope
4.5 • 2K Ratings
🗓️ 9 December 2025
⏱️ 36 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This year marks the 75th anniversary of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, so Will and Mango are uncovering some seriously surprising stories about author C.S. Lewis. Did you know he was famous for his terrible fashion… but also his financial generosity? Or that he almost converted to Hinduism for reasons that involve soup? And that he had a long, complicated frenemy-ship with J.R.R. Tolkien, which led to the two authors hating on a Disney movie together? Well, you will after this episode!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.3 | Guaranteed human. |
| 0:18.5 | You're listening to Part-Time Genius, |
| 0:23.4 | the production of Collidoscope and IHeart Radio. |
| 0:28.8 | Guess what, Will? |
| 0:29.9 | What's that, Mingo? |
| 0:34.7 | So, did you know that Turkish delight is a real type of candy? |
| 0:37.1 | Like the stuff from the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe? Yeah, I don't know about you, but I didn't try Turkish delight until I was in my 30s. And from the time I read that book to the time I was an adult, I thought it had to be the most delicious thing in the world, just the way that, like, that character Edmund craves it and he like basically sells out his family for it. |
| 0:55.5 | Yeah, absolutely. |
| 0:56.2 | I mean, the word delight is in the name. |
| 0:57.8 | So you figure it must be good. |
| 0:59.0 | But, |
| 0:59.1 | but actually what is it? |
| 1:00.6 | It was kind of a precursor to the jelly bean. |
| 1:03.4 | So if you imagine like no candy shell, |
| 1:05.9 | but that sweet gummy stuff inside, |
| 1:08.1 | that's actually what Turkish delight is. |
| 1:09.8 | And it can be flavored like |
| 1:11.0 | rosewater or citrus, and it's really tasty. It's not to have originated in Turkey during |
| 1:17.0 | the 1700s, and that's obviously why it has its name. I feel like that's such a part-time |
| 1:21.5 | genius phrase to say it was the precursor of the jelly bean. I don't think you hear that on many other |
| 1:25.9 | shows, but, you know, I actually, |
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